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Fire History


Asphalt

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3 hours ago, Asphalt said:

Compiling a list of reported EUC fires and burned control boards.

Really cool initiative, thank you!
We can clearly see which manufacturer needs to improve the most, nice to see a clear summary in which this stands out.
 

3 hours ago, RagingGrandpa said:

The consequences of a board failure, compared to a battery fire, are insignificant.

Both types are pretty bad. I'd like to avoid a battery fire as much as a burnt control board, or any other type of control board failure while I'm on the wheel! And I'm not talking about extreme testing like Marty's Overheat Hill runs, just regular use.

A board failure (even without burning) leading to a cutoff while I'm riding at 50 km/h is far from insignificant. I could argue that board failures could lead to serious injury (on me and others as well), versus property damage in case of battery fire. At worst in either case you could end up buying the farm.

It would be nice to have a more complete breakdown of failures, organized by failure type, yes. But this is a good start.

Edited by Patrick Robert
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On 5/20/2021 at 11:43 AM, GothamMike said:

Another Gotway/Begode fire

 

Brand New! WTF is going on with Gotway?

OMG!!!  WTF IS.GOING WITH QC AND SAFETY!!!!  GOD KNOWs WE PAY PREMIUM FOR THESE WHEELS!!!!

Edited by Stadler
Mis spelled
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On 5/22/2021 at 11:32 AM, Stadler said:

GOD KNOWs WE PAY PREMIUM FOR THESE WHEELS!!!!

Not really. You'd be paying a premium for these wheels if they were made in the US by say Apple to US safety/quality standards. You are getting them from a Chinese company because you/we don't want to pay a premium for better quality/safety standards. 

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1 hour ago, VikB said:

Not really. You'd be paying a premium for these wheels if they were made in the US by say Apple to US safety/quality standards. You are getting them from a Chinese company because you/we don't want to pay a premium for better quality/safety standards. 

inter-cell coatings exist to prevent thermal runaway - and these are used in industrial applications where batt fires can represent large production losses. until regulatory bodies require such protections (imposed on imports as well) high capacity consumer li-on batts (power tools,ebikes,euc) will continue to present risks to those who fail to store them without fire/smoke mitigation in mind...

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On 1/18/2021 at 11:36 PM, Patrick Robert said:

Both types are pretty bad. I'd like to avoid a battery fire as much as a burnt control board, or any other type of control board failure while I'm on the wheel! And I'm not talking about extreme testing like Marty's Overheat Hill runs, just regular use.

A board failure (even without burning) leading to a cutoff while I'm riding at 50 km/h is far from insignificant. I could argue that board failures could lead to serious injury (on me and others as well), versus property damage in case of battery fire. At worst in either case you could end up buying the farm.

It would be nice to have a more complete breakdown of failures, organized by failure type, yes. But this is a good start.

Which makes me wonder how many burnt battery started as burnt mainboard.

On Gotway/Begode wheels:

  • Burnt motherboard can lead to shorting the battery packs. Gotway packs don't have BMS on their output for maximum throughput. A short can lead to a battery fire.
  • Motherboard fire can start a fire of the packs themselves, because of their physical proximity.

At least for Begode wheels, the recent addition of a fuse should mitigate the very significant risk of fire by shortening the pack on MOSFET failure.

Edited by supercurio
Mentioning addition of fuse recently
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3 hours ago, supercurio said:

Which makes me wonder how many burnt battery started as burnt mainboard.

OK you convince me to add a ANL fuse when I'll add my secondary battery.
However some fire happen while charging (MB not concerned).

Have we an idea of what proportion ?

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4 minutes ago, Camenbert said:

OK you convince me to add a ANL fuse when I'll add my secondary battery.
However some fire happen while charging (MB not concerned).

Have we an idea of what proportion ?

Fuses are a very good idea and a requirement IMHO in case the BMS doesn't have a quick and effective short protection (which some have) :thumbup:

The risk while charging seem fairly low, maybe thanks to the combination of reasonably well calibrated chargers and top-balancing BMS, making it the safer part of the whole process apparently.

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19 hours ago, supercurio said:

On Gotway/Begode wheels:

  • Burnt motherboard can lead to shorting the battery packs.
  • Motherboard fire can start a fire of the packs themselves, because of their physical proximity.

I don't think any of the actual fires fit that description.
All we have is anecdotal evidence of burned up controllers which didn't cause pack fires.

It would have to be a 'fire while riding'; the handful of those that we've seen have been wheels with electrical modifications.

Perhaps the only plausible example was the EUC that burned in a shipping container... if it became powered on in a box, overloaded because of the jammed tire, and exceptionally well insulated in its sealed foam and cardboard box.

15 hours ago, supercurio said:

The risk while charging seem fairly low

No!

An important circumstance to consider is:

  1. Cell becomes internally shorted due to internal defects, or over-discharge.
  2. Damaged cell now conducts current from the remaining cells in series (during use) and in parallel (all the time), and dissipates heat because of this current flow.
  3. Damaged cell or neighboring cells either become depleted (0V), or reach runaway temperature.
  4. Recharging the damaged cell provides a practically unlimited source of energy to generate more heat, and so heating will continue as long as the charger is supplying current. Runaway temperature will be reached if the charger remains connected long enough.

#1-3 are not preventable: there is nothing to stop the pack from being used with a damaged cell present.
Fuses will not help because the current flow is still within the normal operating range.

If #1 is the 'internal defect' problem, it could surface any time the cell is being used- it could be charging, or discharging.

#4 is partially covered by the EUC BMS disabling the charging input if any cell is under-voltage. But this mechanism can fail if the BMS is damaged, especially by water and corrosion.
 

The risk of an indoor fire is highest while charging.

The risk is especially noteworthy for:

  • Brand-new cells and packs
  • Packs that were submerged in water (even if it occurred days or weeks in the past)
  • Packs that show irregular charging behavior (e.g.: won't charge past 90%)

Damage to people and property can be minimized by charging in a safer environment, such as outdoors, or inside a metal cabinet.

 

 

Edited by RagingGrandpa
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Just tried some categorizing in https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-1dcGO7C5yDs4PqLzl9A4Bu6SU9mSjIhJwLoFoASyio/edit?usp=sharing

I hope i got the details right ;)

Fire 14
   
GW 8
KS 2
Ninebot 1
IPS 1
   
Riding 5
Off 5
Transport 2
Charging 3

 

On 5/26/2021 at 8:32 PM, supercurio said:

Burnt motherboard can lead to shorting the battery packs. Gotway packs don't have BMS on their output for maximum throughput. A short can lead to a battery fire.

 

23 hours ago, RagingGrandpa said:

I don't think any of the actual fires fit that description.

There are 5 "potential" cases. With Fire during riding - but these are "only" 3 GW,1 KS and 1 IPS. 1 of the GW was original, one from Loomo Shop modified and from one one does not know?

But could of course be any other case of Weld/BMS/whatever cause.

23 hours ago, RagingGrandpa said:

The risk of an indoor fire is highest while charging.

 

There seem to be more case (at least collected here) without charging - just off. Although at least one case is not 100% clear if it was while charging...

But anyhow most cases reported are with the EUC standing around...

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2 hours ago, GoGeorgeGo said:

The only fire my friend group has experienced was with a nikola+. Its was on a ride but not while riding, the wheel was leaned up against a wall as my friend was smoking a cigarette. It started hissing and smoking so he moved it away from the wall. A couple loud pops (the capacitors blowing we think) a lot of smoke and a ton of damage, definitely a small fire. Luckily the batteries did not go though so the wheel was kinda sorta salvageable. 

Cost him 800$ to get it repaired (even though it was warrantied by ewheels) and he still does not trust the wheel anymore to this day. (This happened back in Novemberish) Not a battery fire but still a fire, and a very traumatized rider who has essentially quit the hobby due to this incident. (Not to mention he was called a liar and shamed and even had his posts deleted about the incident and the way ewheels handled his repair so he really has a bad taste for the entire community and hobby now) He no longer rides for pleasure and wants to sell his machine, but is afraid to sell someone a faulty machine so he is stuck between a rock and a hard place. 

 

PART_1597888429651-1.jpeg

Do you know any other details? Like mileage, year..etc. The board looks old...like a 1st generation, but the battery size looks to be 21700, so I assume this is early 2nd gen Nik+? if that's the case, might want to check if these are Panasonic or LG 21700 as there was a recall last year for the Panasonic cells.

The board has been revised since last year and the beeper location also changed. The new board and fan arrangement looks very similar to the RS now. Temperature alarm has also been increased to 79-80 Celsius vs the 65 before and the heatsink is exposed now as well. Photo below is the new board from Nov last year.

IMG_7989.thumb.jpg.da4fd4eef17b2226513db557e255a932.jpg

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46 minutes ago, conecones said:

Do you know any other details? Like mileage, year..etc. The board looks old...like a 1st generation, but the battery size looks to be 21700, so I assume this is early 2nd gen Nik+? if that's the case, might want to check if these are Panasonic or LG 21700 as there was a recall last year for the Panasonic cells.

The board has been revised since last year and the beeper location also changed. The new board and fan arrangement looks very similar to the RS now. Temperature alarm has also been increased to 79-80 Celsius vs the 65 before and the heatsink is exposed now as well. Photo below is the new board from Nov last year.

IMG_7989.thumb.jpg.da4fd4eef17b2226513db557e255a932.jpg

Yes he had the recalled cells but he had already got the packs swapped long before the incident. It was a fairly early nikola, he had around 1500-2000 miles on it. All the more reason he was so shaken up by the incident. It was a wheel he trusted and had put decent mileage on, no reason really for it to go off like that. 

Edited by GoGeorgeGo
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  • 3 months later...
15 minutes ago, sevin7 said:

"MSP hs charged inside house  to 100% not sitting in hot  car  put wheel in hatch back to meet my friend to ride going down the highway smoke  filled the car  pulled over and put wheel on side of highway then fire  and a few cells exploded ?!? Not crashed not ridden in any wet weather about 2k miles "

"never been opened"

 

Wonder if it stopped burning on its own? Rare for so much of the pack to be left...

Edited by RagingGrandpa
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Seems like not a lot of people want to look at this objectively and just want to discredit brands.

Knowledge is power and knowing causes behind these incidents would be helpful for everyone riding an EUC and worth a lot more than a few simple laughs.

It would be interesting to know what is causing these spontaneous fires, logically it has to be a short happening but why? Is it bad soldering, water, battery instability? Has any of these incidents any post-incident investigation and conclusion?

Someone much knowledgable then me on this forum could probably chime in with a couple of probable causes other than "it's Gotway".

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  • Asphalt changed the title to Fire History

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