Lithium Battery Causing Extreme Fumes When Cut

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• published: 29 Dec 2014
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Holy smokes, these fumes! Chopping a (puffy and worn out) lithium polymer battery that is holding a 75% charge. I was interested in doing this to see what would happen to a pouch type battery when sliced by metal, like it might happen with cells used in a home built electric vehicle. These high power cells with relatively good energy density (120 to 130 Wh/kg) are good enough to power dragsters or hill climbers. But using them one will have to build sturdy enclosures, and most importantly arrange for venting that would allow fumes to escape and not kill the pilot before getting out/being pulled out. Interesting in this context is to see what the voltage does: It's not at all instantly gone, but still lurks for some time before the battery desintegrates enough to make it go to zero. In this case, there's no big fire, but enough smoldering to cause a lot of trouble if this was a large pack. Potentially related: the 2014 crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 might have to do with fumes from damaged lipo batteries, here are some links: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2586308/Missing-jet-WAS-carrying-highly-flammable-lithium-batteries-CEO-Malaysian-Airlines-finally-admits-dangerous-cargo.html http://www.airtrafficmanagement.net/2014/03/lithium-cargo-clue-to-fate-of-mh370/ I'm copying one of my own replies to comments below, to further explain what, and why, I'm doing this: "....doing extreme tests like this is actually a fairly common thing. For example, if you look into the Boeing Dreamliner battery issue, you'll sooner or later run into videos about a company that was on contract for Boeing, testing cells. They tested a lot of cells. And what did they do? Amongst other things, they took a gun and fired at cells, in different positions, size, state of charge, and whatnot. And where did they do that? Right out there in the desert somewhere in Arizona or Nevada (I don't remember exactly where). They would put the battery on a rock, count back a few paces, ready, aim and...poof. Flames, explosions, the whole nine yards. You think that they are the only ones doing tests so cruelly? Nope. Any company incorporating these batteries into something they sell will do such tests, or have somebody else do it for them. I would not put my money on many testers having filters and scrubbers to deal with the fumes. Sad, but reality. And now, why am I doing this? Well, there are many people out there who, like me, use these batteries without ever really seeing what happens... "if". And if you think the "if" could never be something that needs an axe cutting a cell in half, again you'd be wrong. I have seen a bicycle trailer with a sheet metal box and a battery inside that rolled over, collapsed, and partially cut into a lipo pack. Poofed and burned, but no camera was there. Had the guy known what can happen, he might have taken a bit more time to build a sturdier box. Insulate it. Fasten the battery inside. And so on, there's really no end to it. It might all seem wrong to you, but there is a very good reason to do these things. Feel free to buy an electric car down the line a few years from now from a company that never did extreme tests. I won't. I want to know. Even if it's just for my own projects. Ignorance is not bliss."