"Joao Mendes Cabecas, a captain of the nearby port of Hortas, told Reuters that lithium-ion batteries in the electric cars on the Felicity Ace caught fire, but it was unclear whether that is what started the blaze.
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Lithium Batteries? Unconfirmed, but hmmmm....
- Thread starter Christian Williams
- Start date
"Joao Mendes Cabecas, a captain of the nearby port of Hortas, told Reuters that lithium-ion batteries in the electric cars on the Felicity Ace caught fire, but it was unclear whether that is what started the blaze.
We have all heard about cell phones, Chevy volts and even Tesla's catching fire, so yes it undoubtedly does happen.
Plus I doubt I am the only person here whom has had a phone get HOT while charging.
However it usually only happens when they are charging, or get hit hard.
So my feeling is, charge them at a slow rate.
Don't overcharge them.
I feel they are more suited to slow discharge, so I would mainly hook up LED lighting, charge cell phones and small laptops off them.
Plus secure them in a protected location.
And above all, monitor them as much as possible.
If they start getting hot if safe gently disconnect them, wrap them in a protective cloth or bucket. Then carry them to a safe place where they can burn without spreading.
I am definitely not an expert on them, so please don't come chasing after me if you have a negative experience.
Plus I doubt I am the only person here whom has had a phone get HOT while charging.
However it usually only happens when they are charging, or get hit hard.
So my feeling is, charge them at a slow rate.
Don't overcharge them.
I feel they are more suited to slow discharge, so I would mainly hook up LED lighting, charge cell phones and small laptops off them.
Plus secure them in a protected location.
And above all, monitor them as much as possible.
If they start getting hot if safe gently disconnect them, wrap them in a protective cloth or bucket. Then carry them to a safe place where they can burn without spreading.
I am definitely not an expert on them, so please don't come chasing after me if you have a negative experience.
What with all of the potential stored energy in a bunch of electric or hybrid autos I can imagine some risk.
That's one reason that when you ship a petroleum fueled vehicle you have to certify that the fuel tank has only a maximum specified amount of fuel in it. i.e. mostly drained.
That's one reason that when you ship a petroleum fueled vehicle you have to certify that the fuel tank has only a maximum specified amount of fuel in it. i.e. mostly drained.
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Touchrain
Member III
Haven’t taken the jump with my E38 yet, but have installed in a camper I’m building out. The advantages are undeniable. Two-three times the useable output in a third of the weight. Key, as I understand it is to buy the better built ones, which do cost considerably more, but incorporate safeties and match the individual cells to be compatible. Also, you need to invest in proper charging systems designed for them. I’m not sure I could resist when new batteries are needed for Touch Rain, with her 30-year old charging system.
Example of a quality, mid-priced battery. ( the one I used)
Example of a quality, mid-priced battery. ( the one I used)
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Something in this article about “improperly disconnected lithium battery on used car” being a fire starter. I’m not familiar with lithium battery systems, anyone have a good resource for basic learning about them?
gcaptain.com
Car Carrier Felicity Ace Abandoned After Catching Fire in Atlantic Ocean
A car carrier is abandoned and on fire in the North Atlantic near the Azores. All 22 crew members of the M/V Felicity Ace abandoned ship safely and were picked...
gcaptain.com
I've been teaching firefighting of Li-ion and EVs since retiring from the NTSB, where I investigated a number of them in airplanes and cars. I'm also a member of one of the SAE standards committees for Li-Ion battery safety (J2990).
www.HowItBroke.com
There's a mix of thoughts between small batteries and EV batteries, so:
Comment #1. About half of EV fires are evenly divided between those on a charger and those simply parked by themselves.
There are 2-3 portable Li-ion device fires in airliners per WEEK and none of those are on a charger. Vapes are so bad that the Navy banned sailors from having them on warships (not sure ifs still so)
#2 You can't control the rate for most.
#3 Rate of charge and discharge is called the "C" rate. You can start the boat motor forever as long as the battery C rate is sufficient. This would take longer to go thru than I have right now.
#4 Unless you hit a wall with an EV at well over 35 mph (which is the speed of impact testing) the batteries in cars are REALLY hard to damage and I've seen some doozies.
Damage to small devices IS a leading cause of fires. The most common three are dents, vibration damaging the internal layers, and heat. Cold charging will damage them but it's not common and usually just kills the cells.
#5 There's not much to monitor because batteries just sit there till they start to smoke or otherwise go bad. The vast majority just won't charge as a means of death. All I can add is to reiterate about preventing any kind of physical, vibration, or heat damage.
#6 Spot on about what to do. Unplug if on a charger and either drop them in water or put them outside to let them smoke/burn themselves out.
btw - The smoke seems to not be a threat but it is almost always the day AFTER that people go to a clinic for smoke inhalation. Most of the smoke is common carbon monoxide so not much of a threat BUT it also contains (depending on battery chemistry) acetylene, hydrogen, and other flammables; PLUS acids that will lead to fluids collecting in your lungs.
Absolutely right.
Stay with LiFePo4 and you'll be fine.
Avoid anything with Cobalt (Co) in the description.
As for the ship fire, they ought to scuttle it where it is. The darkened exterior paint shows the fire has been through most decks and the smoke will have destroyed the rest of the cargo. It'll be nearly impossible to firefight technically so they're going to need to let it burn out.
As for cause, it looks a LOT like the Stavanger carr park fire, which was subsequently believed to have been started by an older diesel vehicle, which led to igniting the EVs.
No.6 is actually the one thing I personally question,
Although I didn't say it, I would rather see a boat burn than someone getting injured or worst by trying to remove a defective battery.
As for cooling it off in water, I would have never thought of that.
Good idea.
Do you think the ABC fire extinguishers we are all supposed to carry would cool the battery off in a pinch?
Well, I guess they'll be dropping all those cars in water pretty soon.
Torpedo? Gonna be a while till its safe to go aboard, clamber way down, and open seacocks.
Torpedo? Gonna be a while till its safe to go aboard, clamber way down, and open seacocks.
The same applies to cars, airplanes, and boats. Protect the people and let it burn. As soon as the fire starts most belong to the insurance company.
Li-ion needs to be below 130c which makes direct application of water the best way to extinguish.
ABC extinguishers just make a mess and the space harder to breath in. They have no cooling component. Drop a smoking small device overboard. If a main bank, the best thing is to hit it with a hose from the sink, as long as the battery can give water pressure.
When charging small devices at home, throwing an $8 Amazon fiberglass for blanket on will give the ability to direct or control flames and smoke. Could work for a bank also.
Jerry VB
E32-3 / M-25XP
Felicity Ace Sinks in Atlantic Ocean. Massive fire damage.
Although it'll leak bunker fuel for a long time, this is the best outcome.
Tin Kicker knows more about this topic than I do, but I have been doing some reading in this area so I will offer comments to check my understanding:
Suppose you have a 100aH battery and it can accept up to 100amps of charging (the charge acceptance rate is specified by manufacturers when you shop, and controlled by the integral Battery Management System). 100amps charging / 100aH storage is a "C" of 1. Most manufacturers specify a preferred lower amperage C like 0.2 to make the battery last longer (and presumably lower the risk of overheating). One way to achieve this lower rating is to charge that battery via a Battery-to-Battery charger with a ceiling on the # of amps that you are offering up to the battery (like a 20 amp charger for a 100aH battery for a 0.2 offering) Limiting the # of amps "offered for acceptance by the battery" negates the quick charging advantage of the battery. You have to offer those 20 amps for 5 times as long as you would offer 100amps.
Limiting the amps offered by the alternator is a different problem. Alternator regulators manage voltage and they don't know how much amperage is flowing, they know only the total "field value" which I have gathered is something like a percentage of the total. Balmar has a feature that allows a user to set a fractional amount of field "belt load manager" to limit the total amperage flowing out.
Balmar also has battery temp sensors for regulaors that will alert the alternator to decrease electricity production if the battery starts to overheat.
Most of the LifePo4 batteries on the market are explicity NOT starter batteries. Dakota Lithium makes a combo starting/deep cycle battery. I am splitting into separate starter and a house load batteries.
My starter battery will be/is very small with a total storage capacity of only 4aH, but it is capable of offering 500 cranking amps. This is very different from the house-load style of batteries that dominate the LiFePo4 market where the storage capacity in Amp Hours and the maximum draw possible tend to be equivalent (200aH storage ~=~ 200amp draw/charge ability). There is no need for the equivalence of these numbers, hence the battery designer can create a different starter battery to do a different job than the low amp long-duration loads that most house batteries provide.
Informed critiques of my explanation here are welcome.
A discharged battery has an acceptance rate at which it will "absorb" electricity. Lithium batteries have lower internal resistance and thus will accept more electricity faster than comparably-sized lead acid batteries. This is a big advantage for people who want to sail instead of sail-and-run-alternators-for-a-long-time.)
Suppose you have a 100aH battery and it can accept up to 100amps of charging (the charge acceptance rate is specified by manufacturers when you shop, and controlled by the integral Battery Management System). 100amps charging / 100aH storage is a "C" of 1. Most manufacturers specify a preferred lower amperage C like 0.2 to make the battery last longer (and presumably lower the risk of overheating). One way to achieve this lower rating is to charge that battery via a Battery-to-Battery charger with a ceiling on the # of amps that you are offering up to the battery (like a 20 amp charger for a 100aH battery for a 0.2 offering) Limiting the # of amps "offered for acceptance by the battery" negates the quick charging advantage of the battery. You have to offer those 20 amps for 5 times as long as you would offer 100amps.
Limiting the amps offered by the alternator is a different problem. Alternator regulators manage voltage and they don't know how much amperage is flowing, they know only the total "field value" which I have gathered is something like a percentage of the total. Balmar has a feature that allows a user to set a fractional amount of field "belt load manager" to limit the total amperage flowing out.
Balmar also has battery temp sensors for regulaors that will alert the alternator to decrease electricity production if the battery starts to overheat.
Most of the LifePo4 batteries on the market are explicity NOT starter batteries. Dakota Lithium makes a combo starting/deep cycle battery. I am splitting into separate starter and a house load batteries.
My starter battery will be/is very small with a total storage capacity of only 4aH, but it is capable of offering 500 cranking amps. This is very different from the house-load style of batteries that dominate the LiFePo4 market where the storage capacity in Amp Hours and the maximum draw possible tend to be equivalent (200aH storage ~=~ 200amp draw/charge ability). There is no need for the equivalence of these numbers, hence the battery designer can create a different starter battery to do a different job than the low amp long-duration loads that most house batteries provide.
Informed critiques of my explanation here are welcome.
Good comments and no critique needed.
In #2 I was referring to most people not changing the charging system resulting in our boats having pretty anemic charging systems so the charge rate gets limited by the alternator.
On a good day at standard test temp, with full throttle, when new, the stock alternator on an M25 engine should output roughly 52-55A max. But few of us have a new alternator and fewer run their engines at high rpm, especially to charge the battery. This means the lower rpm results in being the limit as can be seen in this plot comparing the stock alternator with a high amp replacement:
(Note that this shows alternator rpm and it spins faster than the engine.)
Further, we don't run our alternators in a test lab at standard day conditions (59F) and raising the alternator temp to around 100C can reduce efficiency by close to 20%. This means that at full throttle a worn alternator which may be capable of 45A (or less) may only put out 36A at full throttle, and correspondingly less at partial throttle. People installing Li-ion house banks usually have 200Ah or more, so the charge rate would max out at .18C (36/200) and less at lower throttle settings with a stock alternator. On the up-side the batteries will have long happy lives.
So your comments were spot-on, I was just referring to the real world.
For #3, you covered it pretty well, including the good idea of using a lead-acid or AGM for the start and a B2B to charge the house. There are other benefits, such as having the lead-based battery be an electrical "shock absorber" to protect the alternator and Li-ion bank from spikes that happen when the starter button is pushed, a windlass is engaged, or other transients hit the system.
In #2 I was referring to most people not changing the charging system resulting in our boats having pretty anemic charging systems so the charge rate gets limited by the alternator.
On a good day at standard test temp, with full throttle, when new, the stock alternator on an M25 engine should output roughly 52-55A max. But few of us have a new alternator and fewer run their engines at high rpm, especially to charge the battery. This means the lower rpm results in being the limit as can be seen in this plot comparing the stock alternator with a high amp replacement:
(Note that this shows alternator rpm and it spins faster than the engine.)
Further, we don't run our alternators in a test lab at standard day conditions (59F) and raising the alternator temp to around 100C can reduce efficiency by close to 20%. This means that at full throttle a worn alternator which may be capable of 45A (or less) may only put out 36A at full throttle, and correspondingly less at partial throttle. People installing Li-ion house banks usually have 200Ah or more, so the charge rate would max out at .18C (36/200) and less at lower throttle settings with a stock alternator. On the up-side the batteries will have long happy lives.
So your comments were spot-on, I was just referring to the real world.
For #3, you covered it pretty well, including the good idea of using a lead-acid or AGM for the start and a B2B to charge the house. There are other benefits, such as having the lead-based battery be an electrical "shock absorber" to protect the alternator and Li-ion bank from spikes that happen when the starter button is pushed, a windlass is engaged, or other transients hit the system.
Understood re: the decreasing performance of older alternators. Figuring out how to take advantage of lithium batteries intelligently and safely on a sailboat has been keeping me up at night the past few weeks. What you describe:
Alternator -----> Lead Acid Starter ------> B2B Charger ------> Lithium House battery
is what I have come to think of as the "RV Style" implementation has voltage absorption advantages you describe and seems to work perfectly well, especially if one is driving a sprinter van, or towing a trailer for a long distance with the alternator operating. Lots of Aussie guys on YouTube building 4x4 rigs for the outback, recommend this way. The B2B charger allows one to mix battery chemistries (where different types of batteries want to be charged with different voltage/amperage parameters). The B2B can take one level of input charging and step the volts up or down.
The other 'paradigm' that seems to be presented for boats frequently (Rodd Collins/Maine Sail, Jeff Cote/Pacific Yacht Systems) is the 'House-First' for the alternator to first service the house battery, (which really where one wants to use lithium) and then Battery-to-Battery the charging of other banks:
Alternator ------>Lithium House Primary Battery ------>B2B Charger -------->Starter or Aux battery
Under most cases I expect the house primary to be the most-discharged battery, and the one I want to be observed and charged by my alternator voltage regulator. I will have an external alternator protector for my alternator to guard against voltage spikes. The "RV Style" would have been simpler. The "house-first" setup allows one to draw in lots and lots of amps if the primary house is substantially depleted (and this can be done quickly with lithium) without throttling through a B2B charger.
Farther along in my design-build process (i.e. now that I have purchased and am installing everything) I have the sense that my battery banks will be so small that I could have bought a big (40 amp?) B2B-charger and stuck with the RV-style and it would have been easier and less complex.
$.02
I would add one more idea to my comment, hopefully for the benefit of someone somewhere down the line:
This is the simplified concept:
Alternator ------>Lithium House Primary Battery ------>B2B Charger -------->Starter or Aux battery
The actual concept is more like:
Alternator -->Unswitched Positive Distribution Post ------>Lithium House Primary Battery
...............................................................................................(and)------->B2B Charger ------->Starter Battery
................................................................................................(and)------->B2B Charger -------> House Auxiliary
I was initially a little confused by the relationship between the first-charged battery and the "downstream" batteries. The 'Primary' battery and the chargers are all 'drinking from the same trough' of alternator-supplied electricity at the unswitched postive post. The B2B's make the Starter and Auxiliary batteries invisible to the primary house battery (so you don't accidentally drain your starter battery via the common positive post). Electricity only flow in the downstream/charging direction.
I had to add the periods to the left of the (and) for Xenforo formatting. Chargers are connected at the same post as the House Primary.
This is the simplified concept:
Alternator ------>Lithium House Primary Battery ------>B2B Charger -------->Starter or Aux battery
The actual concept is more like:
Alternator -->Unswitched Positive Distribution Post ------>Lithium House Primary Battery
...............................................................................................(and)------->B2B Charger ------->Starter Battery
................................................................................................(and)------->B2B Charger -------> House Auxiliary
I was initially a little confused by the relationship between the first-charged battery and the "downstream" batteries. The 'Primary' battery and the chargers are all 'drinking from the same trough' of alternator-supplied electricity at the unswitched postive post. The B2B's make the Starter and Auxiliary batteries invisible to the primary house battery (so you don't accidentally drain your starter battery via the common positive post). Electricity only flow in the downstream/charging direction.
I had to add the periods to the left of the (and) for Xenforo formatting. Chargers are connected at the same post as the House Primary.
Solarken
Member III
Good Afternoon or what at your location.
LiFePo batteries are quite safe. Don’t get any with Cobalt in them. As for electrical failure in a Porsche the chances are very low. Plus like with a gas or diesel auto they are shipped with a minimum charge and never charged in transport.
I use them on my fully electric E32-2. Love them. 10 year warranty and an American Company.
Look beyond the cost and you will love them.
As for running them. I’ve run at 50A for 90 minutes and not had a warm battery. At 150A for 5 minutes and still no warm battery. The built in BMS is part of this. And the ones Porsche and VW use are smarter than mine.
Good Day and thank You for reading.
BMS = Battery Managment System.