battery explosion, what happened?

[Portertown]

If a battery with a bad wrapper is installed in a mechanical mod correctly (positive battery pole to 510) if can cause the mod to go into a "auto fire" mode because the exposed area in the wrapper can complete the circuit and act as the switch.
This condition will not cause a battery to "vent" as it is no different than pressing the switch.

However if the same battery with a bad wrapper is installed with the positive battery pole next to the switch it can for sure vent a battery when the switch is pressed if the area with the bad wrapper contacts the mod tube. This condition causes a dead short for the battery when the switch is pressed.

 

[Froth]

If a battery with a bad wrapper is installed in a mechanical mod correctly (positive battery pole to 510) if can cause the mod to go into a "auto fire" mode because the exposed area in the wrapper can complete the circuit and act as the switch.
This condition will not cause a battery to "vent" as it is no different than pressing the switch.

However if the same battery with a bad wrapper is installed with the positive battery pole next to the switch it can for sure vent a battery when the switch is pressed if the area with the bad wrapper contacts the mod tube. The condition causes a dead short for the battery.

I would call in to question what caused the battery wrapper to become damaged because if it was from striking an object or dropping this can cause unseen internal changes which could cause all sorts of things to happen from the battery simply no longer working to exploding.

 

[anavidfan]

Ok, I will throw this in, maybe Im nuts but here goes.

Ive been using mechs and rebuildable atties for a few years now. Ever since Ive gone to pressing my wires I occasionally will squeeze badly and combined with bad eyes, I will fire the device and bend it so it touches the screw, base or even squeeze too soon while switch is still making contact. What happens? Spark and a bit of smoke. DEAD short. Rebuild, check battery on the charger or on a reg device like my Provari or Kainos, for sure if those dont detect a problem, its most likely fine.

I have never had a battery go bad with a dead short. But every once in a while it happens, especially when I went with 28 gauge SS wire, much softer than 27 gauge kanthal, so first few times I shorted out the coil and felt dumb, but I always look at the battery with my magnifying glass, put it on my charger that is supposed to detect faults and pop it on my reg if I want to make double sure.

Dead shorts in my experience dont make a battery go kaboom. Am I wrong? or have I been taking my life in my own hands all these years.

In my dumb opinion, I think the fault in this case is the bad/ damaged battery combined with too low of resistance was the probable cause.

Please if I am wrong, let me know. I love my mechs and honestly prefer them to regulated. To me , I find the subtle nuances as the battery gets lower a nice experience.

 

[Northy]

Efest batteries are just rewrapped junk. I'd never trust one in any of my regulated mods with safety features, much less a mech mod. I can't believe people still buy Efest with Sony and samsung out there.

On top of that the battery had nicks in it and you just covered it with nail polish?

Battery safety is very important. Any time you find something "off" about your battery it's best to discard it and buy a new one... but never buy efest batteries. I don't care if they're on sale for $1 a piece... they couldn't pay me to use them!

As a dedicated mech user, I couldn't have said it better.

I would bet the house that crap batteries caused your problem. You made a bomb and pressed the button... surprise, surprise it blew up.

 

[B2L]

Ok, I will throw this in, maybe Im nuts but here goes.

Ive been using mechs and rebuildable atties for a few years now. Ever since Ive gone to pressing my wires I occasionally will squeeze badly and combined with bad eyes, I will fire the device and bend it so it touches the screw, base or even squeeze too soon while switch is still making contact. What happens? Spark and a bit of smoke. DEAD short. Rebuild, check battery on the charger or on a reg device like my Provari or Kainos, for sure if those dont detect a problem, its most likely fine.

I have never had a battery go bad with a dead short. But every once in a while it happens, especially when I went with 28 gauge SS wire, much softer than 27 gauge kanthal, so first few times I shorted out the coil and felt dumb, but I always look at the battery with my magnifying glass, put it on my charger that is supposed to detect faults and pop it on my reg if I want to make double sure.

Dead shorts in my experience dont make a battery go kaboom. Am I wrong? or have I been taking my life in my own hands all these years.

In my dumb opinion, I think the fault in this case is the bad/ damaged battery combined with too low of resistance was the probable cause.

Please if I am wrong, let me know. I love my mechs and honestly prefer them to regulated. To me , I find the subtle nuances as the battery gets lower a nice experience.

That has been my experience as well. I've shorted a battery or two and in the instance where it was a coil issue, the coil popped and that was the end of it. I had an instance with the switch in a Cube mod which shorted and the battery heated up almost instantaneously but did not vent.

The efest, although not 35 amp, is not a terrible battery, and .76 should not have overtaxed it at all. I believe you may be correct that there were internal problems with the battery, possibly related to the damage to the wrap and /or the over discharge.

As a general rule of thumb OP, if you aren't familiar with your equipment AND your having issues with it not performing correctly AND your battery has been damaged, it's best to put it away until you find out what's going on.

 

[anavidfan]

That has been my experience as well. I've shorted a battery or two and in the instance where it was a coil issue, the coil popped and that was the end of it. I had an instance with the switch in a Cube mod which shorted and the battery heated up almost instantaneously but did not vent.

The efest, although not 35 amp, is not a terrible battery, and .76 should not have overtaxed it at all. I believe you may be correct that there were internal problems with the battery, possibly related to the damage to the wrap and /or the over discharge.

I had one short on an atty that I dont have anymore. It was a MiniAtty by Chels and it had a very little clearance from the coil to chimney. I built it checked it and it was fine. Put the chimney on, filled tank then as I opened up the juice control, damn if my switch did not get hot , real fast. Opened it up, insulator melted, inner insulator around the positive pin melted. Scared the heck out of me. Read later that the Atty had bad insulators on some of the earlier ones and they had replaced them with better delrin. I got the updated insulators after much hassle and over a month of waiting for the parts and bad attitude from modder, could not keep that atty, though It was real nice.

But a good mech will have high temp rated delrin as should the atomizers. Not always do high end devices have that and not always does low priced mean not well made.

Im obssesive about batteries, I once a month take all my batteries inspect them under magnification, look for any residue around the top button, seals, wrapper etc. Wipe them with alcohol. I also clean all my contacts on atties inside and out, and on my MODs.

 

[Mooch]

Ok, I will throw this in, maybe Im nuts but here goes.

Ive been using mechs and rebuildable atties for a few years now. Ever since Ive gone to pressing my wires I occasionally will squeeze badly and combined with bad eyes, I will fire the device and bend it so it touches the screw, base or even squeeze too soon while switch is still making contact. What happens? Spark and a bit of smoke. DEAD short. Rebuild, check battery on the charger or on a reg device like my Provari or Kainos, for sure if those dont detect a problem, its most likely fine.

I have never had a battery go bad with a dead short. But every once in a while it happens, especially when I went with 28 gauge SS wire, much softer than 27 gauge kanthal, so first few times I shorted out the coil and felt dumb, but I always look at the battery with my magnifying glass, put it on my charger that is supposed to detect faults and pop it on my reg if I want to make double sure.

Dead shorts in my experience dont make a battery go kaboom. Am I wrong? or have I been taking my life in my own hands all these years.

In my dumb opinion, I think the fault in this case is the bad/ damaged battery combined with too low of resistance was the probable cause.

Please if I am wrong, let me know. I love my mechs and honestly prefer them to regulated. To me , I find the subtle nuances as the battery gets lower a nice experience.

Short-circuits are about the only way to force a battery into thermal runaway and cause it to burst. An internal fault can do it too but that's because the fault is a short-circuit.

It all depends on the amount of current that flows and how hot the battery gets internally. This depends greatly on how long it is shorted. If it doesn't reach the thermal runaway threshold temperature anywhere inside, then no bursting. If it does get hot enough then it's a bad day all around.

 

[roxynoodle]

Anavidfan, I did it once as well with a genny. Tested perfect on my ohm meter, but when I screwed it onto my mech I must have bumped my mesh wick and it touched the positive post. I went to pulse it and it shorted and popped the coil. My battery was also fine, but it was like a less than 1s pulse. Scared the hell out of me though, but I learned to do another visual inspection of my build from the experience.

 

[aetherolea]

The coils never got hot and i didn't touch them.

I had been trying to figure out why the mad was working intermittently for a while. I searched forums, asked a friend who had been using mech mods for years and he couldn't figure it out. I soaked and cleaned it with vinegar twice and made all of the metal parts and connections shine, but to no avail. that why earlier that day i bought a new mod.

Efest is made by IMR which is one of the better companies. Every store in my city sells them and nothing else. Why do you think its not the amps that it says on the battery? have you tested it? how do you know your testing equipment is better than what the battery makers QC lab has? is there a way of testing the tester?

the casing damage was cause by sliding the batteries into the metal mod.

i used nail polish to repair it on the advice of a sales person in a store who told me i was stupid for using electrical tape to repair it. I now have heat shrink tubing that i bought from IMR

I was using 22 gauge wire which is probably why the coil didn't pop. I've since ran out of it and switched to 26 which has made me much happier. I'm pulling big clouds at 35w and my batteries last all day now.

How could a regulated mod fail and cause a battery to overheat?

when using a three post RDA should i be worried about how long the legs in the middle post are? could they cause a short? This wasn't the problem this time because the RDA i was using had 6 posts.

I'll ask my coworker a few questions about this again, I have no idea how much electrical engineering he studied in school. Its possible that he remembered incorrectly, which is something we all do from time to time.

So far the two leading hypothesis's are the battery casing and the over draining of the battery. Do they sell chargers that stop charging when the battery is full? My life style and work schedule do not allow me the monitor the charger and take them out when the light turns green.

Thank you all for your input.

 

[edyle]

damaged wrapper;
possibly metal tweezers;
possibly a 'hybrid-look' mod with no centerpin;

so many things to go wrong;

but no nothing to do with electromagnetic fields; it's a heating coil, not a magnetic coil

 

[Bad Ninja]

"IMR" isn't a company.

IMR = LiMn204
IMR designates the type of cathode used in the battery.


Efest doesn't make batteries.
They buy and rewrap batteries made by other manufacturers.

They have been proven to exaggerate their CDR ratings.

Efest cells have been tested by professionals here and at Candlepower forums ( Efest actually send some of these testers free cells to test).


I strongly advise you do some actual research before using any mechanical mods
No offense, but the posts you have made show you need to become a little more knowledgable about your gear in order to safely use a mech.

 

[Mooch]

The coils never got hot and i didn't touch them.

I had been trying to figure out why the mad was working intermittently for a while. I searched forums, asked a friend who had been using mech mods for years and he couldn't figure it out. I soaked and cleaned it with vinegar twice and made all of the metal parts and connections shine, but to no avail. that why earlier that day i bought a new mod.

Efest is made by IMR which is one of the better companies. Every store in my city sells them and nothing else. Why do you think its not the amps that it says on the battery? have you tested it? how do you know your testing equipment is better than what the battery makers QC lab has? is there a way of testing the tester?

the casing damage was cause by sliding the batteries into the metal mod.

i used nail polish to repair it on the advice of a sales person in a store who told me i was stupid for using electrical tape to repair it. I now have heat shrink tubing that i bought from IMR

I was using 22 gauge wire which is probably why the coil didn't pop. I've since ran out of it and switched to 26 which has made me much happier. I'm pulling big clouds at 35w and my batteries last all day now.

How could a regulated mod fail and cause a battery to overheat?

when using a three post RDA should i be worried about how long the legs in the middle post are? could they cause a short? This wasn't the problem this time because the RDA i was using had 6 posts.

I'll ask my coworker a few questions about this again, I have no idea how much electrical engineering he studied in school. Its possible that he remembered incorrectly, which is something we all do from time to time.

So far the two leading hypothesis's are the battery casing and the over draining of the battery. Do they sell chargers that stop charging when the battery is full? My life style and work schedule do not allow me the monitor the charger and take them out when the light turns green.

Thank you all for your input.

Is there a company named IMR? I ask because it's the prefix used by a different company to identify a group of batteries they manufacture that use a particular battery chemistry.

Efest's ratings for their batteries are marketing driven, not based on actual performance, and have been proven to be exaggerated by several testers...including myself. Since 1992 I have been testing batteries as part of the work I do for my clients and have designed and sold quite a few battery analyzers/testers too. My equipment is calibrated by a national certification lab and my testing is methodical and thorough (see the links in my signature). In fact, my equipment is better than that used by a lot of companies selling batteries. All four of the Efests I have tested have exaggerated ratings.

This doesn't mean that Efests are useless batteries. Some are decent 20A batteries and can work well for most vapers. They just aren't what they say they are. With Samsung, Sony, and LG batteries being accurately rated, often better performing and less expensive, some people feel Efests are not a good battery to buy.

 

[anavidfan]

Here is a dumb analogy.

For years I used to think that people were dumb to spend a lot of money on household cleaners. Id look at the labels and most had either ammonia or bleach or both.

So for many years Id use a half and half mixture of ammonia and bleach. Most people didnt care , but there were a few people that told me they didnt think I should do that. I loved the smell and things got real clean. I ignored the warnings because Id been doing it for years without feeling any ill effects.

As I was cleaning the bathroom in a new apt I lived in, ( its was smaller and no windows like all the other places ) and on my hands and knees scrubbing away.
Suddenly I felt odd, then I saw blood drip on to the perfectly clean floor. Thought what the heck, got up and grabbed on to the sink and saw blood coming out of my nose.

I got out and got some air, after a few hours felt better.

I decided the people warning me were not dumb. I should have listened to them. I did not know I was basically dousing myself with poisonous gases. I was always wondering why the knees of my 501s were always just falling apart....

 

[VHRB2014]

Way too many things to go wrong there. Please keep in mind that it is experiences like this that will get vaping banned.

 

[retird]

Yet another mech-mod explosion:

"Blood just pouring down," E-cig explodes in Oklahoma man's face

 

[rhelton]

Was this a trick question or something lol

 

[c3scott]

My thoughts exactly

Was this a trick question or something lol

 

[anavidfan]

There is a thread I just started and its for these types of posts that I and others are going to try to dispel a lot of misconceptions on the use of Hybrids and Mechs and other non-regulated devices.

I am a mech lover and hate to see so much of the information on mechs and especially hybrids set up are based on "myths" and lack of knowledge.

If any one here is a lover of these and have some basic safety and use of these, we would appreciate it so much. Im trying to do this in hopes to help any with interest in mechs to read and learn with me and others. I also hope that it will be a fun place for all styles of vaping, low resistant, mid and high.

I even the future of vaping , which is the youngins will join in and share and pass on all your experience.

Hybrid Mech Mods Info and Safe Usage

Just to clarify, I posted this here because there seemed to be a few people that do enjoy using mechs and obviously some that have knowledge and might want to share.

ITs not a recruitment effort, its not to induct anyone. Its an effort to support safe and knowledgeable vaping of any style.

 

[B2L]

There is a thread I just started and its for these types of posts that I and others are going to try to dispel a lot of misconceptions on the use of Hybrids and Mechs and other non-regulated devices.

I am a mech lover and hate to see so much of the information on mechs and especially hybrids set up are based on "myths" and lack of knowledge.

If any one here is a lover of these and have some basic safety and use of these, we would appreciate it so much. Im trying to do this in hopes to help any with interest in mechs to read and learn with me and others. I also hope that it will be a fun place for all styles of vaping, low resistant, mid and high.

I even the future of vaping , which is the youngins will join in and share and pass on all your experience.

I think there needs to be a good sticky....

 

[aetherolea]

There is a thread I just started and its for these types of posts that I and others are going to try to dispel a lot of misconceptions on the use of Hybrids and Mechs and other non-regulated devices.

I am a mech lover and hate to see so much of the information on mechs and especially hybrids set up are based on "myths" and lack of knowledge.

If any one here is a lover of these and have some basic safety and use of these, we would appreciate it so much. Im trying to do this in hopes to help any with interest in mechs to read and learn with me and others. I also hope that it will be a fun place for all styles of vaping, low resistant, mid and high.

I even the future of vaping , which is the youngins will join in and share and pass on all your experience.

I think there needs to be a good sticky....

Why use a mech mod? a few years ago they were cheaper but now they are even in price with regulated. I get bigger clods with the same set up on my regulated mod at 45watts. I get better control over flavor and my battery lasts two days now instead of having to change batteries before the end of the day.