Ego-T battery exploded

[Janusxvii]

As the title says the battery on my Ego-T exploded today while I was charging it. I have included some pictures for reference. It was especially bad since I was charging it from the USB port on my computer at work. Now my question in all of this is "why did this happen?" It was a legitimate joyetech ego-T though I was using a no-name brand charger. I would love to chalk it up to a faulty charger but isn't the overcharge protection circuit in the battery and not the charger? There seems to be a lot in the news about e-cigarettes exploding lately and I was under the impression that It was only happening to the cheap knock-offs.

 

[timothy]

Not just cheep ones blow but mostly stacked battery's. I believe any battery can have a problem like this if the protection circuit fails or damaged if dropped. I'm sure someone that knows a lot more than me will chime in on this soon

 

[Vchick]

I'm sorry that this happened to you. You indicated a no-name charger, is this the one that came with the battery?

 

[Vadim]

Wow!
It's hard enough to vape at work without the “goody” people making a scene that we are killing them with water vapor and making us step out with analog smokers getting second hand smoke. So now even the factory made units are exploding, boy oh boy hope no one gave you a hard time about it.
You are correct about the fact that the battery should have a protection circuit in it.

Was it loud?

Questions which from now on may need to be answered by all would be:

If juice gets inside, does it ruin the protection circuit?
We all know it kills the auto batteries.

Are Chinese making these units without QA due to stiff competition and price war among their thousands of factories?

Hearing your story now is making me a bit scarred, the first explosion I heard of was in FL with a self-made MOD. But yours is a factory made unit.

 

[Randyrtx]

That charger doesn't look right for an Ego. My Joyetech Ego charger has an output rating of 4.2V @ 420mA.

 

[Vadim]

I'm sorry that this happened to you. You indicated a no-name charger, is this the one that came with the battery?

That is a very good question Vchick asked, did that charger come with your KIT or did you purchased it separately?

 

[Corpa]

Ditto. All 4 of mine are 4.2V @ 420mA

That charger doesn't look right for an Ego. My Joyetech Ego charger has an output rating of 4.2V @ 420mA.

 

[Janusxvii]

To answer the questions about the charger... no it isn't the one that came with the Ego. I figured they all charged at 5V since that's what USB power is. I thought the only real difference between chargers was the threading (for instance between a 510 and an RN4081).

 

[Janusxvii]

Ok, so based on the replies I would guess that the problem was that I used an incompatable charger. Nobody got hurt and no property was damaged so we can call it a hard lesson learned.

 

[Vchick]

I'm glad that no one was hurt. The threading isn't what determines the charging capabilities. In this instance, it appears as it is user error, as the wrong charger was used. With all of the recent news it's difficult to hear stories such as this when it could have been avoided.

 

[Randyrtx]

Just out of curiosity, where did you get that charger? I'm not aware of any 510-threaded battery that would need a 5V charge input.

 

[chinsk]

That charger doesn't look right for an Ego. My Joyetech Ego charger has an output rating of 4.2V @ 420mA.

I was scrolling down to post this as well. I have never seen an ego charger like that and mine is also 4.2v@420mA.

 

[ianlm]

*Never* use a charger that you aren't 100% positive matches the batteries you'll be charging with it. No educated guess is educated enough. Glad no one was hurt.

 

[Cokeybill]

Is this a 650mah or a 1000mah battery? Also I never charge my batts on my USB, I aleays use my wall outlet. Just in case, I would hate to replace a charger, Batt and PC unit or laptop.

 

[illuxion]

1 cell lipos are meant for a static 3.7v hold with max charge voltage of 4.2v. To charge a lipo you pump constant current until you get to 4.2v then let the current flow until it gets to about 2-3% charge current and then shut off. You can't let the voltage get even .1v over 4.2 or bad things can happen. Pumping 5v into a single cell lipo is BAAAAD mmkay. I run 8 cell series 130C discharge rate lipo batteries in my son's RC truck(capable of delivering over 600amps to a dead short, meaning it could start and average car) and had a faulty one explode inside of a charging bag using a balancing lipo charger. I heard a pop and a really loud hissing, the charger had shut off but the bad cell made all 8 go. It left a stench in the house for weeks and melted the bag on to the table(I now charge on a cinder block on a concrete patio lol)

In the future stick with a charger you can trust and that was made for your battery type. single cell lipo should be 4.2v charge and for low current batteries(which these are) using an absolute max of 1 C-rating(capacity) to charge. If you have a 650mAh battery 1C would be 650mA charge, usually the lower the charge current you use the better the charge.

 

[arcturus]

I have a Joytech 1000 mAh passthrough battery and have been using my KGO charger to load it and to use it while charging. I haven't experienced problems but now I am hesitant. The KGO charger is rated at 5.0V +/- .5 V. If there is indeed a high risk of exploding batteries and there are uncounted amounts of new users without any knowledge about electronics, then wouldn't these incidents be happening left and right? This is the first time I have read anything about the small safety threshold when using electronic battery chargers. Where can we go to find exactly what we need without guesswork? What is the correct charger I should be using for my Joytech battery?

 

[Randyrtx]

The Ego USB passthrough battery has a built-in charger on the USB port, and requires a 5V input. Any USB device will always be 5V. Does your KGO charger have a USB port, or a port that you screw a battery into?

The Ego passthru battery can also be charged from the other end like any other Ego battery, using a standard Ego charger rated at 4.2V.

 

[arcturus]

To Randy: Thanks for responding. It is the typical passthrough battery with the usb port on the tip. It also has 510 threading and fits into the KGO charger. So, I can simply connect it through the usb port without worrying about the input being 5 V? It's just that I would think that this would be a frequent concern and after more than a month of researching this is the first time I have come accross this issue. Thank you for your help.

 

[Janusxvii]

Is this a 650mah or a 1000mah battery? Also I never charge my batts on my USB, I aleays use my wall outlet. Just in case, I would hate to replace a charger, Batt and PC unit or laptop.

It was a standard 650mah battery. You bring up a good point about not wanting to risk damaging a computer. It's really fortunate that the company computer I was charging from didn't get damaged.

 

[mwa102464]

I believe all these chargers are 5V input, and should be 4.2 output,,,,,,,,,,, You should though ONLY use the charger that came with the Batt, some are different, especially some of the VV Ego type chargers, the ones from Longtootem are absolutely different then the ones for true Ego Batts. Glad to see no one got injured here, another case of user error, somehow we really need to educate people more on Charging ecigs, Batts, Chargers. ECF Moderators I think it is TIME FOR A STICKY ON THE FRONT PAGE STICKY= "" Battery CHARGING BATTERY EDUCATION PLEASE READ IF YOUR NEW TO ECIGS"" maybe we should make this the very first thread everyday on ECF as SAFETY SHOULD ALWAYS BE FIRST HERE !!!