18650 battery safety (moved from the the DAVINCI IQ thread)

THIS! As someone who vented a few batteries back in the days when I first started vaping ecigs I know first hand what heat can do to these battery cells. Even the best cells like Sony and Samsung. Heat makes these things vent. The other night after running a session back to back and then turning it on again just to go nuts. Pulled the battery out and hit it with the thermo-gun. Battery was sitting at 190 F. Granted I ran the device for like 22 straight minutes to get there but still, 190f is way higher than the threshold of the batteries. I believe it was luck that it didn't vent right there on my table. o far nothing like that has happened even with 2 sessions back to back BUT the potential is there. Must be a better way of housing that battery to reduce thermal conductivity.

 

I vented two batteries in my life. one 18650 and one 26650. Both in unregulated ecig mods back before regulated ecig mods were a thing and let me tell you, it is the single most frightening thing that can happen to a person. To be holding a metal tube that begins hissing and getting hotter than you would think possible. To make matters worse from what I can tell with the IQ there are NO vent holes in the bottom of the device on the battery side so if you actually do vent a battery you will be holding a pressurized pipe bomb so to speak. Scary stuff. I had to leave town this morning for business so I am away from home for a few days but anyone with a thermal-gun can pull that battery out at it's hottest point and get a reading. I would be curious to see some other peoples numbers after seeing 190+ on the LG HG2

 

I really hope that's not the case. I've had a battery vent on me before and I'd never like to repeat the process. I'm very worried about the safety of this vape now after reading about the high battery temps. Hopefully DiVinci can chime in on this soon, because if not I'm going to try and cancel my order.

 

As far as your question about what to do if a battery vents this is what you should do: Put it down, and let it sit. Don't try to remove the battery, don't try to open it up and check it out. Just shut it off as quickly as you can, chuck it in a sink or can and let it sit. After a good few moments you can come back and open it up and see whats happened to your battery and/or your device. But if the thing starts hissing or sizzling, or dripping while you are holding it, don't try to save it just get away until it's done venting. I understand the instinct to want to just open the door and let the battery drop out but it's just not worth what can happen if its under pressure or venting rapidly. Hot flying acid is just not worth it. Takes about 10 minutes for an 18650 to vent out and then another 10 for the temps to come down enough to hold it.

mod note: Edited to remove non-safety comments

 

At what temperature do batteries explode?

 

They have to get pretty hot. IIRC thermal runaway starts around 150C

Check this out.



"Li-ion batteries play an ever-increasing role in our daily life. Therefore, it is important to understand the potential risks involved with these devices. In this work we demonstrate the thermal runaway characteristics of three types of commercially available Li-ion batteries with the format 18650. The Li-ion batteries were deliberately driven into thermal runaway by overheating under controlled conditions. Cell temperatures up to 850 °C and a gas release of up to 0.27 mol were measured."

http://pubs.rsc.org/en/content/articlehtml/2013/ra/c3ra45748f

 

Dude. This is not the point.

The Ascent does have a liON battery, but not an 18650. An 18650 is a chemical battery made of several smaller batteries. Specifically, this is a closed, non-protected, cell. The ascent did get hot, I also have one, but the battery was placed away from the heating element.

The IQ, on the other hand, has the heater literally next to the battery. Separated by aluminum. Which is conductive.


Here's what it looks like when an 18650 SPECIFICALLY vents.

Click to play YouTube Video

Now, once again, please understand (to everyone on this thread) how an 18650 unprotected cell differs from other kinds of batteries.

for SAFETY!

 

Ok! I'm sorry, lol Maybe don't say "Dude." (with a period) You reserve that for when you are exasperated with your friends.

I haven't received my IQ yet; but thank you for sharing battery awareness. I'm no expert on 18650, but understand they can get dangerous real fast. Hopefully DaVinci is on top of it.

 

What do you suggest we do as a precaution?

 

Hey Reggie. I just suggest everyone do some research on the battery type, verify that their batteries are the proper kind, and name brand.

In my e-cig I can have an 18650 last about 2 or 4 months before it starts randomly getting hot faster than normal (and these devices do not have an oven). At this point, dispose of this battery.

If your battery get's hot or you begin hearing or otherwise sensing a venting event, throw the device or drop it and get away. The way the IQ is built could result in the anodised casing becoming shrapnel, or at least further projecting the batteries shrapnel.

Next, after the batter vents, leave it alone for a while. Like 30 minutes before investigating.

Forgive me, I had just gotten to work and nonsense was ensuing. I was exasperated, but not with you. lol.

 

Hi everyone,

So haven't received my IQ yet ,but I've been reading through this thread ever since I ordered it, and seeing all this comments about the IQ getting to HOT and battery over heating make me really nervous , I'm have been doing some research on my own about battery safety and its scary what can happen when something goes wrong , but every video I have found is about safety with e-cigs/mech Mods/regulated Mods for eLiquid vaping , and none for Dry herb Vaporizers , I'm guessing the venting or thermal runaway in Dry herb vapes are not as common because,and again guessing, you have dont the same amount of control over the voltage,amps,ohms that your device pull from the battery in dry herb vapes like you do with mods,making them "safer" so I think Davinci would have set/tested all this variable on the device to safe values so the IQ doesn't make the battery vent , but as people has mention the oven being so close to the battery , could this make the battery vent when vaping in highers temps ?

so I don't understand why @Davinci_vaporizer is not commenting in this matter, and clarifying all this safety concerns, I'm curious to know @Davinci_vaporizer :
-When making the IQ , did you run any Stress tests on the IQ to check its safety at different temps ?
-testing extremely long sessions times at high temps to see until what point was the Iq safe to use? or something similar
-if you ran this tests ,what can of batteries you used during this tests?what was the max time and max temp, in which the IQ was still safe to use.
-when designing the IQ,being the size it is and how you layout all the compartments, you knew the battery and the oven where going to very close to each other , what measures did you take to prevent the heat from the oven affect/damage the battery? or if no measures were needed ,why?
-and lastly in the case of a battery Venting ,does the IQ have venting holes to dissipate pressure from the Gases?
-could you give us some safety guideline when using the IQ

I dont want to sound rude or paranoid ,but his is going to be my first Vape ever and I don't want my lack of experience with vapes and 18650 batteries make me do something or ignore something that could potentially be fatal or harm me in anyway
so I think clarification on this matter and information about safety from the People who made the device
is priority #1 in my book

thanks in advance,
cheers




here are some videos I've watched which I found helpful:

Click to play YouTube Video

Click to play YouTube Video

Click to play YouTube Video

 

So these batteries are only good for 2-4 months before they are dangerous? Does your e-cig get hotter than an IQ?

 

Yeah that's actually true, these batteries should be cycled or replaced every 4 months maximum. They have a rapid rate of degradation compared to smaller protected cells. All 18650's regardless of brand should be cycled every 4 months. I've been telling you guys these batteries are noting to mess with. It just gets too hot. I don't see anyway to stop it, it's just a design flaw. The heating element, oven, and vapor path run EXTREMELY close to the battery with almost nothing there to shield the compartment from the heat. All I can tell you is be vigilant and pay close attention. One thing I always liked to do was put on some music in the headphones while I have a session or two, probably wont be doing that with this unit. I want to hear what's going on. It almost makes it not so enjoyable to a degree when you are practically scared of the thing more than you are anything else. Look so far nothing has happened that we know of, certainly all of us have been fine so far, so until otherwise proven unsafe we have to regard them as safe. Not optimal lol but safe. Now if stories start coming out about things going beyond worrisome to literally dangerous I am sure we will all know about it rather quickly. As will Divinci. I am pretty uncomfortable with it as it is but so far it's been limited to fear. At this point we know what we know, the unit get's imo too hot, its designed in a way that brings battery safety into question, and that's it. In the future if we know more than that we can proceed but at this point in the game it is what it is, those of us that have it can use it or stuff it in a drawer with the rest of the units you keep around. Those that don't yet have it can wait to see if anything actually goes wrong with one of these units before taking the dive. I don't see how anything else can be done from either end. If nothing ever happens to these batteries even by pure luck then the device is safe, although hot and thats the end of the story. If people start losing fingers then they will be taken off the market. But until something bad actually happens it's just a "use at your own risk" kind of thing.

 

Don't you think the engineers at Davinci tested the battery safety? (I will take your advice and dispose after 4 months, though. I appreciate you looking out for the community.)

 

Well probably not, clearly it got passed as it is, and it gets way too hot but more important is that Davinci doesn't produce batteries. They are just third party batteries that they drop in there before shipping. I ordered two units, once came with an off brand re-wrap battery from china, the other came with no label or print anywhere meaning they probably wrapped it themselves. Your not trusting davinci here, you are trusting the makers of these batteries in China. So no, they didn't test each and every brand of battery they send out because I got two batteries that are unidentifiable, clearly manufactured by two different companies. There is no way davinci can vouch for the safety of the batteries themselves but producing a unit that gets this hot in the battery compartment kind of negates a safe battery in the first place doesn't it?

 

Hm there were too many inaccurate or plain wrong remarks in the page above...

Nope, the Ascent has two 18650 cells. You can see them by removing the silicone "buddy rim" as it's called. A 18650 is just a particular cell dimension/format, but in all cases we are dealing with variants of Lithium-Ion chemistries.

A "battery" aka a pack is one or more cells + a BMS/PCM circuit. Protected cells include the BMS pcb under the positive tab usually. In the IQ case the protection circuit is inside the vape,

--

I won't discourage readers from getting a little bit paranoid, because yes you better know what you are doing when dealing with Li-Ion batteries in general, they can be dangerous indeed but...

1) If you source genuine cells, having the right specs for the application (here: 10A or more, continuous, not peak), from one of the 4 makers, then you should be fine.
2) The IQ is drawing about 8A peak, this is not even really considered "high discharge" by modern standards, most cells on the market can handle that, and if you want more safety margin, just get some Samsung 25R and sacrifice some capacity/run-time.
3) DaVinci did their homework and claimed that the IQ is able to detect weak cells (exactly like good e-cig mods do)
4) Even super cheap micro-controllers have built-in temperature sensors these days and they can detect over-heating conditions, granted not on the battery itself but the device should stop if it's really getting too hot.
5) These cells are specified to operate at up to 75°C, and they can even reach 90°C where you should start to worry, but it's way beyond "warm" at this point, it's burning hot and I don't think anyone reported such extreme values so far?

In short, yes it's bad to have them so close to the heater, but that's the price to pay for the small form factor (all my pen-style vapes get outrageously warm, especially the X-Max v2 for instance) Yes it will shorten your cells life, but as long as you have genuine and adequate cells you should not worry.

It's not their first product you know...

Now if they really ship with random rewrapped Chinese B-grade cells it's another problem....

But you see, FC members are the first to complain when a new portable is released without user-swappable cells, telling they will never ever buy a device they can't service, but the counter-part is that it creates a shit-load of complications when they are swappable: you need to educate yourself, learn about C ratings, charging, storage voltage, find a reputable cells source etc. It's what's called a dual-edged sword.

 

I mean, Davinci must have run tests with heating up these batteries inside of the IQ in order to test the limits and determine how safe it is. I would hope that it passed these sorts of tests. The long term deterioration is another story, I suppose...and we're the test subjects!

 

What about the 4 months longlife?

Look very short for me, I used some batteries +2 years (one charge per week in average)

 

They are rated for about 300 cycles before capacity drops by 25%. At 500 cycles they don't hold much charge anymore. So yes, 1 to 2 years depending on use frequency.

 

Hey there! I did want to jump in and correct you on one thing. The Ascent did have 2 18650's as it's power source. The IQ battery is located next to the heater and is separated by several layers of insulation, the aluminum shell and the internal cage it'self. Also the battery dose have room to give off heat and vent. Air is allowed into the battery casing from 2 locations. 1 At the bottom there is a small gap in the hinge that allows air to flow in and out. Also if you look at the battery door from the top of the device there are gaps around the door that allow for air to flow in and out even when the cap is closed.

Great response and great information!

Great information share! I'll try and answer all of your questions as best I can. I answered a few of them all together so please let me know if I left anything out.

1 - Yes we did run stress tests to see how the IQ and the battery held up under extreme conditions. For those who don't know we are based in Las Vegas and have access to some warm conditions throughout the year. We did tests with the IQ running on max temp 430 with no shut off timer. So the unit would turn on and stay on at 430 and run until it was dead. No venting issues raised after this test

2- We did these tests with the batteries that we chose and with several of the other top batteries that we considered before making the IQ. For example we did this test with the Sanyo Battery that is currently provided and with a Samsung, LG, and MXJO batteries of the same AMp and mAh rating.

3 - We took several steps to protect the battery from the heat in addition to these tests. As I mentioned above Air can pass into the battery casing from the bottom hinge near the bowl and there is also air gaps at the top near the battery door to allow more air to flow in and out of that area. The bowl and battery are also separated by insulation, the internal casing, and the external casing. So there are quite a few layers in between.

 

@Davinci_vaporizer , Thank you very much for answering all my questions and clarifying all the doubts I had, I just needed some reassurance from your part as I mention my first vape and I dont want something to go wrong with,

thanks again,
I ordered Nov 11th ,so now I'm just waiting to try this beauty

cheers

 

"dude" with a period is also reserved for frustration when someone does not get the obvious point and makes an irrelevant remark. I think the gentleman's use of "Dude." is proper grammar and syntax of the English language.

nevermind

"Probably not"? Yeah, a multi-million dollar company is going to use dangerous batteries in their product without testing so they can open themselves up to potentially limitless liability that would close the company. Why is it that people feel the need to come onto the Internet to talk about things they have no idea about and are so clearly wrong. You are either lying and a troll, or plain stupid. So which is it?

SO ICR or IMR or hybrid??? Protected or unprotected? What voltage, what ampere rating? This info would be nice on the DaVinci page.....

Mod Note: Four posts merged. Also, telling members that they are either 'lying and a trol or plain stupid' is against our be nice rule. Warning point issued.

 

For what it's worth, I used my IQ for one sesh and at the end, the unit was a little too hot to hold, not painful, jut bordering on uncomfortable. Now I am in NY, it's snowing, and I have the window open cuz I like the cold. So, I was curious to see how hot the battery was nad when I took it out, it was COOLER than the unit. Where the unit was slightly uncomfortable o hold, the battery was soothing, like holding a nice hand warmer, just to give you an idea of the temperature difference.

 

So like, if I use my vape all day, say every 2 hours for a 16 hour day, so 8 times, but I keep the battery in and keep it plugged in. Will this prolong battery life? If not, is it accurate to say 300 cycles totally emptying the battery so that if I only deplete half the charge every time, will I get 600 cycles that way?

 

Hi Skank,
Did you consider using the Troll Trace software to check? Hope you haven't gone Protocol Zero yet.

- Dildo Schwaggins