Yet another fleet of electric buses on fire at the charging station. Londres this time.

submitted by iamonlyoneman from metro.co.uk

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[–]Touchngo 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

I've been using Lithium Ion batteries for years in electric RC. They are, as u/iamonlyoneman states, extremely vulnerable to discharging or charging too fast, or discharging or charging too much. Lion batteries should never be discharged below 20% remaining capacity. Doing so, damages the cells. Too see how violent this is, with a Lion battery consisting of just 4 cells is, check out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nrsoMsEMNU. Go to the 5:50 mark in the video.

Now, I don't know how many cells those buses have, but the explosion and fireball out the side of the bus in the video is classic Lion battery explosion.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

If you append &t=<seconds> to youtube links it will start where you want. I felt the action happens more around 6 mins, or 360s, so https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nrsoMsEMNU&t=360

I've seen single vape bats go up in people's pockets.... Scary.

[–]iamonlyoneman[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Thousands. The tesla automobile uses thousands and it's just a little car. The battery in a city bus must have many times more.

[–][deleted] 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (10 children)

The "problem" with electrical-infused fires is that they tend to burn hotter and longer. Electrical resistance increases with rising temperature of the material burning transporting a current. So even more current (energy) is converted into heat and so on until you can turn off the current or it turns itself off because something melts e.g. .

So it is reasonable to build transformers away from stuff that can burn.

[–]iamonlyoneman[S] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (9 children)

Nah bro this is down to the lithium chemistry of the batteries.

Current recommendations in some places is to park buses farther apart to limit spread, because if they are near each other like this, the batteries burn so hot they catch the next-door neighbour bus on fire too.

[–][deleted] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (8 children)

Ok. But are you sure that the engineers contained the electronics controlling the currents inside the bus "reasonably" secure away from the batteries ?

[–]iamonlyoneman[S] 3 insightful - 3 fun3 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 3 fun -  (7 children)

You don't understand. Lithium-ion batteries, with a few exceptional chemistries to the contrary, are all bombs ticking, waiting to go off at an unpredictable time. Overheat starts the fuse. Overcharging or overdischarging starts the fuse. Damage starts the fuse. Sometimes, for no apparent reason at all, they go off.

[–][deleted]  (1 child)

[removed]

    [–]iamonlyoneman[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

    LeFePo4 is not used because they can't give the same power. You're looking at twice the power of lead-acid for like ten times the up-front cost. It absolutely is the chemistry to use in a mobile environment, from a safety standpoint.

    [–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

    Overheat starts the fuse.

    My lithium battery pack / car starter is rated for 140F. Can't keep it in my car all the time cause it gets hotter than that in the summer inside cars.

    How is this supposed to be viable in hot weather climates?

    [–]iamonlyoneman[S] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

    It's not at all, but dramatic failures are rare enough that most people don't know the hazard exists

    [–][deleted] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

    I have a proposal that follows from your statement quite reasonably (when looking through the eyes of a tick):

    Let's build all our cars with this technology !!!

    Depopulation and stealing money from people for bullshit that they'll buy if we hack their behavior patiently enough at the same time.

    Which tick could ask for more ?

    [–]iamonlyoneman[S] 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

    We should totally do that! Bonus if we can get everyone to charge the cars inside the garage that's part of their home.

    [–][deleted] 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

    They'll buy our bombs we destroy them with !!! Which tick does object ?

    ..... imagine crickets chirping in the secret chamber they resolved this plan in.

    Then they ordered their bobbleheads in the WEF to implement it for all of humanity with Elon spearheading this nonsense as tick-commander-in-chief of this project.

    He already brings to table his skills in mass-data-mining from his time as second in command in paypal-mafia, he is greedy enough and his parents educated him excellently in the necessary skills in slave-keeping when he was a white youngster in Apartheids-South-Africa and robbed all their working-slaves of their dignity and lifeblood in their gemstone-mines for a grain of bread here or there.

    This possibly is, how it actually happened !!!

    [–]IkeConn 2 insightful - 3 fun2 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 3 fun -  (0 children)

    Bless their hearts.