So a co-worker told me that his e-cig battery exploded the other night while he was charging it in his mod.
I believe his setup is Smok Procolor kit with Samsung 30Q.
The root cause is unclear as to why it exploded. He has never taken his batteries out of the mod since putting it in. He has always charged it via USB through the mod itself, no external charger.
He said he dropped the mod a few times here and there. He dropped it one time during the day on the night that it happened but said he was using it right after and everything seemed normal. This is all the information we have gathered.
My initial thought is it’s because he’s using the Smok Procolor as a charging device instead of an external battery charger.
Does anyone have any clue as to what happened given the above?
I have a Smok Procolor and I can tell you it’s a POS, Smok and Sigelei - never again.
But I have been using it fine, the only difference is I have never charged the batteries through the mod, I have an external for that.
I’m glad that it didn’t happen while he was using it and very glad that nothing serious happened to him.
I would speculate 1 of 2 things. First, perhaps the on board charging circuitry went faulty. With it being dropped who’s to say if that did or didn’t happen? Secondly, the impact of being dropped could have depressed/deformed the positive connector on the 18650s, leading to a short.
I believe your friend needs to adjust the way he handles his mods and batteries.
Yes, that is true. He’s investing in a charger now, I have told him before.
Charging in the mod is not safe and companies should not advertise that it is a viable option.
F[quote=“SthrnMixer, post:3, topic:179178”]
the impact of being dropped could have depressed/deformed the positive connector on the 18650s, leading to a short.
[/quote]
This is the first thing I thought of.
I dropped a mod a few weeks ago and it landed on the battery side corner. It busted the internals of the positive post in the sled. There was about a quarter of an inch gap between the batteries and the neg/pos post. Inspection of the batteries showed that the positive side had in fact dented where the safety ring is. The batteries went immediately to the recycle bin.
Charging your mod via USB is not a terrible practice if you are out and about and don’t have a battery charger. But for safety reasons an external battery charger is a must.
$13 plus shipping vs thousands of dollars of medical bills and possible loss of vision, loss of teeth, skin grafts and any number of things that can go wrong is a no brainer.
If it were one of my co-workers I would shell out the $13 bucks and order him 2 sets of batteries. And teach him a ton about battery safety.
@worm1 Agreed. @Kenbu Unless you have built in batts, it is always advisable to remove the batts, and charge using a quality battery charger. I’m sure you know this, but just had to say it.
Does anyone remember which ELR member (recently) was receiving broken mods, and taking them apart and diagnosing/repairing them ? I’m trying to search for it, having bleh luck on the search.
Good call. I forgot about that. As per above, it may be beyond forensics but I just don’t like conjecture with something this critical to safety. Unfortunately there is no getting a hold of the schematics and firmware code to do an independent worst out analysis. Of course it also could be structural integrity. Happens too often.
it´s a smok product. it´s normal for them to go up in smoke sadly.
it´s because they are using really cheap bad charging controllers on the mods. and that´s why u should NEVER charge a battery in a cheap mod.
1 of 2 thinks could have happened.
1 the mod heated up and the controller got so hot that it made the battery vent.
2. as the built in charge chip is really garbage. and i have read more than 1 person that had there batterys overcharged to 5v because it did just keep pushing power un. so the battery get instable and cant hold the power so it heats up and vents.
so what have we learned. 30us for a standalone charger. and 7 - 14 bucks for a set of spair batterys might save your house.
If he/she/they are willing to send it, I’m happy to look into it…but please bear in mind: it’s highly unlikely to arrive at any kind of “definitive” conclusion.
I’ll say this though, once neglect or abuse is admitted/acknowledged, all bets are off. Even with my opinion of Smok being what it is, it’s unfair to expect any brand/device to perform to normal expectations after being subject to potentially damaging shocks.
@Nappen Sounds like solid advice. As soon as I started piling up my stash of 18650’s I knew it was time to get a GOOD charger. Smok up in smoke. Hehe, that would be funny if it wasn’t so dangerous.
I can almost guarantee that dropping the mod has caused this issue and it was pretty dumb to use it without inspecting for damage (inside and out, mod and batteries). He’s been charging it regularly without a problem and immediately after he dropped it, it got hot…
People still don’t seem to realize that 18650’s are not your regular AAA batteries. Head over to Mooch’s youtube channel and educate yourselves and your friends. Not only that (since he just started) but head over to ECF to read a bit more about battery safety.
A lot of people say you shouldn’t charge your batteries in a mod. I do so though, I know a lot of people who do and nobody I’ve known has had any issue with it. If there’s a USB charging port on the front, it’s usually a safe way to do so (if you take basic battery safety warnings serious).
IMO, just another (sorry to say, DUMB) user problem that has nothing to do with mods or batteries.