Perhaps it did. That was also in my mind but it’s not possible to examine anything now.
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And this is another good reason to vape! Bad luck whit analog cigarettes usually take lifes…
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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.
Also, take his USB cable away from him.
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@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.
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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.
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Wooops, should have searched more. Wonder if we could get that mod sent to @Sprkslfly and let him tear it down.
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I think that was Sparkslfly. I just found the post.
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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.
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Roger that …
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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.
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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.
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@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.
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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.
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Not sure if you read the OP, but he used it right after he dropped it during the day, the explosion happened later that night.
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So I can safely assume the first charge after dropping the mod?
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No conclusive evidence to it but I think it’s safe to assume as many of you have pointed out, it could just be a combination of everything that led to this incident.
Thanks for your input everyone.
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Unsure if is safe to assume anything in this situation.
Because the mod exploded before any inspection was done on the batteries or the internal of the mod prior to charging.
What are Mooch’s thoughts on pass through charging opposed to using an external battery charger?
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Good question. But I think specific mod board should also be considered. For example - there are mods which do not have removable batteries, so on board charging is the only option. Many of those are powered by 18650s, difference being they’re built in, soldered together, and remove the fallible human component. Likewise there are mods with built in LiPo packs. I have 2 of Lost Vape’s Efusions like this. So onboard charging is the only option here too. And when it comes to LiPo packs, what I’ve learned is equal charging/discharging of individual cells is even more important than 18650 cells. Point is, I don’t think it’s necessary to condemn all mods with USB charging ports, even though I would recommend anyone with removable batteries do use an external charger as a safety precaution. That said, I would somewhat trust most mods to charge a single battery. It’s when you start asking a mod board to keep multiple cells in balance and to never overcharge a cell - that’s where I suspect the greatest risk lies. The only board I trust with this task is the DNA board.
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I haven’t seen this mentioned yet, so I will just throw it out there because I use this exact setup with the same batteries (although I always use an external charger). Another thing to consider is what ohm his coil was that he was using with these particular batteries. I say this because I have to be very careful what I build and use with these batteries because they are only safe to use up to 15A.
Edit: Actually, after thinking about it, this probably has nothing to do with it exploding while charging, but would more likely be the culprit if it exploded while he was using it. So, please disregard!!!
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