Posted on 02/11/2025 12:26:27 PM PST by AbolishCSEU
An e-bike battery that exploded is being blamed for an apartment fire in the city of Ithaca Monday morning.
When firefighters arrived on Cherry Street at around 6:40, they found heavy smoke coming from the fourth floor of the five-story building. They determined a battery was burning in the apartment, which ignited other materials. The three people who were inside the apartment were able to escape safely. The building sustained moderate smoke and water damage. The sprinkler system activated and prevented the fire from growing larger.
The Red Cross was called to help those residents who were displaced and no injuries were reported.
The Ithaca Fire Department Fire wants to remind the public that charging large batteries inside carries risk. They advise residents to try to purchase batteries from companies that they recognize and those that carry UL or ETL certifications. Battery fires are fast and violent. Never charge large batteries in stairwells, hallways, or doorways that are in your exit path.
But but e-bikes are green. Ithaca “city of evil” will shrug their shoulders and do nothing to prevent this in the future.
But over the years, as battery technology has steadily improved, that's far from the case any more. Now a battery is more like a tank of alcohol, co-located with a tank of oxidizer.
The next round of battery improvements will make it more like a tank of gasoline, and the next after that will make it more like a tank of dimethylhydrazine.
This is not new. It’s happened many times. By now you would think people would know better. Like having a barbecue in your attached garage. Ebikes are to me like an oxymoron. Isn’t the purpose of the bike to get exercise?
cellphones use lithium-ion batteries...
your tenants aren’t allowed to bring or charge their cellphones in their place of residence?...
Wodered the same about this apartment. Could be an expensive case of rule breaking.
Yes, but they are really fun to ride and cover a lot more ground without getting all sweaty.
I do not own an Ebike.
However, my wife and I rented them last August when we went to Bar Harbor/Mount Desert Island/Acadia National Park.
I was advised to rent these by other friends previous experience. We circumnavigate the park twice in one day. Going to the top of Cadillac Mountain and back down. The Ebike made it fun. While pumping straight up hill on a regular bike for a 61 year old overweight male would have killed me(maybe literally).
With an Ebike you could go up hill doing 15-20MPH. Then 40+ mph down hill spinning the peddles which recharged the battery.
It was by far the best way to see the park. FYI, the main road around the park is mostly one way. So you don’t have to worry about cars passing you close. It was also much easier to pull over and stop at all the scenic stops along the way.
Lastly, you need a reservation to drive a car to the top of the mountain during the summer. This is because there are only so many parking spots. With a bike you do not need a reservation.
“Ebikes are to me like an oxymoron. Isn’t the purpose of the bike to get exercise?”
That’s what I thought. Then I rented one on a trip to explore a canal towpath. Several months and much research later, I own a mid-drive Turbo Vado 4. I cannot describe how much fun these things are to ride! You still have to pedal to move (except for class II bikes), but you can set how much or how little (or no) assistance you want and when. You can exercise hard, or remove the stress of going up steep hills. It’s like your legs being twice as strong, but you still feel it. The good e-bikes sound and handle like a typical 11 or 12 speed bike. But you feel like you’re 20 instead of 50-60.
The e-bike segment is exploding. Look up the many almost tearful testimonials of people with health problems and older people who thought their bike riding days were behind them. Healthy people like my wife and I are riding more often now, because it’s fun again. Even 20-somethings are using e-bikes for a little assist on mountain trails.
But folks should not buy e-bikes online. Not only will they find there is no local tech support, but the the technology in these budget bikes has not been developed and vetted. Many of these suppliers are just cobbling together low quality and low cost parts. By contrast, the established traditional bike companies like Specialized and Trek, with dealers nationwide, have some incredible e-bikes into which they have poured proper design and development resources. They have battery and circuitry failsafes and do not suffer from these kinds of fires. They cost more, but they’re worth it.
It specifically mentions e bikes due to the size of the battery. You have to draw the line somewhere.
cellphones have a history of batteries overheating and catching on fire...
I have a Tesla in my garage, and I will be buying a charger for use there . . .Others use 240 V chargers, I’ll be fine with just a puny 110V model since I don’t drive every day, nor very far - except on trips, which I’ll be using outdoor Tesla “Superchargers” for.
E-bikes, OTOH, are notoriously prone to fire since, compared to a Tesla, they are el cheapo. Cheap, Teslas are not.
Batteries under the floor mean a low CG, and also that they are not, unlike conventional engines, waist-high missiles targeting any car which would collide with it. Very competent engineering goes into them on the collision safety front.
OTOH high performance is available in the same package; the horsepower - and especially the torque - will make you take notice. I didn’t opt for the perforce version, but I did opt for all wheel drive - which means dual motor, which means it doesn’t say, “who, me?” when you give her the gun - it says, “was that enough?" 😊
They point oit the obvious issue without calling out China directly.
“They advise residents to try to purchase batteries from companies that they recognize and those that carry UL or ETL certifications”
If you look at these types of fires it is always cheap Chinese knock off battery packs and cells. You almost never see a Panasonic or Toshiba pack go up in flames why? Because they use quality cells with a full cell by cell battery management system that can sense when a cell is biased or overheating and immediately stop the charge before thermal runaway. This and quality packs also don’t use NMC cells with flammable electrolyte you get lithium iron phosphate cells in better packs which have either nonflammable or low flammable electrolyte. These are electrolyte fires lithium in the cells in ion form is not flammable it’s bound to another atom at the atomic level only.
Of course if you insist on using NMC cells there are ways to keep them from thermal runaway. Your cell phone, tablet and laptops nearly all use NMC cells due to the high energy density vs LFP. Two major groups and two different ways to virtually eliminate thermal runaway. High density power cells are what has made the modern world possible with ,smartphones tablets,laptops, medical devices, drones, sensor packages....they are not going away. The next gen of aluminum,sodium, magnesium, calcium,potassium, and sulfur cells are all in production and rapidly rising in market size for all of the above reasons this is the world we live in now.
https://www.lgchem.com/company/information-center/press-release/news-detail-9535?lang=en_GLOBAL
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