Boeing Dreamliner Battery Fire

amberwolf said:
probable spec sheet for the cells:
http://www.s399157097.onlinehome.us/SpecSheets/LVP10-65.pdf

Thanks for that link, Amberwolf!

A company like Boeing wants a reliable supplier, no doubt, but looking at the specs it would amaze me if they did choose that Yuasa LiCo battery, only 87 - 101 Wh/kg? Even the much safer A123 pouch LiFePos have 130Wh/kg...
 
My understanding of lithium cobalt. Please correct me. L. cobalt is used in stuff like phones. It is the most dense of the chemistries. Which allows the most talk time, and a very high discharge rate. Because the demand of discharge from small devices they get warm but no fire or explosion. But if we used it on our ebikes, we would have lots of fires and worse. Is that the idea?
 
neptronix said:
I'm laughing my fraggin' ass off over here reading this article.
I can point out at least a dozen people on this forum who could have designed a better battery pack.

Me too, on many levels! First, it is so ironic that all our transport restrictions on Li batteries was to prevent a mishap on an aircraft... now Boeing designs large format Li into their premier airframe, and what happens, and aircraft system initiated Li fire...

Next, to solve their problems perhaps we should send them a few rolls of Mil-Spec Chinese sourced, grey duct tape!! :mrgreen:
 
bigmoose said:
neptronix said:
I'm laughing my fraggin' ass off over here reading this article.
I can point out at least a dozen people on this forum who could have designed a better battery pack.

Me too, on many levels! First, it is so ironic that all our transport restrictions on Li batteries was to prevent a mishap on an aircraft... now Boeing designs large format Li into their premier airframe, and what happens, and aircraft system initiated Li fire...

Next, to solve their problems perhaps we should send them a few rolls of Mil-Spec Chinese sourced, grey duct tape!! :mrgreen:

I would rather have you design my ebike battery than the people that designed the ones for the jets. That is for sure.

I bet it was young, well paid, college trained engineers that text a lot and goof off on the computer at work, that designed those jet battery packs ?
 
ebent said:
My understanding of lithium cobalt. Please correct me. L. cobalt is used in stuff like phones. It is the most dense of the chemistries. Which allows the most talk time, and a very high discharge rate. Because the demand of discharge from small devices they get warm but no fire or explosion. But if we used it on our ebikes, we would have lots of fires and worse. Is that the idea?

The RC LiCo (aka HobbyKing LiPo) is not used in a single consumer product that I'm aware of.
The "Consumer" LiCo is found in almost every consumer products: Laptop, GPS, camera, cell phone, etc... They are also used in commercially available ebike battery packs. They are also used the Tesla battery pack.

RC LiCo has a lower energy density than Consumer LiCo but a much higher discharge rate.
Consumer LiCo has a higher energy density but a much lower discharge rate.

Both of them are Lithium Cobalt Oxide (LiCo).
 
Thanks Sam. Every time I hear lipo I thought that was the chemistry. One more sliver of knowledge. On a relative basis lipo is volatile compared to most other chemistries. How much weight and space and ah would be lost if LiFePO4 was used instead? Isn't that the better solution?
 
ebent said:
Thanks Sam. Every time I hear lipo I thought that was the chemistry. One more sliver of knowledge. On a relative basis lipo is volatile compared to most other chemistries. How much weight and space and ah would be lost if LiFePO4 was used instead? Isn't that the better solution?

Surely those bozos that designed that pack and put it in a jet could have designed and built a LiFePO4 pack that could burn up too ?
 
Boeing 787= outsourcing lesson from hell
 
Takes notes all you MBA students and future CEO's.. Good case study here on globalization.
 
ebent said:
Thanks Sam. Every time I hear lipo I thought that was the chemistry. One more sliver of knowledge. On a relative basis lipo is volatile compared to most other chemistries. How much weight and space and ah would be lost if LiFePO4 was used instead? Isn't that the better solution?
You're welcome.

This HobbyKing popular pack
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__15521__Turnigy_5000mAh_4S1P_14_8v_20C_hardcase_pack.html
has 74Wh (3.7 * 4 * 5) and weighs 528g, so 140Wh/kg.

The LiFePo4 A123 20Ah pouch has 65Wh and weighs 496g, so 131Wh/kg

The Consumer LiCo Panasonic 18650 3.4Ah cell has 12.95Wh and weighs 45g, so 288Wh/kg.
 
Jason27 said:
Boeing 787= outsourcing lesson from hell

Amen to that. Have to spread around the fabrication pie to all the countries that are purchasers. Second fact that cannot be denied is the personal impact in past years of Alan Mulally. He was probably the best manager of complex aerospace systems since Warner Von Braun. He worked on the 777 program first as director of engineering and, from September 1992, as vice-president and general manager. The 777 as you know came in close to on time, and had a pretty good record. Alan is now CEO of Ford Motor Company, and I say proudly, the only american car company that did not need, nor take any bailout money.

The dreamliner has been a bust on schedule, I think it is 3 or 4 years late. Now problems with fuel leaks and major systems. Boeing has clearly lost something with Alan leaving.

I have never been an advocate of composite systems for high reliability, civilian systems. I guess we will see with the dreamliner as the years unfold. Our constant quest for efficiency is going to be our Achilles heel.
 
The thought that you can't make things in house is not true.

I just watched an interview on YouTube with the CEO of Tesla Elon Musk saying he found it cheaper to make the Tesla roadster and model S parts in house in California rather than outsource the parts. Obviously Boeing did the opposite.
 
bigmoose said:
Jason27 said:
Boeing 787= outsourcing lesson from hell

Amen to that. Have to spread around the fabrication pie to all the countries that are purchasers. Second fact that cannot be denied is the personal impact in past years of Alan Mulally. He was probably the best manager of complex aerospace systems since Warner Von Braun. He worked on the 777 program first as director of engineering and, from September 1992, as vice-president and general manager. The 777 as you know came in close to on time, and had a pretty good record. Alan is now CEO of Ford Motor Company, and I say proudly, the only american car company that did not need, nor take any bailout money.

The dreamliner has been a bust on schedule, I think it is 3 or 4 years late. Now problems with fuel leaks and major systems. Boeing has clearly lost something with Alan leaving.

I have never been an advocate of composite systems for high reliability, civilian systems. I guess we will see with the dreamliner as the years unfold. Our constant quest for efficiency is going to be our Achilles heel.

Our Achilles heel really is our workers goofing off at work texting and playing on the computers.

The younger workers do it so much. Half the day their face is looking at an I Phone texting. Boys and girls.

Those I phones are taking us down ?

The kids can't focus at work.

They are getting harder to train to do hi tech work that needs a lot of focus.

Those I Phones got their brains all over the place.
 
just waiting for the Tesla scare once the chemistry is connected
then I can buy back in
all stocks should be down if the longshoreman strike at the end of the month

The breakthrough with lithium-ion batteries was in the electrolyte material. Up until 1990 batteries were water-based. Researchers at Berkeley found that using an organic electrolyte led to dramatic increases in energy density, or the amount of energy in the package.
Lithium-ion batteries such as those used on the 787 have safeguards, such as controllers that trigger a shut-off if temperatures rise too much; vent built-up pressure; and prevent the batteries from bursting into flame.
A Boeing executive said the 787 has a redundant safety system with four controllers on the batteries, although that’s apparently not enough to prevent incidents and satisfy regulators.
Research continues into improving lithium-ion batteries, but the technology is now mature, said Jonathan Posner, associate professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Washington, who called the technology “a logical choice” for the 787.
“I don’t think Boeing would have used it if it wasn’t mature,” he said.
Posner said Boeing seems to have “an engineering issue that just has to be resolved. But I would be surprised if they don’t continue to use lithium-ion batteries in the 787.”
Different materials can be used in these batteries, some safer than others. Based on information posted on its website, Boeing supplier GS Yuasa appears to be using lithium cobalt oxide cathode material, which is the original material used by Sony.
“From a safety point of view, that’s not the best,” said Ji-Guang Zhang, a researcher at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland. He said cobalt oxide batteries ignite at lower temperature than batteries made with other materials, such as lithium ion phosphate.
Supplier GS Yuasa declined to discuss whether the batteries in question use cobalt oxide and referred questions to its partner Thales Group, which didn’t promptly respond.
Still, it’s all relative.
“Theoretically, it is safe,” Zhang said. “I think it is not less safe than a gasoline-powered engine. ... Gas is much easier to burn than batteries.”
Battaglia said lithium-ion phosphate “has been known to sort of be safer.” But he added that “nothing is safe — you’ve still got a lot of energy and an electrolyte in there that’s flammable.”
 
Dogman would have suggested they make the pack easy to get to in case of a fire ?

Heck, that should be the #1 lipo rule.

They had to hack a hole in the jet and it took 40 mins to put out the fire ?

I would rather Dogman design my battery pack than the bozos that designed that jet pack.

Dogman, Boeing needs you.
 
Yeah it should have been dumpable like a shit brick onto the runway. or onto a tether away from the plane if in flight. or at least designed where all fire was contained, and all smoke was vented to exterior of plane. All batteries can burn, lipo is just highly exothermic with huge toxic smoke. and i mean huge. and flames.

very ironic though with lithium shipping regs an all that.
 
Jason27 said:
The thought that you can't make things in house is not true.

I just watched an interview on YouTube with the CEO of Tesla Elon Musk saying he found it cheaper to make the Tesla roadster and model S parts in house in California rather than outsource the parts. Obviously Boeing did the opposite.

Tesla does not make their batteries in house.
 
hydro-one said:
Yeah it should have been dumpable like a shit brick onto the runway. or onto a tether away from the plane if in flight. or at least designed where all fire was contained, and all smoke was vented to exterior of plane. All batteries can burn, lipo is just highly exothermic with huge toxic smoke. and i mean huge. and flames.

very ironic though with lithium shipping regs an all that.

Right? shipping dangerous lithium batteries is apparently only OK when they're a critical part of the airplane. :lol:
 
Well publicised fires on board Boeing dreamliner planes, pretty serious and I would bet this is more down to how they are being charged and supported rather than the cells themselves.

I had to laugh though, on the news they showed a picture of the burnt batter box and said, this is the battery in question, its about the size of a shoebox, now this battery doesnt actually power the planes engines :lol: :lol: you dont say ha ha, its funny I said to the missus no a box of lipo that size just about powers my ebike :lol:

Its funny that the airlines for a long while have clamped down on the transportation of lipo in the cargo hold but seem to accept that its safe to use in the plane? bit of a double standard.

This is going to cost someone their job and a lot of money for sure.

130115233133-boeing-dreamliner-battery-story-top.jpg
 
Just wondering if cabin pressure could have anything to do with this. What if these lost pressure at altitude?
 
aroundqube said:
Just wondering if cabin pressure could have anything to do with this. What if these lost pressure at altitude?

Surely that would have been known though? They would have instruments to detect any loss in pressure.

There seems to be other problems with the 787 besides the batteries - cabin windows breaking, electrical problems, fuel leaks. The Toulousains must be delighted with Boeing's problems.

The batteries are getting most of the attention because they are exotic but there seems to be a widespread systems failure across unrelated areas. Something is seriously wrong. You can't easily imagine Boeing workers being so careless and their work would have to pass multiple checks - so that leaves design and manufacture.
 
Joseph C. said:
Surely that would have been known though? They would have instruments to detect any loss in pressure.

There seems to be other problems with the 787 besides the batteries - cabin windows breaking, electrical problems, fuel leaks. The must be delighted with Boeing's problems.

The batteries are getting most of the attention because they are exotic but there seems to be a widespread systems failure across unrelated areas. Something is seriously wrong. You can't easily imagine Boeing workers being so careless and their work would have to pass multiple checks - so that leaves design and manufacture.

Yeah cabin pressure was definitely not lost. But I don't think that the "Toulousains" can laugh after their problems with the A380 :p
 
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