TSA banning certain batteries

lebox97

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Re: TSA on lithium batteries

nothing new there...
"....the Federal Aviation Administration has studied fire hazards associated with both primary and lithium-ion cells, and their extensive research is publicly available. As a result of this research, the FAA no longer allows large, palletized shipments of these batteries to be transported as cargo on passenger aircraft." (my bold and underline)

leave your pallets of lithium-ion cells at home - stick to carry on/arm loads, and you'll be fine :crackup::D

(FYI, I recently carried on a unopened Costco Eneloop charger/battery case onto an airplane and security did not glance at it twice)
 
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Alan B

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This confirms a thought I had recently. We now need spare battery carriers that are also flashlights, so they are not considered "spare". Just a pushbutton and low power LED/resistor to make it a legal flashlight.

I wish they would just require TSA approved spare battery carriers.

So, save all your old flashlights for carrying spare batteries.

Anyone have any 8xCR123 lights ??

Convert everything to NiMH.

-- Alan
 

65535

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I just flew on both the 19th from LAX and the 24th from Florida International and neither my U2 E1e or my 4 spare cells got even a first look, let alone a second.
 

ErickThakrar

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well, if you'd read the article it does state that it's effective from January 1st, 2008. And if the batteries contain more than 2 grams of lithium they're outright banned, installed or not, spare or not. So the real question is... How much lithium in weight is there in a CR123?
 

MikeLip

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Was there a sudden rash of downed airliners caused by lithiums that I was unaware of, or is this yet another example of government solving a non-existent problem?
 

ErickThakrar

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I'm thinking it was probably brought on, atleast in part, by the couple of incidents were lithiums exploded in a flashlight. Remember that happened a year or two ago, I think in LA?
 

ampdude

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What about all the lithium ion batteries in everything from cell phones to laptops. Those are more dangerous. Are those okay? :crackup:
 

cave dave

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More info:

From "banned" website: "For a lithium metal battery, whether installed in a device or carried as a spare, the limit on lithium content is 2 grams of lithium metal per battery. Almost all consumer-type lithium metal batteries are below 2 grams of lithium metal."

A CR123 contains about 4.2 Watt-hours. so if 8g of lithium is about 100 Wh then a CR123 would have a li content of about 0.34g
 
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ErickThakrar

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One, this is obviously NOT referring to carrying pallets of batteries.
Two, this is also not referring to that previous thread.

And thirdly, from the horses mouth: http://safetravel.dot.gov/whats_new_batteries.html

It does say that "almost all consumer batteries" are below 2 grams of lithium per battery. I would be very interested in finding out exactly how much there is in the different types. Same for Li-Ions. Not just SWAGing it but actual numbers. There's no telling how accurate the TSAs listed numbers are.
 

depusm12

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Well I flew out on the 21st of Dec and back on the 27th of Dec and had a total of 18 Li-Ion rechagable batteries and 2 chargers and cords in my carry on 2 in my Typhoon, 2 in my SF C2 and 6 in a SF spares carrier and 8 in a spares carrier. TSA never blinked and eyelid.
 

Timaxe

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The main restrictions appear to deal with checked baggage. I usually carry-on all of my spare batteries.

That said, the actual TSA website uses some "equivilent lithium content" unit. Using that we can derive how much is in the CR123...

The limits are expressed in grams of "equivalent lithium content." 8 grams of equivalent lithium content is approximately 100 watt-hours. 25 grams is approximately 300 watt-hours:
A CR123 primary has 3.0v nominal voltage, and I would guess 1300mAH capacity. Which is equal to 3.9 watt-hours. I think what they mean by Lithium Metal batteries are Lithium Primaries, so you have a 2 gram limit PER CELL. 2 grams would be equivalent of approximately 25 watt-hours. So unless you had a 8000mAH 3.0v Lithium Primary, these new rules won't affect you. (Note, there are apparently some Lithium Primary C cells that would have more than 2 grams, but note that these are primaries, aka non-rechargeable. I don't think they're popular at CPF.)

Now let's have a look at Lithium-Ion batteries. Apparently as long as these have less than 8 grams of Lithium Content you aren't affected. What capacity is this for 3.7v Lithium-Ions? 27,000mAH for a 3.7v Lithium-Ion is equivalent to 8 grams. My 3.7v AW C cells are only 12.21 watt hours, or about 1 gram each. Unless I had an 8x Lithium-C light (or RC car), I wouldn't bump into the 8 gram limit. But since each cell is below the 8 gram limit, technically I could have as many of those floating around as I like the way I read it.

Let's just hope we don't run into screeners who don't know about batteries trying to confiscate our large cells. I fly on the 4th, so I guess I'll see first hand, though to be honest they've never even blinked at my camera bag (with lots of Lithium batteries, electronics, flashlights, flashes, amateur radio equipment, etc).
 
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paulr

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I think there are some largish laptop batteries in the 100 WH range. My camcorder pack is around 60 WH so two of them would be over the limit.
 

SilverFox

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Please note:

The term "up to 2 g of lithium" includes the range 0 - 2 g.

Primary lithium cells have lithium metal in them. Sanyo lists 0.57 g of lithium in a CR123 cell.

Li-Ion cells do not have lithium metal in them. To convert to an equivalent lithium metal content, you need to multiply the capacity in Amp Hours by 0.3. If you have an 18650 2400 mAh cell, it would be classified as having the equivalent of 0.72 g of lithium metal.

Tom
 

ltiu

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