Battery Grenade Goes Off On Duty Belt

[TKO]

This happened three days ago. I just got permission to release some info on this.

Good thing the kid was wearing body armor and had a quick thinking partner or it would have been bad.

I don't have times to post details right now, but here are some pics.

 

[Daniel_sk]

No surprise, cheap batteries from China...:green:.

 

[Illum]

Ouch....
Thank god for that body armor, burns from metal fires is worse than ordinary burns.

W[T]F batteries....

 

[stitch_paradox]

Any information why it happened?

 

[NoFair]

Good thing no one was inured. :thumbsup:

I've never seen a battery of that brand to test ok. My HDS refuses them at once. :sick2:

Buy decent cells, Surefire usually has good LEO discounts and since it is a duty light buying a large box would probably make sense.

Sverre

 

[Gunnerboy]

Crappy batteries. I recall seeing them on DX's site. :shakehead

 

[carrot]

No surprise. You buy crappy batteries, you get burnt.

A thorough and very careful cleaning will probably make that Surefire like new again.

 

[Manzerick]

Wow!! That is horrible!!


My worst fear if for my EDC to pop like that!!!

 

[jufam44]

Wow! I'm glad nothing more serious happened with a like that! Please post details when you can.

-Max

 

[Jay T]

If you look at the "reviews" for WF batteries on dealextreme's site a common comment is "why pay more?". Hmmm.

 

[gary3911]

They should change the brand name of the batteries from "WF" to "WTF".

 

[Flash_Gordon]

Glad you are OK. Uniform bits can be replaced. It could have been in your hand.

How many more lessons about cheap cells do we all need? Please, this is not a place to economize. Your use of the term grenade can be quite accurate.

Mark

 

[WildChild]

I will say like Size15 would say, a SureFire should always be fed by american made CR123A. It happened too many times with cheap China cells... Thanksfully, you were not injured!

 

[pbs357]

They should change the brand name of the batteries from "WF" to "WTF".

Ok I'll only laugh at that because no-one was seriously injured. Seriously though that comment is funny as hell.

Regarding cheap gear, I agree that "you get what you pay for" only allows skimping cost vs quality when there are no danger risks involved. For example, I keep a few of the DX LED drop-ins around, but at worst they'll do is, well... NOTHING, when I need them to light up. Batteries have so much stored energy, PTC protection and a reliable company name behind them are essential. I can't imagine the WF brand standing behind this incident to "make it right." Glad nobody was seriously hurt, and my prayers go out to that C2...I'm sure he'll pull through, tough little bugger.

 

[Raoul_Duke]

They should change the brand name of the batteries from "WF" to "WTF".

Funny :naughty: :twothumbs

Scarry thing is about 4 years ago I went through a box or two of these at least, maybee ~50 in total, one leaked before even using, other than that everything was OK.

I dont use any primaries anymore, and prefer Emoli for my hotwires, although I do have a few cheap RCR 123's in my E2D.

 

[250]

The quick story is that the guy had been using the light and it failed. he probably thought it was the bulb and went on with his duties. Some time later (which I can't remember, I;ll edit it tomorrow) the SF got hot and burnt his shirt.

Someone stated the batts were cheap ones from China. Any one have more specific details. I wold like to forward specific information to the investigating Sgt., unless TKO is closely involved. I almost made a dupe but luckily checked before I sent my post I would hate for the Department to forbid certain lights (Surefire) because they think they are unsafe.

Thanks

 

[Mr Happy]

To evaluate whether something is safe, you need to consider both the likely frequency of a failure occurring, and the level of harm such a failure could produce if it did occur. So you could have a failure that happens frequently with minimal consequences, or a failure that happens infrequently but with serious consequences if it did. Either could be considered equally "safe" or "unsafe".

Lithium batteries like the CR123A contain a significant amount of lithium metal, and on failure are like incendiary grenades. They therefore fall into the infrequent but severe consequences category.

I imagine devices using lithium primary batteries would be considered unsafe for use in an environment involving danger from ignition sources or where there is significant fire risk. Neither should they be used in confined spaces where the fumes from combustion could pose a problem.

This is just my opinion of course, but there have been enough documented instances of combusting lithium cells to cause various restrictions on transport of them by air (where confined spaces and danger from ignition sources are known problems).

 

[SilverFox]

Hello 250,

Basically we have observed that there are inconsistencies in some of the cells made in China. Uneven cells in a multi cell application can cause a cell to "rapidly vent, sometimes with flames."

There has been some testing on this, and we were unable to get the "premium" brands to exhibit the same behavior.

There is speculation that the purity of materials used in the batteries may be causing the problems, but we really don't know for sure.

While all batteries have this potential, there are very few reported incidents of these problems occurring with the "premium" brand cells.

Your department should stock up on Panasonic, SureFire, RayOVac, Streamlight, Duracell, Energizer, Sanyo, or BatteryStation cells for multi cell use. The other cells are fine for single cell use.

Tom

 

[this_is_nascar]

I'm glad the person is OK, what what do you expect? You get what you pay for. So how much money did the company think they saved by purchasing these cheap-a** cells?

 

[kongfuchicken]

Agreed with Silverfox.
Never use cells with different levels of charge in the same multi-cell light.
Invest into a battery tester and take 5 minutes of your time to find the duds in your stash. Use them in single cell lights or toss them if you don't have any.
You most likely won't find any if you use usa made brands but I guarantee you that if you use cheap imported cells, you'll find at least one.

The effort greatly outweigh the risk, in this case a burn hole in place of your shirt pocket.