Picture this, you're lying in bed as you wake up to the smell of something burning. Curious as to what it is you look over and see your nightstand on fire as your brand new Galaxy Note 7 is engulfed in flames. This was a real life nightmare for Samsung and many of their consumers. As many of you know, Samsung recently had to recall their Galaxy Note 7 due to a neat new feature they added to the phone. What could possibly be better than an exploding phone!? Hundreds of cases of the Note 7 overheating and some catching on fire or even exploding have been reported which led to a huge recall and devastating loss for Samsung. This was a dilemma across the globe. The FCC and airlines banned the Note 7 from all flights, including carry on and even checked luggage. At first the issue was unknown, but after Samsung looked into what could have caused the issue they came to a realization. As many of you could guess, it was the poorly made battery. After Samsung had recalled about 1 million out of the 2.5 million that were already manufactured, they began to make changes to the battery to resolve the issue and get the phones back on the market. As you can imagine, it was a mess for Samsung and their users throughout the globe. Samsung stopped all sales and shipments of the Note 7, and worked with government agencies and other corporations to provide refunds and exchanges for the device. Trying to resolve the issue the best they could, they started to send replacement phones to customers. Soon enough, there were even more cases of the phones exploding and catching fire.
So what caused the battery explosion?
The exploding battery was caused by a few contributing factors but the main issue was a short in the battery. Small devices like the Note 7 and many other if not all phones are powered by lithium ion batteries which consist of highly reactive and flammable elements such as lithium and carbon. These elements are able to store energy in the form of positive and negative electrodes which are separated only by an extremely thin piece of micro-perforated plastic. In the first batch of defective batteries, the positive and negative layers were squished at the top right of the battery, and part of the negative layer was pushed into the positive layer which caused a short and resulted in a phone on fire. After a few reported cases of this, Samsung recalled all the phones and soon issued replacement phones and shortly after even those phones began to explode. Due to constant competition between the companies that manufacture cell phone batteries, these batteries are packed as tightly as possible. The more layers packed into the battery, the more powerful it will be. Different from the last defect, these batteries were said to be packed too tight and the layers separating the positive and negative poles were punctured. The defect in the second batch of batteries was once again, poor manufacturing of the batteries. The manufacturer did a poor job welding the positive layer with the rest of the battery, and left a small piece of material loose inside the battery. With the battery being pressed so tightly together, it was basically a ticking time bomb. With some of them worse than others, it was only a matter of time before the poor construction gave and the extremely flammable chemicals inside caught fire. There is also a process called “plating” in which the lithium ions inside the batteries start to coat the surface of the negative contact. In some extreme cases such as in some the Note 7 explosions (second defect), the lithium metal that coats the contacts forms tiny spikes (called “dendrites”) that can puncture the separator creating a short circuit. In some of the batteries, the insulation tape that insulates the two layers (positive and negative) was completely missing which leads to a defective battery.
The second production of defective batteries is what really hit the nail on the head for Samsung. How will customers react when the Note 8 arrives? Fearful of another explosive phone? Hopefully not, Samsung has big plans to perfect their devices from now on. They will do so by implementing a new battery testing protocol that should make phones safer and prevent any unseen issues along with upgrading their staff and be more cautious of design flaws. Profits suffered for Samsung, it is said the recall ran the company about $5 billion in all. Samsung hopes the Note 8 will help buyers forget about the Note 7 woes.
Links:
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
https://www.cnet.com/news/samsung-galaxy-note-7-return-exchange-faq/
So what caused the battery explosion?
The exploding battery was caused by a few contributing factors but the main issue was a short in the battery. Small devices like the Note 7 and many other if not all phones are powered by lithium ion batteries which consist of highly reactive and flammable elements such as lithium and carbon. These elements are able to store energy in the form of positive and negative electrodes which are separated only by an extremely thin piece of micro-perforated plastic. In the first batch of defective batteries, the positive and negative layers were squished at the top right of the battery, and part of the negative layer was pushed into the positive layer which caused a short and resulted in a phone on fire. After a few reported cases of this, Samsung recalled all the phones and soon issued replacement phones and shortly after even those phones began to explode. Due to constant competition between the companies that manufacture cell phone batteries, these batteries are packed as tightly as possible. The more layers packed into the battery, the more powerful it will be. Different from the last defect, these batteries were said to be packed too tight and the layers separating the positive and negative poles were punctured. The defect in the second batch of batteries was once again, poor manufacturing of the batteries. The manufacturer did a poor job welding the positive layer with the rest of the battery, and left a small piece of material loose inside the battery. With the battery being pressed so tightly together, it was basically a ticking time bomb. With some of them worse than others, it was only a matter of time before the poor construction gave and the extremely flammable chemicals inside caught fire. There is also a process called “plating” in which the lithium ions inside the batteries start to coat the surface of the negative contact. In some extreme cases such as in some the Note 7 explosions (second defect), the lithium metal that coats the contacts forms tiny spikes (called “dendrites”) that can puncture the separator creating a short circuit. In some of the batteries, the insulation tape that insulates the two layers (positive and negative) was completely missing which leads to a defective battery.
The second production of defective batteries is what really hit the nail on the head for Samsung. How will customers react when the Note 8 arrives? Fearful of another explosive phone? Hopefully not, Samsung has big plans to perfect their devices from now on. They will do so by implementing a new battery testing protocol that should make phones safer and prevent any unseen issues along with upgrading their staff and be more cautious of design flaws. Profits suffered for Samsung, it is said the recall ran the company about $5 billion in all. Samsung hopes the Note 8 will help buyers forget about the Note 7 woes.
Links:
https://www.cnet.com/news/why-is-samsung-galaxy-note-7-exploding-overheating/
https://www.cnet.com/news/samsung-galaxy-note-7-return-exchange-faq/
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