Originally Posted by
PhotoJoe
Our problem was there was an internal short that didn't allow the charger to sense the full charge. So, it kept charging, and charging.....and charging.....then burning. This happened late afternoon on a Friday. Had it happened a couple of hours later or on Sat/Sun, we would have lost the whole place. We used to leave about 10,000wh worth of batteries on charge at all times. NOT ANYMORE! Now, we charge only before they ship on a job, in a safe area.
And don't even get me started on shipping lithium-ion! What a headache. If you ship/check a "medium-size" lithium-ion on a plane, there a million rules and regs in place, special labels, packing procedures, training, etc. that are federal law with IATA and FAA, however, no airline is required to accept any shipment with any lithium-ion. The ramp agent can deny any shipment that he/she doesn't want to take responsibility for. So, if you have a decent size lithium-ion battery powered lighting system and ship it with your bike, you have to declare it. It may or may not be accepted.
When charging even a small 200MAH lipo or li-ion "hobby-sized" cells at home with a top of the line charger standard operating procedure is to place the battery in an ammo box or similar.
I couldn't imagine charging a 160wh battery 24/7 at in the middle of a workplace without some sort of special safety regulations in place. When that battery explodes its going to be an occurence not an accident.