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    Swollen power bank

    Rechargeable power bank for cellphone etc has swollen up and broke open the plastic case. It's expanded so that I can't press the sides of the shell together. There's no leakage. It was in a fabric pouch, so easy to tell. No warmth or heat.

    Pressing the test button lights up the charge indicator lights. Seems to be fully charged.

    I've had it for maybe five years. Used only a couple of times. Kept charged. Last checked within the last two months.

    Any idea what happened? Is it dangerous, getting ready to explode?
    Attached Files
    Last edited by Curious808; 09-23-2022, 04:40 PM.

    #2
    Re: Swollen power bank

    i believe its trapped gas .. i have heard stories of freezing them to reduce the size .

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      #3
      Re: Swollen power bank

      It's generated gas. It's usually designed strong enough to withstand any gas generated but generated gas means that much less active ingredients. Plus gases where things used to touch will no longer touch and there's capacity loss.

      Main danger is if you puncture it, it will pop like a balloon and leak out flammable gases. There's only so much of it in there so it's not that much of a hazard.

      Get ready to replace the pack.

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        #4
        Re: Swollen power bank

        i think it's hydrogen.

        it looks like a stack of cells - are they all like that?

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          #5
          Re: Swollen power bank

          I doubt it's hydrogen, this is a waste of lithium if it's hydrogen.

          Rather it's more likely electrolyte decomposition. The electrolyte is organic and flammable, and usually organic compounds will decompose to some oxide of carbon. Since there's empty space, some of the electrolyte will also vaporize and mix with the gaseous decomposition components. The sum of it all will be flammable because of the electrolyte component.

          BTW if it were hydrogen, it will likely diffuse through the package and will deflate fairly quickly, faster than a Mylar helium balloon (though clearly slower than a latex helium balloon.)
          Last edited by eccerr0r; 09-24-2022, 10:21 AM.

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            #6
            Re: Swollen power bank

            Originally posted by eccerr0r View Post
            It's generated gas. It's usually designed strong enough to withstand any gas generated but generated gas means that much less active ingredients. Plus gases where things used to touch will no longer touch and there's capacity loss.

            Main danger is if you puncture it, it will pop like a balloon and leak out flammable gases. There's only so much of it in there so it's not that much of a hazard.

            Get ready to replace the pack.
            ^This, that is basically the standard failure mode of Lithium-Ion Polymer (LiPo) "pouch cell" batteries, and most will eventually fail like this at some point (though some just die without swelling as well). Though how long it takes can be a crap-shoot, I have a circa 2006 2nd gen iPod nano that still has its original LiPo battery which still works (albeit with about 50% of its original runtime) with no swelling evident, and I've also had a couple LiPo phone batteries fail like this at only 2-3 years old (granted an "always-on" product like a cell phone gets allot more wear on the battery).
            Last edited by dmill89; 09-24-2022, 01:24 PM.

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              #7
              Re: Swollen power bank

              apple used to say that you can charge a lipo about 500 times

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                #8
                Re: Swollen power bank

                Those batteries are history and you need to carefully remove them from the battery pack and dispose them properly and find some replacement battery cells use the numbers on the battery cells and do a Google search for them you probably can find them on EBay but be aware that they more than likely are Chinese made batteries and there quality is questionable at best so if you can find them and you are not paying much for them

                At least the ones that are very puffed up those will be ones that are history
                The other ones might still be good but like I said earlier be careful removing the one that is for sure is bad

                Probably being over charged is most likely the cause of it puffing up like that one other cause is if you pulled a lot of current for a certain amount of time can also cause this to have as well
                Last edited by sam_sam_sam; 09-25-2022, 06:46 AM.
                9 PC LCD Monitor
                6 LCD Flat Screen TV
                30 Desk Top Switching Power Supply
                10 Battery Charger Switching Power Supply for Power Tool
                6 18v Lithium Battery Power Boards for Tool Battery Packs
                1 XBox 360 Switching Power Supply and M Board
                25 Servo Drives 220/460 3 Phase
                6 De-soldering Station Switching Power Supply 1 Power Supply
                1 Dell Mother Board
                15 Computer Power Supply
                1 HP Printer Supply & Control Board * lighting finished it *


                These two repairs where found with a ESR meter...> Temp at 50*F then at 90*F the ESR reading more than 10%

                1 Over Head Crane Current Sensing Board ( VFD Failure Five Years Later )
                2 Hem Saw Computer Stack Board

                All of these had CAPs POOF
                All of the mosfet that are taken out by bad caps

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