Experimental investigation and visualization on thermal runaway of hard prismatic lithium-ion batteries used in smart phones

In this study, we demonstrate first time the application of confinement tests under excessive heating to track the thermal responses during the thermal runaway in hard prismatic lithium-ion batteries used in smart phones. Seven hard prismatic lithium-ion batteries used in smart phones of iPhone 5, iPhone 6, Redmi 2, SAMSUNG Note 3, SAMSUNG S5, SONY C3 and SONY Z3 at full-charged state have been studied. Characteristics in relation to thermodynamics such as onset temperature, crucial temperature, maximum self-heat rate and maximum temperature are measured and assessed. SAMSUNG S5 shall carry the most unstable feature with an exothermic onset temperature as low as 117 A degrees C. SAMSUNG Note 3 displays the worst-case scenario by possessing the maximum temperature and maximum self-heat rate reaching the extremity of 675.6 A degrees C and 11,860.0 A degrees C min(-1).