“Small defects in the manufacturing or materials stream lead to the plus/minus sides of the batteries being shorted with each other after a small amount of use. “If there is an inherent defect in the cell, it will go off at some point,” Whitacre explains. “These are known as ‘low cost li-ion batteries’ by most in the industry-they are not knockoffs or copies, but are instead just mass-manufactured cells.” “There are a lot of factories in China that now make Li-ion batteries, and the reality is that the quality and consistency of these batteries is typically not as good as what is found in top tier producers such as LG or Samsung,” Whitacre says. Predictably, a slew of cut-rate brands are flooding the market with shoddy scooters made from cheapo components. They’re cheap, and it makes sense: This is a hot (pun not intended) holiday product, the reputable models are pretty expensive, and more-affordable brands are using cheaper components to lure in shoppers that don’t want to spend a grand or more on a hands-free Segway. Jay Whitacre, Professor of Materials Science & Engineering at Carnegie Mellon University, says that the problem doesn’t have to do with these self-balancing scooters themselves, but with the quality of the batteries being used. They’re just a lot more prone to defects. They’re almost always tucked in one of the foot rests, and they work the same way as the lithium-ion batteries in our smartphones, tablets, and laptops. Plugged in or not, the big problem has to do with the quality of the rechargeable lithium-ion batteries inside these things. In the mall incident, the board wasn’t plugged in at all there have also been reports of scooters bursting into flames while people were riding them. The perceived danger is significant enough that major airlines have banned the little vehicles altogether.īut what is actually causing all these fires? In the New York and Louisiana incidents, the board was plugged in and recharging. At a mall in Washington this week, a scooterboard caught fire and shoppers were forced to evacuate. A gyroboard caused significant damage to a home in New York a few days ago. But that's not the strangest thing about them-that would be the fact that this year's most popular holiday gift keeps catching on fire.Īn exploding two-wheeler burned down a house in Louisiana a few weeks ago another scooter combusted in the same state in the past week. Those self-balancing scooters that everyone’s calling “ hoverboards” don’t actually hover.
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