Samsung Galaxy S II Burns Inside Man's Pants

[Guest]

whole thing seems a bit suspicious to me. mostly because of the timing of this incident, and which brand of phone it happened to.

 

[Vladislaus]

[citation][nom]sam buddy[/nom]I'd like to know more details about this incident. I'm really curious if sweat had something to do with it. Sweat seems to be a problem for many smartphones, and seeing the burn at the battery connection, it could easily be a short circuit due to that.A friends iPhone3G stopped functioning because of sweat. After drying it up, he had to take it at a repair shop for a thorough clean-up, and they had to replace something. But no burning or anything serious in this case.BTW, these incidents should be reported, so people can take measures and protect themselves, and companies test their products more. This is not bashing, and the Apple reference is for an incident already reported days ago on Tom's. Good job Marcus for linking it to this article also, so anyone who missed it can get informed.At least, chargers seem to have stabilised, they used to blow-up while charging idling phones. Batteries need more attention, though.[/citation]
This king of incidents usually are very rare freak accidents and most of the time unpredictable. Batteries nowadays have a very high energy density and when something goes wrong with them they have a nasty tendency to overheat and sometimes catch fire and/or explode.

 

[Guest]

Solution for this is current limiting circuitry in the batteries - starting with a fuse. This is not a hard problem to fix - probably cost them $.50/phone.

 

[Guest]

At least the phone is appropriately named 'Skyrocket', the user clearly interrupted the initial count-down launch phase.

 

[kcorp2003]

probably one of the battery cell chamber was leaking. there's always few bad apples in the bunch. Anyways the product line needs to be reviewed.

 

[drwho1]

"Samsung Galaxy S II Burns Inside Man's Pants"

Must have been downloading Porn.

 

[tanjo]

Defamation!!!!

From the looks of it, the plastic part only melted... probably below 90C. His pants is still safe though. Overcharged intentionally or extremely high humidity.

 

[nebun]

[citation][nom]billybobser[/nom]NOT HOLDING IT RIGHT[/citation]
i think his penis got in the way

 

[nebun]

this is why Samsung should stick to making tvs and home appliances

 

[nebun]

[citation][nom]AbdullahG[/nom]What the heck is wrong with smartphones now a days? First the iPhone, now the SII? No one is safe![/citation]
actually they are very safe, just think of how many millions of cell phones are out there in use every second

 

[phexac]

[citation][nom]del35[/nom]Ummmm, me think that guy was working for iCrapple. Recently one of those crappy locked down retro coffin phones Apple puts out, the iPhone 4s, caught fire in a plane. So iCrap probably was looking for an major event with the most popular phone in the market, The Samsung Galaxy 2S. So obviously we had to have one of those phones burn in someone's pockets... It is called media manipulation.[/citation]

Yep, knew it was only a matter of time before anti-Apple trolls made Samsung's phone melting down somehow Apple's fault.

 

[cTs Corvette]

I'm always suspicious of stories on the internet that begin with "My friend" or "A friend of mine."

 

[Guest]

This looks like a short between 2 of the 3 contactors on the battery. Maybe he allowed a spent staple inside the case and it shorted or.... A conductive liquid was allowed inside the case and it shorted. Weird.

 

[ericburnby]

[citation][nom]olaf[/nom]Apple fan-boys at there best One incident with possible attenuating circumstances does not make for a recall. Four pictures cant tell you the whole story. Side note : it might be a lesson learned not to keep battery's next to your privates.[/citation]
Oh how soon we forget. Go back to the recent Apple iPhone that had a battery burn on an Australian airline and see how many people were claiming it's time for Apple to investigate, issue a recall or that it was due to lousy quality control.

 

[rantoc]

Looking at the pictures it seem it wasn't any flames present but rather smoke. Even when the miniaturization usually raises heat due to tightly packed components it also helps preventing fire as there usually aren't much oxygen to be find around the hot spot that could cause flames. Its fun to read the extreme hysteria as soon as a single accident happens (no matter the brand), considering how many millions of phones there are and how few times they have major malfunctions like this its way more dangerous to pass a road crossing but how often does the medias write about that?

 

[razor512]

It may not be an issue with the design of the phone. i have seen similar issues like happen.

some people will keep extra li-ion batteries in a book bag and over time dirt will build up on the connector, then they will simply swap batteries with out examining the connectors.

the end results is burns on the plastic and corrosion of the connectors (though not as bad as in that picture)

there is a reason why many companies list in the user manual to clean the electrical connectors regularly.

if the connectors were clean and that happened then it may be an issue with the wiring or build quality of the connectors causing improper contact which allows the connector to heat up too much. (eg connect a 9V battery to an electric motor, then using braided copper wire, separate a single strand then tap that to the battery, you will see the wire heat up and turn red

this will happen in a phone if the battery makes poor contact, of further inside there is a poor solder joint.

 

[Uberragen21]

Don't blame the phone when the problem lies with the battery. There will always be defective products made, and batteries are no exception. When lithium ion batteries are defective, the lithium will smolder and burn.

Watch this video, it's pretty cool and shows how damaged lithium ion batteries will produce an exothermic reaction.
Lithium Ion Batteries - Fire and Explosions

 

[joytech22]

Well it was obviously a short of some sort at the battery connector.

If my Galaxy did the same thing, I wouldn't feel it for a while, the screen faces my leg and the battery compartment faces the other way, I do that to protect the screen from damage.

I might notice the warmth coming in through the screen though.

 

[nieur]

he must paid by apple

 

[sam buddy]

[citation][nom]Vladislaus[/nom]This king of incidents usually are very rare freak accidents and most of the time unpredictable. Batteries nowadays have a very high energy density and when something goes wrong with them they have a nasty tendency to overheat and sometimes catch fire and/or explode.[/citation]

I totally agree on that, a few accidents in tens of millions of devices are rare, indeed. Still, raising awareness might help people avoid such incidents. I do believe the cause of both Galaxy and iPhone incidents to be a battery fault, not a phone design issue.