SDS100/SDS200: **SAFETY ALERT** SDS100 battery severely swelled

[darkness975]

So since I only have the one battery and it is inside my scanner and I often let it charge overnight / daytime when not home do I need to be concerned that my scanner is going to blow up and destroy all of my valuable and my pets or what? How prevalent is this issue of nuclear meltdown batteries?

What about leaving it plugged in for however long even when the light is green?

I don't have "charge while scanning" set, it only charges when the scanner is off.

I have not opened it up since I installed it.

Maybe I should just take the stupid battery out and use AC power, since I do that most of the time anyway. That would be a detriment for grabbing it and taking it mobile in the car though.

I have a HomePatrol II that has had the same weird Chinese batteries for years (since 2015) in it. I don't use it on battery power and rarely charge it (only when it tells me it's too low to use the recording feature).

I leave it on all day and most of the night recording.

 

[darkness975]

For those with swollen batteries, I'm curious where your voltage alert preference is set. I saw a post on the SDS Facebook group where someone mentioned setting theirs to 3.2 volts and had no issues. I'm not an electrical engineer, nor do I own an SDS100 (yet), but what I've read over the years is that over-discharging lithium cells is very bad for them. It's hard to see Uniden allowing an alert setting that would compromise the cell life, but 3.2 volts seems like a pretty deep discharge for Li-ion or LiPo. What do you battery experts think?
.

I think the lowest you can set the low battery charge alert is 3.2V.

 

[buddrousa]

So since I only have the one battery and it is inside my scanner and I often let it charge overnight / daytime when not home do I need to be concerned that my scanner is going to blow up and destroy all of my valuable and my pets or what? How prevalent is this issue of nuclear meltdown batteries?

What about leaving it plugged in for however long even when the light is green?

I don't have "charge while scanning" set, it only charges when the scanner is off.

I have not opened it up since I installed it.

Maybe I should just take the stupid battery out and use AC power, since I do that most of the time anyway. That would be a detriment for grabbing it and taking it mobile in the car though.

I have a HomePatrol II that has had the same weird Chinese batteries for years (since 2015) in it. I don't use it on battery power and rarely charge it (only when it tells me it's too low to use the recording feature).

Please read post #59

 

[darkness975]

I need some help identifying if my battery, the smaller one, is having this problem please. I am legally blind and I cannot tell. But it looks like it is possible my battery might be swelling up in these photos I just took.

In these photos, I have the battery sitting in the cover that would go over the smaller battery if it were installed in the radio right now. In one of the pictures it is sitting on a blanket that mysteriously started getting holes in it about a month ago. I'm wondering if some of the battery acid had leaked out back when I had the battery sitting on the blanket before putting it away until just now finding it to take some pictures. The holes I am talking about are not the issue and they are not in the picture but in the second picture I am holding the bottom of the case or cover and turning it at an angle so that others can see what I think I am seeing with the deformity of the battery inside of the case cover.

Maybe this all is normal looking but to me it looks like the bottom corners are crimping as if the battery could be swelling causing the crimping. But I just can't tell with my vision so I hope somebody can help. Thank you.

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Brian (COMMSCAN)

Why does your battery look like it's been chewed on by a mouse? It looks like the case is flaking off.

 

[mule1075]

So since I only have the one battery and it is inside my scanner and I often let it charge overnight / daytime when not home do I need to be concerned that my scanner is going to blow up and destroy all of my valuable and my pets or what? How prevalent is this issue of nuclear meltdown batteries?

What about leaving it plugged in for however long even when the light is green?

I don't have "charge while scanning" set, it only charges when the scanner is off.

I have not opened it up since I installed it.

Maybe I should just take the stupid battery out and use AC power, since I do that most of the time anyway. That would be a detriment for grabbing it and taking it mobile in the car though.

I have a HomePatrol II that has had the same weird Chinese batteries for years (since 2015) in it. I don't use it on battery power and rarely charge it (only when it tells me it's too low to use the recording feature).

I leave it on all day and most of the night recording.

It is only happening when the battery is stored outside the scanner. It happened also with a few Unication batteries awhile if I remember correctly.

 

[darkness975]

Please read post #59

Post #59 didn't exist when I was originally typing my reply above.

But I see it now, thanks.

 

[FoeHammer]

Well Like I said having used multi cell lipos in many rc drones & trucks , If you understand the proper care & handling of lipos , they are safe to use ,..For me with my rc equipment , I never fully discharge,.. & when not using the battery I put it on a storage charge & keep it in a cool dry place (military ammo can) & of course use a smart balance charge to make sure the cells are equalized on multicell batteries & never leave a charging battery unattended ,..Now I do not have a SDS radio yet , I do not know if the battery is single cell or not ,what the recommended charge rate is , or how the firmware handles charging , measures individual cells or heat etc . I use a smart charger similar to this one for my rc batteries ,..I have no idea if unidens charger would have these types of capabilities

 

[mule1075]

Also I do not recommend leaving anything charging while you are away. I do not leave anything charging even if leaving only for a few minutes.

 

[buddrousa]

I let the battery fully charged on my desk as posted also I had 2 RC batteries fail stored fully charged.

 

[letarotor]

Why does your battery look like it's been chewed on by a mouse? It looks like the case is flaking off.

Haha no idea about that. I had been keeping it in a zipper pouch on the side of a camera / radio bag. I don't really see what you are referring to but that doesn't mean it's not there I never took it out of the radio until I got mine larger replacement battery and then I just set it in the battery compartment case cover, left it sitting on the coffee table for about a week, and then put it into the zipper pouch on the bag. I took it out a few times but never did use it. It was going to be my backup battery for trips but now I'm going to be contacting Uniden about it.

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Brian (COMMSCAN)

 

[sparklehorse]

Please read all post. This happened after they were stored not in the scanners.

I understand that. My question relates to the theory I'm exploring that letting the battery discharge to 3.2 volts can possibly damage it, thereby causing a subsequent failure, whether stored in a desk drawer or the radio or wherever.
.

 

[buddrousa]

Well I had it set to 3.3 and only let the run down 4 times in its life. So the battery only had 4 full cycles.

 

[WeBeCinYa]

Yep, I wasn't using it anyway.

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It’s been working flawlessly. Now I’ve got to go check on my big battery. Haven’t used it since.
I run mine down to 3.2 and charge up. I prefer the small battery.


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[mrkelso]

Thank you for your reply Mike. I took a number of photos here and I'm posting a link to where they can be seen on my Google Photos account. I believe I did what you were mentioning and hopefully some of these will be the type of images that can be helpful. I took photos with both the flash off and on just so there would be a better chance of getting what was needed. I do notice that at one end of my battery the metal portion seems to taper down and have some crimped looking edges. Maybe that is normal? It's not uniformly flat the whole way across but it does look relatively flat and level up until the point where it tapers down on one end. Thank you for your help and I sure do appreciate you taking the time to do it. Here is the link to about 10 or so photographs that will hopefully help determine if the battery looks safe or not?

https://photos.app.goo.gl/xL1UzXu8hSYJ4qn97

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Brian (COMMSCAN)

In my Humble opinion, it looks like the crease on the one side of the metal flat bottom is starting to bulge a little causing the indentation.

 

[eaf1956]

Haha no idea about that. I had been keeping it in a zipper pouch on the side of a camera / radio bag. I don't really see what you are referring to but that doesn't mean it's not there I never took it out of the radio until I got mine larger replacement battery and then I just set it in the battery compartment case cover, left it sitting on the coffee table for about a week, and then put it into the zipper pouch on the bag. I took it out a few times but never did use it. It was going to be my backup battery for trips but now I'm going to be contacting Uniden about it.

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Brian (COMMSCAN)

If Uniden already sent you a bigger replacement battery. Why on God's green earth do you feel like you need to contact them about the old one? Do you think they are required to replace a battery that they already replaced? Just my 2 cents...

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[KevinC]

If Uniden already sent you a bigger replacement battery. Why on God's green earth do you feel like you need to contact them about the old one? Do you think they are required to replace a battery that they already replaced? Just my 2 cents...

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I'd imagine he's concerned about the swelling issue and the possibility a fire...but I could be wrong.

 

[eaf1956]

I'd imagine he's concerned about the swelling issue and the possibility a fire...but I could be wrong.

I'm sure Uniden knows and maybe it should be disposed of

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[N8TXX]

deleted

 

[N8TXX]

I race RC boats with LiPo batteries. We always store at 50%. These RC batteries have another connector besides the charge connector that the special charger can control discharge and charging of each cell to 1/100th of a volt. When you select storage on the charger it discharges/charges the cells to exactly 50%. Following these rules my batteries don't swell. It's too bad we have this problem with our scanner batteries. This might be hard to control.

 

[mule1075]

I'm sure Uniden knows and maybe it should be disposed of

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Since it is OEM equipment that came with the unit it could very well be covered under warranty. It might be a good idea to find out. How Uniden would fulfill the warranty if that is case is intriguing to say the least.