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Lithium-Ion Batteries Linked to Airplane Fires
smellsofbikes writes "The National Safety Transportation Board thinks it's possible that lithium-ion batteries caused a fire that destroyed a United Parcel Service airplane on Feb 8, 2006. The FAA already bans non-rechargeable lithium batteries from air shipment because aircraft don't carry fire suppression equipment capable of extinguishing lithium fires. The interesting thing is: these batteries aren't being used or charged, they're just being shipped: spontaneous battery combustion. Is this something that happens in the back of computer stores, or just on airplanes?"
is squishing a lithium ion battery enough to make it catch fire?
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It's not just spontaneous, it's environmental stress. A cargo hold is a cold, low pressure, high vibration environment . This may be the first time a newly-made battery is exposed to these factors, causing infant mortality flaws in manufacture to become aparent. Even after the infant mortality portion of the bathtub curve, reliability calculations typically rate one hour of cargo flight time as worth 10-20 hours on the ground. That flight from china may be equal to 10 days on the ground.
HIV Crosses Species Barrier... into Muppets
Why does it take several months for the FAA to find the source of the fire, when firefighters track down the offending source in days?
Flashlight geeks have been dealing with this issue for a while.
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http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.ph
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.ph
There have been several documented "venting with flames" of primary CR123A batteries. Rechargeables seem to be a lot more stable, occasional Dell laptop conflagarations notwithstanding.
...can these be modified by someone with nasty goals in such a manner that they might actually bring down an airplane? Disturbing thought if true....
Given how some of my UPS packages arrive looking like they were dragged to my house behind the truck, I would say that it is pretty likely that UPS is doing things to the batteries that my computer store doesn't.
Impossible! Why would the batteries not catch fire in a store, yet catch fire on an airplane??? The FAA is nuts!
Clearly it couldn't be physical battery damage, because shipping things almost never results in damage. And clearly it couldn't be due to air pressure related leaks, because airplanes are pressurized at 1 atmosphere.
Right? Isn't the FAA crazy for thinking of such nonsense?
TFA doesn't say whether the one that caught fire in the hand luggage was after landing or not but the rest seem to be post-flight.
Now, when you're on a commercial flight cruising along at 33,000ft, you may only be pressurised to 9,000ft and this, of course, includes your hand luggage.
Is it possible that the depressurisation to 9,000ft alt and the repressurisation on landing resultant expansion and compression cycle of the lithium batteries and causing them to somehow fail?
Ripping an new rectum in the fabric of spacetime.
The good news is that it wasn't an exploding MacBook.
Manufacturing errors can cause a lithium ion battery to explode. Reputable manufacturers do tests to screen out defectives, but on rare occasions, test errors occur and a bad battery can sneak through.
...just waiting on the announcement that notebook computers, portable DVD players, i-pods and cell phones have been banned from commercial aircraft.
Oxygen linked to fires...time to take ACTION!!
Lithium-Ion batteries are always kept partially charged, as they last longer this way and it can be dangerous to attempt charging a battery under a certain voltage. So a laptop battery contains a significant amount of stored energy, meaning any internal short from stress, damage, or manufacturing defect could easily result in fire. It's not really spontaneous, or any big mystery.
I've seen it with my own eyes. I wrote the embedded software (8051 C) for a robotic bone lengthener / deformity corrector in the early 90's, it was powered by Lithium batteries that ran the motors and provided 5V for all the electronics. On more than one occasion (during development) we had Lithium batteries just go up in fire and smoke, for no apparent reason. It caused us a lot of worry to say the least, especially since any bad and ready to blow cells were packed into packs with surrounding cells.. to add to the fire. This was 12 years ago, so I am sure Lithium batteries are better than ever, but it doesn't suprise me to hear about them going up in flames.
Don't tell me you actually check these items, do you? If they allowed these items only as carry-on that would eliminate a lot of baggage theft, methinks, and also allow for the use of safety equipment if there is a fire. Two problems solved in one stroke.
I have a bunch of dead laptop batteries here -- if I open them, can I get the fun stuff out?
You can start by not breathing anymore. ;)
UPS Dictionary says .....
Fragile (fra-gil-lay) from early French n. To toss about with reckless abandon.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
How about another airplane disaster movie? I'm thinking of calling it...
"Li-ons on planes"
aircraft don't carry fire suppression equipment capable of extinguishing lithium fires.
s _29_18/ai_n6280927. Planes don't carry water??
I googled it quickly and found this http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0UBT/i
Electric RC flyers have been dealing with this issue for a while.
0 9187
Here is an informational thread about lipo batteries:
http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2
One of the failure modes of a Li-Ion battery is what the industry calls "vent with flame", or what everyone else calls, a fire. (A very spectacular one, at that - not just ignition, but the fire actually shoots out like a jet).
Li-Ion batteries are extremely volatile and sensitive, which is why good batteries have a variety of protective circuits on them (or can have) - e.g., physical distortion (detects if the battery balloons), over temperature (charging/discharge), over current, unsafe low voltage (if the battery voltage falls too low, you can't charge it safely), and many more. That's also why their charge regimen is so complex (charge at constant current to ~90% capacity, then constant voltage charge to 100%. Then stop all charging until capacity is around 90% again, then restart CV charge - this is why the first 80% can happen relatively quickly, while the last 20% can often take as long as it took to get to 80% in the first place) since they need charge controllers and "smart chips" to monitor the state of the battery.
Usually these events happen when the battery is actually used, but there isn't anything to say that it can happen otherwise. Those protective circuits require power, and they get their power from the battery while outside the device. And since you cannot store Li-Ion batteries discharged very well, they are often charged at the factory, during assembly and final sale. A nice short somewhere along the line and battery will vent with flame.
There's a reason why most LiIon batteries have hard to get at terminals or come with protective covers. It's not for convenience, but more for during storage/shipping, so the terminals don't get shorted.
Oh yeah, those protective circuits are optional - not all batteries have every one (some may not need it or find a way to protect it in another way - battery distortion can be handled by having the battery having to fit in a slot - if it can't fit, well...). Third party ultra cheap batteries may have *no* protective circuits at all (hence those "Nokia Exploding Batteries").
...don't carry fire suppression equipment capable of extinguishing lithium fires. Neither do they carry equipment to extinguish magnesium or aluminium fires. Fires in metals are generally very hard to deal with due to their very high temperature.
...and what about my watch battery ?? Will they pay for my damaged hand when my watch explodes ?
I think the airlines will use this as a way to extract even more from us in flight surcharges. :lol:), $50 for a laptop, $20 for a digital camera etc. to cover the 'increased cost of safety on board flights.'
;-)
Imagine surcharges of $10 for an music player ($30 if it's an iPod
Maybe I should shut up and stop giving airlines ideas.
Check out these photos here of lithium polymer batteries (commonly used in r/c models) in action... SUPER FUN HAPPY BURN THE HOUSE DOWN TOYS!
I'm not fat, just big boned...
The War? No. . Motorcycle accident? No. . Slashdot? YES!!!
..
"Here's something you can try at home if you're a total skeptic"
Skepticism. . like exploding batteries. . is dangerous. .
Unless you fly cargo planes. Lithium batteries aren't allowed as cargo on passenger aircraft. If your laptop explodes (which would hardly be an aircraft-crippling explosion), there are crew present to act quickly.
I've heard of the strangest things blamed for airplane crashes. The fact is that some pretty smart people are put on the investigation of a crash, paid handsomely and given a deadline to produce an answer. Their jobs might depend on it. As the investigation progresses, theres always a 'most likely cause' that changes. When the deadline arrives, the most likely cause of the day becomes the answer.
Some things only happen on airplane crashes.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
Several airlines have just announced that they are banning the in-flight use of Dell laptops.
Could the batteries possibly be manafacturered by the same reliable company as this notebook? If so, the question is, is it a quantity over quality issue, and could it be happening with more of their product lines?
I have pretty extensive experience with lithium and lithium ion/polymer/prismatic(and otherwise)/LIFn cells)
They are dangerous. Lithium polymers can create an extremely high temp fire if shorted, dunked in water, etc. Lithium ions can (and will) explode if shorted in water or otherwise. The case on it can't expand like the lithium polymers wrapping which allows it to burn instead of turn into a crappy grenade.
Lithium cells (like the new 1.5v cells out for cameras and other digital technologies) don't have as high of a current capability as recharable lithiums, but offer extreme weight->low current capacity. They get hot very quickly and catch fire very fast. It is possible that the plastic wrap on the lithiums in question was damaged and shorted on a metal item unless it was dropped. As you see, the cells can be crushed which will cause a fire in very short order.
And by the way, don't put out a battery fire with water or it will short other batteries out and compound the problem. What kinda moron posts that junk?
Lithium technology is safe if treated right. I guarantee you the voltage matching or cutoff circuitry is what lead to the dell laptop issues, and that the lithium cells on the UPS flight were wet or damaged in some other way as to cause the problem. I would hate to see lithium batteries be shipped via HASMAT trucks, but unless we start hiring more people that can read english labels that say "do not wet, fragile" they may have to be...
-JNY
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I don't know about anybody else, but if I never read the phrase "robotic bone lengthener" again, it will be too soon.
That is most likely what they'll let RECHARGEABLE Li batteries onboard but not full capacity non-rechargeable Li batteries. With all the ways the batteries can be damaged before they're put on the planes, there's too much of a risk of fire from latent fires due to damaged cells.
This is also why there aren't lots of fires in the backrooms of computer stores. All those laptops not only don't have charged batteries but they've probably already been inspected for damaged packaging.
Atleast that's my theory.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
One of the maintenance items on the helicopters I used to fly on (as a passenger) was very careful treatment of the Ni-cad batteries. Someone explained to me that if you didn't look after them properly, they were subject to thermal runaway. The battery would have a certain self discharge current. If that was enough to raise the battery's temperature a bit then the current would increase and warm the battery more which would cause the current to increase which would raise the temperature ... and the battery would explode.
Some battery chemistries are more prone to thermal runaway than others. Lead-acid, for instance, almost never explodes. Ni-cad can explode. Apparently lithium-ion batteries explode. Of course if we wanted to be safe, we would use lead-acid batteries but then they would weigh a lot more. Ya pays yer money and ya takes yer pick.
Flashlight geeks have been dealing with this issue for a while.
I'd imagine this would be true if they are using cheap Li-Ion batteries or mixing cells from different brands. Hell, it's not even wise to mix cells of different ages of the same brand (old versus new).
IIRC, Lithium Ion battery charge can creep from one cell to another and due to the fragile nature of these batteries (easily overcome with proper circuitry) it's possible one cell can overcharge another. IE, if one cell discharges faster than another, the charge will flow into the empty cell possibly causing overheating. At least that's what I am getting from wikipedia. If the circuitry on the cells is cheap, overheating can be very likely.
So I wouldn't become all super paranoid over a few stories like this as it almost always involves cheap batteries or mixing of cells (which may be from using cheap batteries or "Whatever is around the house" in the first flashlight example). After all, you'll almost certainly hear about EVERY single failure but you never hear about the batteries performing their job correctly because when you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all.
Quick tip: The reason a lot of FPs are done by ACs is due to the fact that it can quite easily fail, and provide embarrasment (as you can now see). So don't forget that 'Post as AC' checkbox next time, k?
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
I did. Every piece of electronics survived except for my phone, which was in my shirt. Which, fortunately, I was not wearing when the battery got hot...river water is not too conductive usually, but this was tidal. Advice: don't try this in the sea.
Pining for the fjords
One of the reasons I submitted this story is that I just bought a house that's at roughly 3500 meters (11,000 feet) elevation. UPS is shipping jillions of batteries, and obviously this isn't THAT common, but I still wonder about me taking up my laptop, and my friends taking up theirs. I wonder even more about flying up there in a Cessna -- not much higher altitude, but where's the knee of the safe/explode curve? (Is it a curve? or is it linear with altitude? or logarithmic, given that's how pressure drops? I'd expect it'd drop off with temperature, but if that's true, temperature drops somewhat faster than air pressure, so why are these happening at all?)
With all that said, it's unsettling that a battery has *anything* going on in it when it's just sitting there in a brown paper box. Do Li-ion batteries have vents, like old lead-acid batteries? Can they evolve gas? (If so, what happens to their chemistry afterwards? it's not like they can recapture hydrogen offgassed: do they lose efficiency over time from this?)
I know much less about batteries than I thought I did.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
Just look at any R/C Forum or wbe site (or battery university) for horror stories about these batteries. I use them, but as soon as I see any bulging or swelling of a pack I get rid of it. I personally know a guy who lost his entire garage (and part of his house) from a fire during recharging (you should never leave them un-attended).
They are great batteries that are light with lots of power, but they are quite finicky. I always charge as slow as possible and use a temp probe to shut everything down if it gets too hot.
All that being said, I wonder how they could ignite if they are not in a charge or discharge (besides normal dishcharge as they sit unused) while in a cargo hold. I would think (no, I did not RTFA but hey this is Slashdot) they would need to be mutilated or highly disturbed in some way to catch fire.
Repant. Thy end is sheer.
Sometimes the FAA does things for appearance's sake. Big surprise there, eh? The ban on cell phones in-flight was the result of unexplained instrument malfunctions. No direct link between electronics failure and cell phones was ever shown. That didn't stop the FAA from banning cell phones which "might" be causing interference. No lab tests ever showed any linkage. I think cell phone use on planes would send many people over the edge, personally, but the FAA's stated reason for the ban doesn't hold water. Why should the situation with these batteries be any different? The FAA will be wanting to give the appearance that they're doing something about the problem, even if it's the wrong solution. THe FAA is the only government agency that hasn't gotten any worse under Bush. That should tell you something.
It makes one wonder why everyone's touting electric/hybrid vehicles that run off of li-ion or polymer batteries. If people (erroneously) thought that hydrogen cars would do a Hindenberg in their driveway, wait til they find out about this.
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http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=1
-Charlie
I know they use to build(and may still) rocket nose cones out of pyrex but last I checked the lids were just tempered glass...and gravity was the only thing holding them on.
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I know I've seen it written here before, but there's an old chemistry saw that certainly rings true.
"The are two types of chemists: Those who have never worked with Lithium, and those who are scared to death of it."
Coming this summer!
-Darkshadow (There was a thing called Heaven; but all the same they used to drink enormous quantities of alcohol.)
Even if the plane flew into the vacuum of outer space it couldn't have more than 15 PSI inside. At normal flying altitudes the pressure differential between the atmosphere and the inside of the plane would only be in the 5 - 10 PSI range. Enough to leak out of course, but I don't believe it would EXPLODE!
:wq
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...work fine (ever had a non-Dell laptop pull a Dell while you were flying?). The problem could arise from the difference in pressures. Perhaps the lessened pressure allows for odd expansion within the batteries causing strain on the lithium (I don't remember how stable lithium is as an element) resulting in excess heat?
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#include <beer.h>
The smoke and debris may include hydrofluoric acid. Make absolutely sure that the ambulance crew and the doctor know about this.
HF doesn't eat your skin and char your muscles the way sulfuric acid does. It seeps into your system through the skin and causes devastating delayed-onset reactions. You can spill HF on you, think you're OK, and be dead two days later.
Call Poison Control for advice while you're waiting for the ambulance if battery debris hits you. I've seen posts that quote safety procedures as including getting OUT of the affected clothes and applying a calcium gluconate gel pack, but please don't take your safety advice from a Slashdot post by someone with no medical qualifications.
And when the instructions say never to mix fresh cells with partially depleted ones, believe them.
I don't think the modest pressure drop (from 14.7 psi at sea level to 9.5 psi at 3500 m) is going to cause accidents. I think the only reason the airplane angle is important in these situations is that the accident is happening in an enclosed space filled with flammable materials, and people can't run outside to get away from the smoke or call the FD to put out the flames, et cetera.
Lead-acid batteries can produce hydrogen by electrolysis of the water in them when they are charged. If I had to guess, I'd say this is because if the battery is thoroughly discharged, and not, perhaps, very well designed, then so much sulfate is taken out of the electrolyte (sulfuric acid) solution as lead sulfate that the resistance of the solution rises. Then, when current is applied to charge the battery, instead of the formation of sulfate anions, some of the current electrolyzes the water, producing H2 and O2. I would assume that careful design of your battery and reasonable charging conditions minimize this problem. Note that H2 production is not a normal and necessary result of charging a lead-acid battery.
The chemistry of Li-ion batteries is totally different. IIRC, there isn't any water in their electrolyte, it's some organic solvent in which a lithium salt dissolves. (I don't think there's any lithium metal in there, either, so the reactivity of lithium with water mentioned above somewhere would seem doubly irrelevant.)
I think all you need to do is (1) avoid damaging your batteries by abusing them physically, and (2) avoid abusing them electrically, by charging and discharging them in the manner for which they were designed.
Li-Poly batteries are used a lot in RC aircraft. Here is a link to a page about LiPo fires (with a link to some videos) Lipo Fire info.
Lipos are used a lot in RC flying, but you have to be very careful with them. If they short, they will start to buldge a bit, and can catch fire. Also, LiPos can only be discharged so far, until they are useless (I believe under the 3.7 volt level). If you are interested about rechargable batteries, RC people are the ones to look at. (that includes NIMH, NICD, and LIPO)
It's a--IMHO--clever joke. Nice movie reference. Too bad the mods are pop culture challenged today.
an old grunge song, a psycho drug, and a hybrid car, all capable of explosion, sounds like a job for...homeland security man!!!!
Leave it to the "experts" at /. I've never seen more FUD in my life than on the pages of /.
CR123's have been around for at least 12 years. I had a Canon EOS 10S in 1994 that used CR123's.
If CR123's were known to cause fires, it would have happened before now. I can't believe you morons are going to blame the battery.
If CR123's were dangerous, they would have taken down dozens of airplanes.
A maroon who has abused his laptop battery? I can never tell whether people who misspell "moron" are being deliciously ironic...
Back around 1992, I used to work for a Kodak dealer who sold the Kodak DSC200 series digital cameras. They were a Nikon 35mm camera body with a digital film back and Li based rechargable battery pack.
My boss was on a client site setting up to run a demo, these cameras cost AU$30k each, it was sitting on a counter waiting to be hooked up when it burst into flames.
While I wasn't present for the actual fire, I did see the melted unit afterward when packing it to be sent back to Rochester for tests.
This has been a *known* issue for a very long time.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
No, the lithium in laptop batteries is in the form of lithium salts.
what sig?
Could this possibly explain the exploding Dell notebook in Japan from a few weeks ago ? I'm kind of worried because I don't exactly treat my old Inspiron like gold anymore.. hell, I treat 3-dollar-bill-hookers better than I treat my laptop. I don't want the thing to set my GOOD computers on fire from sitting next to them in the searing humid heat.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Musta been the fumes comin' off the batteries.
Since this article appeared on Slashdot, Al Quaida is reported to have been buying large quantities of Lithium Batteries. They are rebranded to "Energizer" and shipped in furry little toy rabbits.
An Al Quaida spokesman said that they hope at least 1 out of 100 of these rabbits will ignite in an airplane.
So if they ship one million of them, maybe one or two planes will crash into a major US city.
Debian GNU/Linux - apt-get into it.
As another poster says, it's sea level pressure minus 4.4 psi...the pressurization is actually engaged before takeoff to put a slight positive pressure in the airplane. That makes the fuselage a bit more rigid, reducing the amount of structural fatigue it gets in the takeoff roll. If you're wearing one of those digital watches with an altimeter feature, you'll see the reading go somewhat below the ground elevation.
Actually, airplanes with pressurized cabins are pressurized to the pressure at 8000 feet, not "below ground elevation." If you did in fact have an altimeter watch, as you describe, it would indicate you were at an altitude of 8000 MSL.
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I can't speak to lithium batteries,
Sure you can! Just pick one up, look it square in the terminals, and start talking. It's unable to run away, you can speak as long as you want.
On the other hand, I don't know if you're able to speak about lithium batteries, because you haven't told us one way or the other.
Not to pick on you in particular, but have people always used "to" in this manner? It seems like a relatively recent perversion of the word; am I wrong? I don't recall people saying things like "I can't speak to the safety of this car," or "I'd like him to speak to the source of his campaign funding" until a couple years ago. Doesn't it sound funny to anyone else? Is this actually proper English, or is this just another example of people jumping on the "sounds fancy, so it'll make me sound smart" bandwagon?
Like woodworking? Build your own picture frames.
Someone inform David Ellis & Samuel Jackson! This has "Snakes on a Plane II" written all over it.
I'm not supprised at all..
Li-Poly batteries are popular is the electric R/C hobby.
The fire danger from over charging or physical damage are well known.
These are the same type of battery you have in your cell phone.
Li-Ion is the same type of battery but in a metal case.
See this video on Google
Li-poly battery fire
If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur. --Red Adair
The way I read this article, my ultrasound bone stimulator (by Exogen), which contains a non-rechargeable Lithium battery, cannot be taken aboard a plane. I broke my leg this last spring. I was prescribed the ultrasound thingy last month when the osteo-doc decided my fibula was not healing as fast as it should. Fortunately, I'll only be gone over a long weekend, but kinda glad I read the article. I had no idea that these things weren't supposed to go on planes. Makes me wonder how many people flying today and in the future do not know this. One more reason to hate flying. (Guess I oughta see if there's anything on their web site.) Cragen
He works in auto racing, F1 & Indy cars mostly. He likes to tell the story about the foundry where they were heat treating magnesium wheels and something went wrong. I think it was 8 wheels, for about 80 or more pounds of magnesium. On fire. The fire department wanted to show up and put it out with water. Very very bad idea.
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Amusingly enough, iPods seem to be specced for a maximum of 10000 feet as well (http://www.apple.com/ipod/specs.html). I agree that these figures may be somewhat conservative, as I see people skiing and boarding with those things all the time, right around 11000 feet high.
I Googled altitude specs a bit more, and there are some drives specified for 6-7000 feet. Even considering a nice safety margin, I would hesitate to take those up to where you live.
I didn't read all the comments above this one so I'm not sure if I'm being repetitive.
A Lithium Ion battery is essentially made of folded Aluminum (Al) and Copper (Cu) foils (with a porous plastic seperator between the two). The Cu is doped with graphite, and the Al is doped with the active material (i.e. the Lithium compounds like Lithium Cobalt Oxide or LiCoO). There are different chemistries you can dope the Al foil with; the Cu will always have graphite on it however.
If you puncture a Lithium Ion battery (with a staple or a nail for instance) you wind up shorting the Al and Cu foils; this leads to a thermal runaway (i.e. the battery puffs up and gets really hot). The size of the puncture, what you used to puncture the battery, and even the location of the puncture all play a role in the volatility of the reaction. As a general rule though, LiCoO batteries will catch fire explosively when punctured. Other (newer) chemistries, like Lithium Iron Phosphate, will only puff up and vent black smoke when punctured (no flames, hooray!).
So long story short: if you puncture the battery or short the leads with a metal wire or drop it really hard (this could cause the foils in the battery to slip and touch each or even crack some of the foil on the inside) get ready for puffing and possibly a fire.
All your planes are belong to us
It doesn't help that you could order bricks and somebody will ship them to you in a 'delicate instruments' box.
Disposable lithium cells as described in the article, contain metallic Li. This fellow made a periodic table out of wood with elements and describes how to extract the lithium foil from a disposable battery.
Assembly is the reverse of disassembly.
http://www.theodoregray.com/PeriodicTable/Stories/ 003.2/index.html
D'oh! this fellow
Assembly is the reverse of disassembly.