Samsung Ships Flameproof Boxes For Note 7 Returns (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Samsung has been forced to cease production of its disastrous Galaxy Note 7 Smartphones because they keep catching fire, but it still has to address the problem of cleaning up its mess. The phone has been recalled twice, and owners now have to send their incendiary handsets back to the South Korean firm. And that poses a bit of a problem: if you need to issue a recall for a phone that is prone to spontaneously combust, you don't want those phones catching fire in transit. Samsung's solution is a fancy "Note 7 Return Kit," and it has sent one to XDA Developers. The kit contains a special "Recovery Box" that's lined with ceramic fiber paper to provide some protection against incineration. Samsung warns that some people will have a bad reaction to this lining, so the recovery kit also includes some gloves to protect your hands. They don't appear to be flame retardant, so if your Note 7 is currently ablaze, we'd suggest minimizing contact with it. Samsung also includes a shipping label to send the phone back. The box reinforces that flying ban, noting that the devices are only to be shipped by ground, safely within reach of the quenching hoses of the fire department.

Comments

This could have been a simple battery recall

[sinij]

This could have been a simple battery recall if they still used removable batteries.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, because encouraging owners to swap out their own batteries with the cheapest Chinese crap they can find will be much safer.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[aaarrrgggh]

Not necessarily, and pointing out this meme over and over again is really beating a dead horse: it isn't going to happen unless customers demand it and are willing to pay more for it. I am surprised they took this approach rather than have a disassembly kit at retailers or "repair centers" to minimize the hazards, but whatever.

It will be interesting to see what Samsung does next for phone branding. The Samsung Phoenix? Sit it out for a couple months until customers forget about it?

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[alvinrod]

That may not be the case though. There's been a lot of speculation that it wasn't a battery issue (at least not entirely) but also something related to the overall device design, which is further supported since they've stopped production entirely. Given that there were multiple replacement units that had problems within a week of them going out to customers, it's difficult to accept the idea that it was just a battery issue unless Samsung completed screwed the pooch on exchanging devices.

Removable batteries don't matter if the device itself is somehow leading to the problem for whatever (I've heard some ideas that its the CPU getting too hot, the case expanding/contracting and deforming the battery) reason. Perhaps Samsung could eventually engineer a battery that wouldn't be susceptible to whatever the underlying cause was, but how many months would that take to engineer and properly test and then how many more to produce enough to provide them to every customer. Most customers probably couldn't go without their device for that long, they probably couldn't travel with it even if they were still using it, and without really knowing the whole story or the scope of the problem, six months might by asking a non-trivial amount of people to play Russian roulette with their phone, which is a massive liability issue.

Yes, consumers really like having removable batteries, but if the device itself ensures a greatly reduced lifespan that results in a violent destruction of the battery, does it really matter if it's removable?

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps Samsung could eventually engineer a battery

LiFePO4 cells can be short-circuited, overheated, even punctured, and they won't catch fire. Oh and they have half the capacity of the "oops I turned into a fireball by accident" chemistry that you can find youtube videos of people puncturing and they catch fire.

I don't think there are many phone makers out there willing to sacrifice half their run time for safety, but the technology exists.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Zxern]

You are of course assuming Samsung wasn't using the cheapest Chinese crap batteries they could to begin with.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[timrod]

The thing is, even if a removable battery doesn't cut down on fire incidents, it would have made the phones a lot easier to ship back to the manufacturer. Rather than go through all these hoops with fire-resistant boxes and ground-only shipping, they could simply have told people "Keep the phone powered off and bring it to an electronics recycler or an authorized seller to have the battery taken out and the phone shipped back to Samsung".

I can easily see UPS and Fedex refusing to ship the returned phones, since if it's a problem with the battery deforming most of the phones are going to be more dangerous crammed into the back of a cargo truck with a million other packages (all of which UPS/Fedex are liable for) than they would be anywhere else. If the phones could be shipped without the batteries inside, this problem wouldn't exist.

Instead, Samsung now has a very costly problem on their hands. They have to find a shipper willing to ship the phones (potentially making them more dangerous) and then recycle them without having anyone catch on fire.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

but LiFePO4 doesn't lose capacity with charge cycles as fast

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[thegarbz]

Yes consumers really like having removable batteries

[Citation needed] for the most part as far as I can see, outside of a few slashdot posters consumers couldn't give a crap about a removable battery.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[adolf]

Suppose we use your theory, and take a Samsung firebomb back to the retailer.

They remove the battery.

What happens then? Where does it go? How does it get there?

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[kno3]

Given that Samsung is one of the biggest lithium battery manufacturers in the world, that seems likely.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[drinkypoo]

Removable batteries don't matter if the device itself is somehow leading to the problem for whatever (I've heard some ideas that its the CPU getting too hot, the case expanding/contracting and deforming the battery) reason.

A removable battery might well solve this problem, because it is better-protected than the bare foil packs that they use in phones without removable batteries.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

To be honest, I'd go for LiFePO4 batteries any day, even if it they added size and weight to the phone to compensate the lesser capacity. Phone weight hasn't really been an issue for the past 20 years. It's a shame nobody has made a "big" smartphone with a (safe) huge battery. Something that would last a week with normal to heavy usage without having to think charging at all. There are certainly some "extreme" phone models out there, but even they have compromized a lot in battery size to reduce the phone's weight and size.

I would be perfectly fine with something similar to Samsung S5 that was two times thicker, with the battery taking all the extra space. I've tried some of those add-on battery cases, but they didn't feel that safe to use. They have no-name China batteries and I've had too many problems with such over the years.

Captcha: sexually

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh lord, I couldn't imagine the fallout from having the knuckleheads at the thousands of AT&T / Verizon stores disassembling fire-prone devices and losing screws / parts or puncturing the batteries accidentally and burning their faces off.

I guess it would get the extreme libertarians to stop complaining about "subsidizing" the public fire departments though.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[apoc.famine]

Or that could have made it worse as customers bought $5 Chinese knock-off batteries as spares.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Recycle the batteries locally. Ship the phone back for central recycling.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait - are you saying that their quick charging thing that they have been advertising on might actually be the problem? They're over-charging and any mechanism that they use to try and prevent exactly this might be inadequate?

And they can't delete that feature without opening themselves to a class-action truth-in-advertising lawsuit, so the best choice is to just shitcan the whole product and start over?

But Samsung can do no wrong! How can this be?!

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[phorm]

I don't think the push for thinness helps. Similar to how the iPhone 6 is experiencing issues with dying screens (due to flex on one of the related chips), perhaps what's happening is some important trace/component is being shorted because the overly-thin device is able to flex enough to cause Bad Things (tm) to happen, e.g. breaking a solder, having two components touch that aren't supposed to, etc

Things are pretty crammed inside these phones, so it wouldn't take much for an unintended short to occur even outside the battery.

Re: This could have been a simple battery recall

[2ms]

Racist much?

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it still matters. Why are you arguing this? You plan for the typical use case and that's that. Cars often get recalled for bad airbags. Because they sometimes go bad, and so do batteries, should we go ahead and just remove them from vehicles? A phone currently on fire is not the typical use case for the device. People want removable batteries. Whether they catch fire or not doesn't change this just as you said having a removable battery won't change the rate of ignition. You're just arguing because you want to be "right".

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps it is not the battery itself but the built-in charging system
Lithium Ion / Lithium Polymer cells have a nominally charged voltage of 3.7Volt and should NOT be charged beyond a cell voltage of 4.2 Volt
With more than 1 cell in series ,during charging each individual cell needs to be monitored for not exceeding 4.2 V .
If 1 of the cells has reached a voltage of 4.2 volt (but the other cells not as yet) this cell needs to be partly discharged while the other(s) are still being charged . The relevant control system is crucial .....so when not properly designed/working can overcharge a cell and hence cause a fire.

Re:This could have been a simple battery recall

[adolf]

Oh. It's the local "recycler" who has to deal with the firebombs.

No thanks.

Evidence please.

[Anonymous Coward]

They switched the battery cells in production for the first recall. If changing the battery didn't fix the problem, why would changing the battery easier fix it?

Re:Evidence please.

[HornWumpus]

Battery packs often contain current limiters.

If you're installing cells permanently, you will be tempted to do cute things with the charge circuit.

Individual cell charging is common in the RC world. (Chargers are complicated, the market is mostly junk.) It is also common to charge batteries in fire-proof bags.

Lithium batteries in consumer products need to be handled with caution. They aren't $300+ jumbo airplane batteries. If one dying cell kills the pack, that's a fair tradeoff for simplicity plus another level of current limiter.

Re:Evidence please.

[dgatwood]

These are LiPo batteries we're talking about. AFAIK, they're always a single cell, and I don't think they typically contain any circuitry. If they did, they'd have a four-wire connector like lithium ion packs, rather than two. (Or at least all the flat packs I've seen only have the two wires.)

Re:Evidence please.

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, no?
http://ep.yimg.com/ay/yhst-137...

Re:Evidence please.

[HornWumpus]

They're almost the same voltage/cell.

Anybody know the pack voltage for this thing?

Re:Evidence please.

[tlhIngan]

These are LiPo batteries we're talking about. AFAIK, they're always a single cell, and I don't think they typically contain any circuitry. If they did, they'd have a four-wire connector like lithium ion packs, rather than two. (Or at least all the flat packs I've seen only have the two wires.)

No, you can get LiPo batteries with protection circuits that are just two-wire only. The other two wires are typically a thermistor connection and a one-wire connection to a gas gauge chip or memory chip to hold stuff like serial number, storage capacity, etc. But if you don't need that, two wires is more than sufficient - you can have a thermistor on the board itself, and a gas gauge on the main board works just fine as well.

Re:Evidence please.

[Khyber]

"Chargers are complicated"

Only because people fail at understanding basic power systems and basic fucking math. I have no problems using a wall wart with exposed wires to charge individual Li-ion cells.

Re:Evidence please.

[thegarbz]

Battery packs often contain current limiters

Battery packs often contain current limiters that exclusively protect them from short circuits. That extra terminal on most battery packs is a temperature sensor. Charging and making sure things don't go pop during charging is almost exclusively done outside the battery pack.

In any case this is all conjecture. The stories coming through are of phones spontaneously combusting during operation, not during charging.

Re:Evidence please.

[Anonymous Coward]

They switched the battery cells in production for the first recall. If changing the battery didn't fix the problem, why would changing the battery easier fix it?

Jesus you're thick. You remove the battery and dispose of it properly, and then ship back the phone without any special hazard consideration.

Re:Evidence please.

[HornWumpus]

A quality charger will detect that one of the cells in a pack isn't holding charge as well as the others and exercise that cell automagically, it won't generally fix the cell, but will extend its life.

Re:Evidence please.

[HornWumpus]

The charge circuit does not go away when it isn't charging. It could still be the problem. As you say it is all conjecture.

Something is shorting (or nearly shorting) the battery.

Smartphone?

[Anonymous Coward]

A smart phone would be a cheap, simple, functional phone with long battery life and good call quality and good support for the majority of apps in one of the major marketplaces.

Wake me up when somebody invents a smartphone.

Re:Smartphone?

[Visarga]

Beep Blup Bop! I am a bot. I will send a message to the user "Anonymous Coward" when somebody invents a smartphone.

You first.

[Anonymous Coward]

Where did they say they replaced the batteries? More importantly, considering no one has yet identified the exact issue, how are you so certain that replacing the batteties would even have solved it?

Re:You first.

[Joce640k]

This could have been a simple battery recall if they still used removable batteries.

Yep. How is he 100% certain it isn't a problem with the battery controller chip? Beats me...

Re:You first.

[hey!]

Let's practice a little logic here, shall we?

Having a problem in the battery cells or pack does not preclude having a problem in the "controller chip" or any other system component. But are we multiplying entities here unnecessarily? Gratuitously attributing failure to the battery when the fires could be attributed to other system components?

No. Because li-ion battery design is supposed to prevent fires in the case of other system components/software being faulty. This is because that battery chemistry is inherently fire-prone: you have a flammable organic electrolyte bathing electrodes that release oxygen, with the entire system subject to thermal runaway. Therefore Li-ion battery packs have to be designed, like a Norman castle, according to the principle of defense-in-depth. It follows directly that any battery fires when the pack is installed in the system require failures in depth.

Re:You first.

[Khyber]

" Gratuitously attributing failure to the battery when the fires could be attributed to other system components"

Nope, most other system components can't get that hot if you paid attention to Ohm's Law and did the math yourself.

"No. Because li-ion battery design is supposed to prevent fires in the case of other system components/software being faulty"

Humans that think they can beat physics suffer the consequences of physics. In this case, fire is the consequence.

"This is because that battery chemistry is inherently fire-prone"

Do the math on Nickel-Zinc and try saying that again with a straight face, assuming you even know how the physics and math for specific types of power storage systems works. Norman castle doesn't apply, here.

Next Week

[Anonymous Coward]

Watch for news of Spontaneously Combusting Flameproof Boxes.

The Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight

[mykepredko]

They're sending out boxes for their potential firebombs that require gloves to handle?

Clearly they realize that sending something that could spontaneously catch fire in the mail or through couriers is a significant concern, but wouldn't it make more sense to set up return centres at carrier retail locatdions where the phones could be loaded with a "discharge app" (put the display on full brightness, run the speaker at full volume with an inaudible signal, turn on the radios without broadcasting, etc.) to make them safe for later transport.

I'm sure that there will be cases where the phones will have to be sent in by customers, but I would think arranging for them to go to return centres would cover 98% of the total and allow customers to get replacements (probably iPhones)? This would limit the impact on the customers and help the carriers manage customer satisfaction.

Re:The Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight

[aaarrrgggh]

Did some digging... the reason they likely didn't go with that approach is you need to heat the glass to soften the adhesive holding the unit together, and once opening it there is still a lot of tooling necessary to remove the battery.

Re: The Gang that Couldn't Shoot Straight

[Anonymous Coward]

The battery discharge part may not be the best of ideas.
After all, the vast majority of phones that have exploded were in a state of discharge at the time.

However both the acts of rapid charge as well as rapid discharge would cause the largest temperature differential within the battery, which seems to me is a good contender of an action that would accelerate an explosion.

On the other hand your idea of centralized return centers would probably be a better place to mitigate the risk of performing a rapid discharge, so that's one more mark in favor of such centers.
(Which are a very good idea I wanted to say)

On top of the convenience to many customers and the cost consolidation for Samsung, such return centers would probably also be cheaper and more efficient by simply having fewer but larger such fire resistant boxes, instead of only sending many smaller boxes.
Fewer separate delivery runs would reduce the number of opportunities for an explosion within a faulty box, or a box sealed incorrectly by the end user.

But at that point, it may just be safer to collect the phones at a return center and at the end of the day have the batch safely incinerated on-site using the proper equipment to contain the expected mass battery explosions and toxic fumes.

While this isn't without risks too, it would at least provide the opportunities to inject actual experts into the chain of events.
Technicians that know what to do (and what not to) to disassemble the phone on-site to remove the batteries safely, and/or perhaps something akin to "bomb squad" people for the actual battery destruction, etc.
Although if Samsung would avail themselves of such a chance is another matter entirely.

The less the end user has to do in the whole process, the less these explosions will make the news, and the fewer multi-punches to Samsungs PR face.

How big of a box does ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Tesla send you for the Model S?

Re: How big of a box does ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Plus you pay for return postage

Kudos to Samsung

[Anonymous Coward]

At least Samsung is taking their gaffs more seriously than The Donald. Still great comedy, though!

The box looks like...

[Anonymous Coward]

http://weknowmemes.com/wp-cont...

Other alternatives

[Dan East]

It would be safer if the devices were frozen in carbonite for return shipping.

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow.. you're projecting. A lot.
-Smart person who did get picked on

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Well think about it. We're talking about sending back exploding smartphones. And the idiot says freeze them in carbonite. Even as a smart person who got picked on, don't you just want to give him a wedgie and flush his head down the toilet?

Re:Other alternatives

[yuhong]

I think they are waterproof.

Re:Other alternatives

[ACE209]

Let go of your anger. Only to the dark side it leads.

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, I don't get where this came from. Just want to chime in. I found it funny because Han Solo (an uncontainable, "risky" rebel) is frozen in carbonite as a way to secure him. This is making light fun of the "risky" Samsung battery, being contained in carbonite in a similar manner to Solo. It's an amusing thought. Nothing to do with the actual chemistry/freezing in water/science though.

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

It would be safer if the devices were frozen in carbonite for return shipping.

Apparently said boxes are not proof against flaming on the internet.

Re:Other alternatives

[MachineShedFred]

now only if they were fireproof...

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Any joke that needs an explanation automatically ceases to be funny.

Re: Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. This is stupidity. These people need to stop.

Re:Other alternatives

[Khyber]

No, because frozen things tend to be less explodey, thus this is smart.

Re:Other alternatives

[Anonymous Coward]

If you didn't get the joke perfectly knowing where it comes from maybe you need to pop that fart bubble you're in and learn a little about the world. And obviously that epic fail at interpreting the joke takes all the "smart" from you.

How the mighty have fallen!

[hyades1]

"Back in the day", I had a Samsung slider that was pretty much bulletproof. Long battery life, very primitive internet capability (but enough to let you search for information or check email), and a tolerance for punishment that verged on masochism. And it could get a signal where a lot of phones couldn't.

Ever since, they seem to have gotten into some kind of death spiral where their phones look great and offer steadily increasing capabilities, but reliability has declined to the point where they're now they're manufacturing pocket bombs.

It's a pity, really. When they offered a phone you could use in a road hockey game without hurting it, I was a hard-core loyal customer. Now? Not so much.

Potentially unlawful ?

[slincolne]

I don't see how sending explosive devices in the post is lawful. The fact that the manufacturer believes there is a risk of fire is a clear indicator that these are dangerous items.

Worst of all, if one does catch fire in transit, the sender (not Samsung) will be liable for the consequences.

It's really disappointing to see a company like Samsung handle this so badly

The only sensible option is to return it to the point of sale for a refund. Failing that, people should be contacting Samsung so that they (and not the customer) are responsible for the safe packaging and transport of these devices.

Re:Potentially unlawful ?

[Anonymous Coward]

That is what the special box with markings indicating the contents, and prepaid ground postage are for. This isn't the first device with a defective li-ion battery and UPS has procedures in place to deal with it.

Citation required

[Brannon]

> consumers really like having removable batteries

Pretty much all the best-selling smartphones have non-removable batteries.

Did you mean to say "the completely irrelevant smug technorati at Slashdot really like having removable batteries"?

Re:Citation required

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it's slightly more nuanced than that. Consumers, when asked, /say/ they want replaceable batteries. Their actions prove otherwise.

(Very large majority will never buy spare batteries/swap them. Most will use the shipping battery for the entire lifetime of the phone.)

Asking is the least reliable way to get a truthful answer out of a consumer. They will usually say one thing, then do another.

This is completely normal for battery recalls

[Xylantiel]

I had a battery recall on a NVIDIA tablet and the return kit was a fireproof box that required ground shipping. And they weren't exploding, just failing early. This is standard procedure for any defective li-ion battery.

Re:This is completely normal for battery recalls

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting.

Useful advice

[cyber-vandal]

so if your Note 7 is currently ablaze, we'd suggest minimizing contact with it.

. Uh, thanks?

A Brand To Protect

[SeattleLawGuy]

... massive liability issue.

The massive liability issue is half of it. The other half is that Samsung has a brand to protect, and is smart enough to know that no single product is worth destroying their brand.

Galaxy Note smartphone

[joyetechesigara]

Galaxy Note smartphone was constantly warming was 7 wonders of the explosion.

Possible revenge-sabotage within Samsung?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if the exploding mobile phenomenon is a disgruntled employee's revenge for the Samsung's abandonment of the digital photo camera business? Samsung entered the MILC market years ago and quickly released its own series of lenses with a proprietary NX bayonet connector. They released beter and better camera bodies, culminating in the professional grade Samsung NX1 created with non-publicized help from Nikon, which camera is still unmatched by even the Sony Alpha 6300. Then Samsung suddenly abandoned the market and left the customers with a dead-end inventment (photo camera lenses are darn expensive). The engineers in the camera branch were relocated within Samsung, reportedly to help boost photo capabilities of smartphones, but they lost seniority and ended up in lower tier work positions. One of them could have decided to pay back with fire and brimstone?

Re:Possible revenge-sabotage within Samsung?

[Anonymous Coward]

If "seniority within a corporate drone hierarchy" gets anyone too worked up (pro-tip: to the executives, you're all peons), they probably don't have the clarity of thought to sabotage at this scale.

This is a simple combination of serious mistake + honesty about that mistake. Will they learn from it? Watch this space.

Re:Possible revenge-sabotage within Samsung?

[hey!]

Err... you do realize that design of a product like this is a team effort? What you would need is a conspiracy of engineers to seriously undermine, possibly even destroy the business division that employed them.

Re:Possible revenge-sabotage within Samsung?

[MachineShedFred]

1. your tinfoil hat needs adjustment.
2. Why would an optical engineer be working on batteries and charging circuits? That's what electrical engineers and chemical engineers are for.

QA ??

[dywolf]

I'm just curious how the hell this problem got past their QA department?

Re:QA ??

[magarity]

I'm just curious how the hell this problem got past their QA department?

Because they sold millions of them and a few dozen have caught fire. Kinda hard to thoroughly run millions of units through a QA department.

Re:QA ??

[Anonymous Coward]

any design or process flaw that could cause this many failures, including in the replacements, is far more prevalent than just a few dozen phones.
the production also isn't in the millions.

a proper QA process would have caught this.

-source: professional QA engineer

Re:QA ??

[Khyber]

"Kinda hard to thoroughly run millions of units through a QA department."

No, not really, even with an actual staff of QA engineers vs automated tools.

Source: I did the QA on every LED light I've sold, Hydroponics system I've built, and very building I've constructed, plus I continuously do QA on every mine I currently own as I continue to prospect further into mountains. People that know what they're doing will find the flaws very early on.

Re:QA ??

[magarity]

Why wasn't production in the millions? The recall covers 2.5 million units.

Why the "static shielding bag?"

[kimvette]

Since these phones will only be recycled, why bother with the static shielding bag?!

Re:Why the "static shielding bag?"

[MachineShedFred]

Probably because it costs 5 cents to make sure there isn't a static discharge that could potentially cause a battery fire while these things are being tossed around a shipping company's logistics center, or bouncing about in the back of a truck?

Flameproof?

[Chewbacon]

Challenge fuckin accepted. Where do I get one?

I love that dept tagline

[k6mfw]

from a previous Samsung slashdot article and someone quoted that in their comment. Considering flaming Galaxy 7 phones and exploding washing machines, https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

I looked around to see any footage of exploding washing machines, found this Hotpoint that seemed quite formidable as it kept going instead of just abruptly stopping after first breakage, https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

It's the door, not "quenching hoses"

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference between ground and air transport is that when there's a fire on the ground you just stop and get out. You can't do that in an airplane!

This just in!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Customers now report that the Flame proof boxes are now catching fire too! Apparently they were made from highly flammable material (something about cosy savings).

Here it is right here on the Internet before your very eyes, so as a highly reputable AC, no citation is needed since this truth stands on it's own merit, therefore it must be true.