EV Battery Fires Analyzed

[CyberGus]

I found this video on TMC about EV fires, and agree it's really informative. Some highlights:

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[CyberJet]

An interesting thing I've been wondering about for a while is what will happen to the Cybertruck if it catches fire. Hopefully, it never catches fire but if it does and the battery pack continues to combust will the strainless steel not melt because it is stronger than other car materials and also can withstand higher temperatures or not get damaged much. Then the car's battery pack might be badly damaged but the car's stainless steel body will be mostly fine and not damaged.

 

[CyberGus]

An interesting thing I've been wondering about for a while is what will happen to the Cybertruck if it catches fire. Hopefully, it never catches fire but if it does and the battery pack continues to combust will the strainless steel not melt because it is stronger than other car materials and also can withstand higher temperatures or not get damaged much. Then the car's battery pack might be badly damaged but the car's stainless steel body will be mostly fine and not damaged.

The surviving stainless parts will make for nice souvenirs, but a HV battery fire will certainly total the vehicle.

 

[firsttruck]

An interesting thing I've been wondering about for a while is what will happen to the Cybertruck if it catches fire. Hopefully, it never catches fire but if it does and the battery pack continues to combust will the stainless steel not melt because it is stronger than other car materials and also can withstand higher temperatures or not get damaged much. Then the car's battery pack might be badly damaged but the car's stainless steel body will be mostly fine and not damaged.

Might not be hot enough to totally melt stainless into pool of liquid but might be hot enough to put in plastic state and cause deformation.

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304L - 316L Stainless steel melting points - 1,375 - 1,450°C
Grade EN Specification Melting Point
1.4307 304L 1,400 - 1,450°C
1.4845 310 1,400 - 1,450°C
1.4401 316 1,375 - 1,400°C
1.4404 316L 1,375 - 1,400°C
Stainless steel melting points - thyssenkrupp Materials (UK)
https://www.thyssenkrupp-materials.co.uk/stainless-steel-melting-points.html

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maximum temp of lithium-ion battery fire: 1,100 - 1,300°C

UNECE Wiki - Electric Vehicle Fire Testing
Dean D. MacNeil, Senior Research Officer
Co-authors : NRC : Gary Lougheed, Cecilia Lam, Guy Carbonneau, Ryan
Kroeker, Dave Edwards, Jeff Tompkins; Transport Canada : Ghislain Lalime
Energy, Mining and Environment – Ottawa
613-990-1769
National Research Council of Canada
Presentation to the 8th EVS-GTR Meeting, Washington, USA June 1-5, 2015
Electric Vehicle Fire Testing - UNECE Wiki
https://wiki.unece.org/download/attachments/25270993/EVSTF-03-29e.pdf?api=v2

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Evaluating the thermal failure risk of large-format lithium-ion batteries ( LIBs ) using a cone calorimeter
Zhi Wang, Xiaoyao Ning, Kang Zhu, Jianyao Hu, Han Yang and Jian Wang
Date received: 10 October 2018
Journal of Fire Sciences
2019, Vol. 37(1) 81–95
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/0734904118816616

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maximum flame temperature are 803°C for 50% SOC and 1,102°C for 70% SOC LIBs

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Lyten - Lithium-Ion Battery Fires
2024
https://lyten.com/lithium-battery-fires-a-burning-issue/

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fires are chemically driven and very hard to extinguish. Third, these fires are very hot (~800 deg C), and they can easily ignite whatever is nearby (i.e. the rest of the vehicle, surrounding structures, etc.).

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