Truck & Industry News

[Robinicus]

Yeah it is the batteries, they can spontaneously combust if they short and the temperature they burn at is about 2000 degrees C (3600+ F)...they cut through steel like a welding torch when they go up. Diesel does pose some risks of course, but the fire temp of uncompressed diesel is only around 200 C (400+ F).

[leo.arevalo12ss]

Wouldn't it work to have tiny batteries to power it because I think Tesla does that with their cars to reduce overheating however would it work it semi's?

[CalocoDoesTrucks]

No one will have a sleeper version for a while until they find a way to remove the fire hazard issue as OSHA won't approve it at this point.

A quick al be it not very thorough search didn't yield much.
Mind pointing or even linking to where you got this from?
(side note: OSHA realy needs to update there site, it looks anchient)
If this realy is an OSHA issue then how come Nikola has been showing off sleeper cabs on the Nikola One? (yea i know Nikola's recent history, still though)

Yeah it is the batteries, they can spontaneously combust if they short and the temperature they burn at is about 2000 degrees C (3600+ F)...

Spontanius combustion of li-ion cells, while it does occur, is rare. The media likes to pick up on EV fires as it generates click, where ICE fires are so normal no body would care. Yet ICE fires happen way more often.
Granted currently fire departments across the world aren't always prepaired to deal with EV fires properly, this is however changing slowly.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/05/17/news/c ... index.html 2018
https://insideevs.com/news/341441/are-e ... ined-cars/ 2018
https://www.fleeteurope.com/en/safety/e ... Y03&curl=1 2020

[CalocoDoesTrucks]

Wouldn't it work to have tiny batteries to power it because I think Tesla does that with their cars to reduce overheating however would it work it semi's?

Tesla has been using (as far as we know) their/panasonic's 2170 cylindrical cells in the 2 prototypes (silver + black/red) that have been running about since their reveal.
There plan is to use their new 4680 cylindrical cells in the production trucks (the latest production prototype (white) should have these already)

[Robinicus]

A quick al be it not very thorough search didn't yield much.
Mind pointing or even linking to where you got this from?

No, I won't post info I get through the course of what I do....probably won't be long before some of this info is removed again like some other info I have shared on here that the OEMs apparently complained to SCS about.

Agree on the rarity of the fires from these cells (most are caused when non certified cells are used in an application and that isn't the case here)....however, these cells have also not been tested in the real world at large scale in this type of application. The main issues I would be concerned about would be cells dropping to too low of a voltage (cathode exposure is the main fire concern) with a truck being parked for an extended time and/or being damaged by performing welding on a truck without properly isolating the cells etc. This regularly happens in the industry and fleets will struggle with specific maintenance/inspection required outside of their normal practice.

[CalocoDoesTrucks]

No, I won't post info I get through the course of what I do....probably won't be long before some of this info is removed again like some other info I have shared on here that the OEMs apparently complained to SCS about.

Oh altight fair enough. Little anoying that info isn't publicly available/easily findable though.

You say the issues you outlined happen regularly in the industry, however there aren't that many ev trucks that i know of in wide spread use. Is this refering to the 12v/24v batteries?
From what i know there are plenty of precautionary systems in place to stop ev batteries from going to (close to) 0v to curb the complete killing of the cells. Haven't heard of any ev fires due to a lack of voltage though. Will look in to that one!

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EDIT: found a repport by RISE from 2019 named "Fire Safety of Lithium-Ion Batteries in Road Vehicles".
It details the effects of overdischarging cells on pages 37 and 38.
Essentialy creates an internal short which could start a fire...
I can't imagine there isn't any undervoltage protection in place in EVs but that sure don't sound fun... 

Out of curiosity, if you are able or willing to say, what do you do for a living? Given you have access to information OEMs seem to want to keep somewhat hidden.

[leo.arevalo12ss]

Did anyone hear about this
https://www.virginiabusiness.com/articl ... for-12-7m/

[supersobes]

That doesn't really mean anything for Mack Trucks. Mack started manufacturing the new Mack MD at that facility back in September.

[iowatruckerdgh48]

You say the issues you outlined happen regularly in the industry, however there aren't that many ev trucks that i know of in wide spread use. Is this refering to the 12v/24v batteries?

Yes, this happens a lot when a shop does not disconnect the main battery ground lead from the vehicle, before doing any electrical (arc/Mig) welding on it, for any reason.

From what i know there are plenty of precautionary systems in place to stop ev batteries from going to (close to) 0v to curb the complete killing of the cells. Haven't heard of any ev fires due to a lack of voltage though. Will look in to that one!

Essentialy creates an internal short which could start a fire...
I can't imagine there isn't any undervoltage protection in place in EVs but that sure don't sound fun...

I use lithium - polymer batteries in my radio controlled (R/C) model aircraft. They have systems built into them to prevent over discharging, but there are always "wizards" who like to override these systems so they can squeeze every last bit of performance from their batteries. The hobby magazines are full of stories about fires from this, as well as fires caused by a cell randomly going bad during charging/discharging, or a shorted cell balance wire, or a punctured cell caused by a crash or dropped battery. While rare, it happens often enough to be worrysome.

[joschac2]

Cells will normally be useless under 3.2 3.0 Volts. Ifs it 3.2 / 3.1 You may be still able recover it. But once it hits 3.0 or under. Its done for good . Battery is useless


From the i,v seen in the RC world sense we control what our battery does
and i race my rc vehicles