Great explanation,may be they were too confident on the quality of their cells that they didn't go through testing before assembling in to their packs.Because folded separator would have given the faults easily if they were tested.
This should be a HUGE lesson in QC. I am sure LG saved some money in not having proper QC. It might have even been a LOT of money they saved... Not proper staffing, not buying some validation equipment, etc... But not having that proper not only led to fires, which to be fair as you mentioned, that happens. The fact is, you will never be able to get rid of all problems in any tech. The REAL issue is that their QC and auditing didn't allow them to narrow down which batches had the issues. As a result, instead of just replacing the batteries from one line or one machine or whatever, LG had to replace ALL the batteries. So it was somewhere under $2B dollars... Yeah, great that you might have saved a couple hundred million dollars or whatever... Until it costs you $2B to fix... That said, as a Bolt owner, I haven't told anyone I'd never buy another Bolt. Love this car. Got over 100k miles on it before my battery was replaced. No significant degradation. Except for the slower fast charging, which is fine for my use, this is a great car... Problems can happen to any car. Recalls happen. GM took care of it. I'm still happy... And hopefully LG has learned an important and expensive lesson. ;-) Also, there haven't been a lot more fires as they have been replacing packs, so it really was a very very small percentage of the packs that had an issue...
Enjoyed and learned from your explanation. Thanks for sharing. Any suggestions for owners of the Bolt EV on how to minimize the risk tied to the battery recall?
Very clear explanation. Question, GM said both defects had to be present for a fire to start, but it seems like either defect alone is capable of creating a short leading to a fire, so why would GM make that claim? Any thoughts?
Thank you and yes, that is correct. Either issue is enough to cause an internal short however probability of a cell failure when both issues are present increases significantly. We are still waiting to see the final failure analysis report from LG Chem / GM on this issue, which might give more details on how many cells had both issues or a single issue present.
@@akshaymakermax Please do an update when you get access to the final report, would love to know more details. I have a 2019 Bolt Premier, 16,000 mi, manufactured 6/19.
So bottom-line is that this wouldn't have been a big fire if the pack was designed properly(Both electrically and mechanically) Any idea who the OEM of these packs was or was it GM themselves?
Yes, but needs to start with QA on the cell level, as the issues started on the cell level. In an effort to limit the damage caused if cell's with failures reach the pack again, pack level safety needs to be enhanced. Not sure who assembles the pack in the end, if it is GM or LG. But cells were provided by LG.
The fold and short situation should be detected by bms management SW the first time powered it up and charged, it was not that logical the short developed after so many batteries were on the market for months, may be something more basic that the cell factory using material not following specification? Falsify QA report? skipping maintenance of production machines causing material misalignment and floating debris inside the pouch? When the cost was squeezed to the bottom, it came back hit them on the top.
So, this is a manufacturing defect in the LG cells? Poor quality control? Not knowing which cells are defective until the smoke escapes, total recall is the only way to insure the cars, houses, shopping malls, apartment building, don't burn down as a result of the battery defects. After seeing how a folded and stack can have manufacturing issues and the steps required to manufacture these batteries, no wonder Tesla's cylindrical batteries are so much faster, simpler, and cheaper to manufacture while being less prone to defects.
Great straightforward explanation, thank you.
Thanks for good info, and specially good sound, and no musik. 🙂 now I know better what happend in the bolt battery.
The best from Sweden.
Good concrete explanation
Thanks for sharing. Until now, I couldn't find the technical details. Nice job!
Great explanation,may be they were too confident on the quality of their cells that they didn't go through testing before assembling in to their packs.Because folded separator would have given the faults easily if they were tested.
exactly. it actually wasn't a z-fold issue. That's just their press release. Good instinct!
This should be a HUGE lesson in QC. I am sure LG saved some money in not having proper QC. It might have even been a LOT of money they saved... Not proper staffing, not buying some validation equipment, etc...
But not having that proper not only led to fires, which to be fair as you mentioned, that happens. The fact is, you will never be able to get rid of all problems in any tech.
The REAL issue is that their QC and auditing didn't allow them to narrow down which batches had the issues.
As a result, instead of just replacing the batteries from one line or one machine or whatever, LG had to replace ALL the batteries.
So it was somewhere under $2B dollars...
Yeah, great that you might have saved a couple hundred million dollars or whatever... Until it costs you $2B to fix...
That said, as a Bolt owner, I haven't told anyone I'd never buy another Bolt. Love this car. Got over 100k miles on it before my battery was replaced. No significant degradation. Except for the slower fast charging, which is fine for my use, this is a great car...
Problems can happen to any car. Recalls happen. GM took care of it. I'm still happy...
And hopefully LG has learned an important and expensive lesson. ;-)
Also, there haven't been a lot more fires as they have been replacing packs, so it really was a very very small percentage of the packs that had an issue...
Enjoyed and learned from your explanation. Thanks for sharing. Any suggestions for owners of the Bolt EV on how to minimize the risk tied to the battery recall?
Very clear explanation. Question, GM said both defects had to be present for a fire to start, but it seems like either defect alone is capable of creating a short leading to a fire, so why would GM make that claim? Any thoughts?
Thank you and yes, that is correct. Either issue is enough to cause an internal short however probability of a cell failure when both issues are present increases significantly. We are still waiting to see the final failure analysis report from LG Chem / GM on this issue, which might give more details on how many cells had both issues or a single issue present.
@@akshaymakermax Please do an update when you get access to the final report, would love to know more details. I have a 2019 Bolt Premier, 16,000 mi, manufactured 6/19.
So bottom-line is that this wouldn't have been a big fire if the pack was designed properly(Both electrically and mechanically)
Any idea who the OEM of these packs was or was it GM themselves?
Yes, but needs to start with QA on the cell level, as the issues started on the cell level. In an effort to limit the damage caused if cell's with failures reach the pack again, pack level safety needs to be enhanced. Not sure who assembles the pack in the end, if it is GM or LG. But cells were provided by LG.
LG is the manufacturer. GM and LG have a joint venture agreement to manufacture batteries.
Showing that, that form factor is probably not the form factor to be used.
The fold and short situation should be detected by bms management SW the first time powered it up and charged, it was not that logical the short developed after so many batteries were on the market for months, may be something more basic that the cell factory using material not following specification? Falsify QA report? skipping maintenance of production machines causing material misalignment and floating debris inside the pouch? When the cost was squeezed to the bottom, it came back hit them on the top.
you're right. the issue wasn't the cells, like they claim. The issue would have arisen sooner than the months the packs were in use.
So, this is a manufacturing defect in the LG cells? Poor quality control? Not knowing which cells are defective until the smoke escapes, total recall is the only way to insure the cars, houses, shopping malls, apartment building, don't burn down as a result of the battery defects. After seeing how a folded and stack can have manufacturing issues and the steps required to manufacture these batteries, no wonder Tesla's cylindrical batteries are so much faster, simpler, and cheaper to manufacture while being less prone to defects.