LiPo safety - any personal experience?

[tzt2]

I'm waiting on my LiPo batteries to arrive for my PortaCube project - this is a new style battery I have not worked with before, I see LOTS of safety warnings. It is understood that these are the kind of batteries that you do NOT want to short out - even momentarily.

Now, I bought the recommended charger and protection circuit. I'd also like to think that after almost a decade of working with electronics on a wage earning level - that I know how to handle dangerous voltages and potentially dangerous goods. However, I am human.

How safe are these? Are they stable? Should I get a LiPo bag for them to live in in my casing (knowing all that would do is to contain the explosion)?

Thanks!

[hailrazer]

Well you don't want them to get extremely hot. so make sure your case has a fan exhausting the hot air.

You don't want any shorts. So use electrical tape to cover all exposed connections.

Make sure you triple check your wiring before connecting and soldering. And short will cause a fire.

Other than that you should be good.

[timmeh87]

Obviously you want to have a protection circuit on there. And use a proper charger (no power supplies unless you know how!). Do some research, Its not that hard to be safe if you know what you are doing. (edit: I read back and it looks like you are at least one step ahead of me on this)

You might want to consider what will stop the batteries from discharging, running them until they just stop working can have consequences. Dont go below 3v per cell. Some protection circuits aren't so easy to reset if you trip them.

Youtube has some fun videos of people exploding their batteries on purpose.

Newer LiPO4 batteries have none of the dangers associated with other chemistries.