Hacker News Reader

Comment by rwhitman | Hacker News Reader

One day at work I watched a coworker's fake phone charger explode in a literal fireball that went off with a large "bang!" complete with shrapnel, flame shooting out and good amount of smoke.

This article talks about the theoretical danger from an engineering perspective, but I've witnessed these things explode first hand. Definitely heed the advice - get a real charger

View on HN

I had a genuine Nokia-charger go total armageddon on me once. Never charge your phone while you sleep, it might be the last thing you ever do. Regardless if it is "fake" or "genuine".

I always used to charge devices while I slept (and the plug is pretty close to my bed). Then a few weeks ago my MacBook magsafe adapter literally burnt through the insulating material and the metal wires. Fortunately it happened during the day so I could react to it, but needless to say I won't be charging anything over night again!

Errrr, If that's true then it's astonishingly unacceptable. (I mean - official chargers should never be dangerous.)

It was a big enough deal that Apple was sued, and gave away free replacements.

http://consumerist.com/2011/11/apple-replaces-frayed-magsafe...

Thanks for linking to that report, I didn't actually know about that. I brought mine back and as soon as they saw it they replaced it. I think any company would have replaced it to prevent bad publicity, there were visible burn marks on it.

I charge my iPhone at night using the genuine Apple charger. As far as I'm aware it is grounded (UK) and I have one of those RCD type things for the whole house, as well as a fuse box.

Should I be worried and stop charging it overnight? It has become part of my going to bed routine and works well as the iPhone will sync wirelessly overnight but I'd rather not wake up on fire.

I think the main hazard is fire, isn't it? Both the RCD and the earth connection are to stop humans from being electrocuted if they are touching the circuit while it shorts.

I don't know enough about the characteristics of a charger exploding but I'd say the RCD may not be fast enough to prevent the explosion, and that's assuming the explosion is due to shorting to begin with.

The 'uncle' post of your one had some good advice http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3904523

Correct. You need an arc-fault circuit interrupter for that.

I was using a grounded UK charger too when this happened (although it was Mac not iPhone). I think the chances of this happening with high quality electronics is pretty low but as far as I know the Fire Service recommends unplugging all electronics at night so it's probably not necessary but obviously the safest solution.

I charge my devices overnight.

I have a smoke alarm installed in the same room, an RCD on the socket and they sit on a solid granite surface!

A few years ago I used to race radio controlled cars - the cells on them taught me a few lessons about how damn dangerous chemical cells are.

For the Americans an RCD is the same thing as a GFCI, it's also called an ALCI in some places.

And still all three acronyms are totally meaningless to me.

Residual-current device: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Residual-current_device

I'd think an arc interrupter would be better.

You need both to prevent fire and accidental shock. Fortunately, you can install both at the same time for all of your receptacles by using GFCI+AFCI circuit breakers. Unfortunately, they are expensive.

All true, and also: GFCI breakers will not substitute for the dual breakers used in many panel boxes, they are too big. And, use of GFCI breakers is not compatible with three-wire circuits used in many locales in the US, at least. (What I mean is, two hot wires of opposite polarity sharing a common grounded conductor, allowing to run two circuits over three wires.)

Surprisingly difficult to find an arc interrupter in the UK. I found a link [0] which might shed some light on that; essentially the characteristics/problems of a 240v grounded system are different to a 110v, predominantly 2-pin system.

[0] http://www.theiet.org/forums/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=205...

You could say this about having any electronic devices plugged in when you're not observing them. It's not practical.

Do you have empirical evidence that keeping battery powered devices on chargers has a high enough risk to be concerned? Anecdotes aren't evidence. I once had a UPS go bad and nearly melt down while I was sitting next to it. Should we not leave UPSes plugged in?

> Never charge your phone while you sleep, it might be the last thing you ever do.

Never cross the street, it might be the last thing you ever do.

Well they did have that problem with some batteries that were recalled http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6945593.stm http://www.pcworld.com/article/140101/cell_phone_battery_exp...

Reply on news.ycombinator.com