COUNTERFEIT BATTS BLEW UP IN MY DEREELIGHT! i was a victim and this could happen to u

folks, i kid you not when i say that my flashlight blew up yesterday night. i was in my sub-basement with my dereelight and i heard this high pitched wheezing sound from the light which i have heard before but i just assumed it's the regulating circuit doing its job. so, im holding the light up and all of a sudden the tailcap switch shoots off and i hear a loud snap and smoke and sparks start shooting out from where the tailcap switch used to be. i dropped the light and went for the fire extinquisher. as im spraying it, the second battery pops and shoots more smoke and sparks. DO NOT USE THE BATTERIES THAT COME WITH THE DEREELIGHT! they're highly volatile! after that my whole house was filled with a smell of lithium. is there anything i can do about this? i only had that light for about a month....thanks

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

UPDATE: Since the OP has yet to correct his false statement in his post, DEREELIGHTS DO NOT COME WITH BATTERIES from the manufacturer. The OP used cheap counterfit batteries from another purchase and put them in a Dereelight where the batteries failed either from being junk, or being junk and not having matching voltage.

Last I checked batteries do not come with the Dereelights. Did you order from Dereelight directly, or somewhere else? Another dealer may have included cheap batteries.

You really should offer us more information, like where you got the light, what type of batteries you were using, who makes them, and what pill you were using.

If you shoved some cheap R123's into a Dereelight with a 4.2v pill that might spell trouble.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

I've not heard that before, please tell us more. The fault must be the batteries and not a design in the light. What type of batteries, what voltage, etc?

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

I'm guessing since he said it had two batteries in it, and he has been using it for a month, they are rechargable. Maybe they aren't protected cells and they weren't at the same voltage when installed.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

1) Air out your house as soon as possible.
2) Avoid contact with any chemicals that may have come out of the batteries, liquid or solid
3) If you have had prolonged exposure to the aforementioned or have touched any of these, see a doctor immediately. A search on CPF will bring up more useful information.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

i think i've made a mistake and i do apologize. as wadef said...the dereelight doesn't come with batteries. i had mistaken the M3 for the dereelight. my M3 came with batts. i was running the dereelight with standard Panasonic CR123As. i've been using those in all my lights and nothing has ever gone wrong. i have no idea why it would this time. that high pitch noise that comes from the dereelight raises a flag. i should clarify that i have been using the dereelight on and off for a month....very low usage and on the same set of batteries. this is in no way, an attack on dereelight. i just want to understand what went wrong.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

Only use a class D fire extinguisher on lithium fires! It's a chemical, electrical and metal fire.... using the wrong extinguisher is major trouble time.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

carrot said:

1) Air out your house as soon as possible.
2) Avoid contact with any chemicals that may have come out of the batteries, liquid or solid
3) If you have had prolonged exposure to the aforementioned or have touched any of these, see a doctor immediately. A search on CPF will bring up more useful information.

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thanks carrot! i called the non-emergency number and they told me that the smell is okay and to just air out the house. just wish i had one of those fire extinguishers that put out foam instead of some fog like substance. i would have slept better if the light was covered in foam.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

+

halocon, please edit your title and first post accordingly.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

do you know what pill you had in your dereelight

there should be a sticker on the side of the lamp assembly

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

M3? Surefire M3? So the M3 came with Panasonic CR123's and you used them in your Dereelight? Please tell us which Dereelight pill you have, 2SM-1, 2SM-2, 2SD, 3SD, etc?

Also were you mixing and matching your Panasonic CR123's? In two cell lights they should be voltage matched. If you put in a 3.3v CR123A and another that was at say 2.9V, you could run into problems.

Also, I agree with Orbital, edit your topic title and post as you are posting false information about Dereelight coming with bad batteries. This sounds more like user error than anything else. Waiting for more details.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

Wow, I'm glad you weren't hurt by the flying tailcap or the vented gases.

WadeF said:

...Also were you mixing and matching your Panasonic CR123's? In two cell lights they should be voltage matched. If you put in a 3.3v CR123A and another that was at say 2.9V, you could run into problems....Waiting for more details.

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+1. I'd be curious to hear details as I have a few panasonic, as well as other, primaries kicking around as back-ups.

I also have a few primary CR123's from my glo-toobs that I've always been concerned about since they are not a well-known brand (yellow label, name unknown until I get home and take a closer look at them). Regardless, I plan on running them in single CR123 lights or in the glo-toobs themselves so that should minimize any issues.

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

Considering what happened, I'm confident in supposing that what happened is the dreaded "mismatched CR123 battery" syndrome.

You should do a search here on CPF because there has been extensive reporting on this.
What happens is that if you use two batteries where one is more than 20% different in charge than the other one, and then you leave them on in a high current light (Deree or any other in it's class), the mismatch causes a violent and sudden meltdown.

Someone here on CPF has done some experiments and has shown that he can easily (and reliably) duplicate what happened here.

The only way to feel better about avoiding the situation is to check ALL batteries used as pairs (even "new" ones) and be sure they read similar voltage.
A good option is to get a ZTS meter which tests the batteries under load.

For my part, I don't trust any battery in a pair unless I've "ZTS'd" them first.

Re: batteries that come with the dereelight

halocon said:

i think i've made a mistake and i do apologize. as wadef said...the dereelight doesn't come with batteries. i had mistaken the M3 for the dereelight. my M3 came with batts. i was running the dereelight with standard Panasonic CR123As. i've been using those in all my lights and nothing has ever gone wrong. i have no idea why it would this time. that high pitch noise that comes from the dereelight raises a flag. i should clarify that i have been using the dereelight on and off for a month....very low usage and on the same set of batteries. this is in no way, an attack on dereelight. i just want to understand what went wrong.

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Your could try taking some picture of the batteries and send a email to Panasonic and ask them why their batteries blows up and see what they answer. :tinfoil:

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

Where did you get your Panasonic's ???

There are some dodgy Chinese clones about, these can be recognised by the misspelt word Elsetric.

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

fluke said:

Where did you get your Panasonic's ???

There are some dodgy Chinese clones about, these can be recognised by the misspelt word Elsetric.

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I was just going to ask the same question. In the process of buying lights here and there I ended up with 4 of the fake Panasonic's my self. Did not have a clue until I caught a thread about them here on CPF.

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

fluke said:

Where did you get your Panasonic's ???

There are some dodgy Chinese clones about, these can be recognised by the misspelt word Elsetric.

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OKAY! we have a winner! those are mine. !@#$%^! but i've never had problems in the past. i wonder why....maybe i just got real "lucky." well, thanks for showing that to me. now i know better. got any brands you would recommend?

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

GREAT....now i have a dead 125 dollar dereelight and a crapload of fake panasonic batteries. i knew that deal was too good to be true. NEVER AGAIN....

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

Not to make light of the situation, but you may want to edit the post title to "counterfeit batteries blew up in my dereelight" or something similar, as at the moment it is still a tad misleading.

Re: my dereelight blew up in my hands!

still waiting on the LA

i like how many times you've changed the title, however it could still not be the batteries