Samsung Note 7 Explosion Cause Confirmed; Is It The Battery Or The Design?

Samsung continues to battle against its flagship crisis. Samsung ordered a product recall of around 2 million Galaxy Note 7 worldwide for safety measures after over 30 confirmed Note 7 explosion was reported. Samsung said that the company's profit plunged from $6 billion to $4.6 billion since the issue.
Following the recall, Samsung immediately conducted a series of testing to find out what causes the explosion. However, the company still cannot figure things out. On the other hand, a lot of experts have been conducting their tests in the background. Fortunately, it seems that one manufacturing company has unveiled the very reason for Samsung's Note 7 explosion.

According to TNW, the main cause lies in the phone's design which causes the battery to misbehave and, enventually, catch fire. Instrumental company conducted their own test to find out the answer and based on their findings, the explosion is caused by the battery being compressed. The source said that Note 7's design, which basically leaves no space around the battery to breath in, is the fundamental cause.

Lithium batteries are prone to catching fire when it get contact with other external objects or being pressed in so hard. One similar event happened with Tesla's electronic car where the battery got contact with a tiny external debris, triggered something in the inside of it, leaving the car glazed in fire. Instrumental's finding suggests the same thing. Because the design leaves no gap around the battery, it easily squeezes the battery enough to cause the positive and negative layers of the battery to get in contact with each other and cause the explosion. The phone does not need somebody to intentionally press on the phone because the design itself does it.

CNet also explained why the battery explodes while charging, or a couple of minutes after charging. It said that batteries swell a little when charged. This is the reason why most phone designs leave 10 percent gap above the battery to avoid putting unintentional pressure on the battery that might trigger both the positive and negative layers.

The source concluded that Samsung's aggressive manufacturing process could be the very reason why it's now being failed by its own flagship. Although, there have been recent reports that Samsung is trying to regain itself with an all new Samsung Galaxy S8. Find out more in a report by Jobs & Hire.

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