Motorola smartphone battery charging

I have a < 2 year old Motorola MotoG3 smartphone. The instructions say: "Motorola batteries and charging systems have circuitry that protects the battery from damage from overcharging." So recently I did not worry about leaving it connected to a 5V charger for hours at a time to ensure it was always ready for use.

The first symptom was that the flash/torch LED did not light up; I wondered if, since this is software mediated, it was a fault in the Marshmallow upgrade at about the same time.

Then recently the screen has popped out of the housing, leading me to suspect that the battery was not protected as specified and has bulged badly. Discussion with Motorola support led only to the offer of a charged repair, though I argued that this counts as "unfit for purpose" under UK law.

So I have a replacement battery on order and have removed the old one which has indeed bulged. It may even have bent the motherboard which is reflective enough to show a convex mirror effect. Also the connection between the motherboard and the flash/torch LED is just by spring contacts next to the battery, so a bulging battery has probably caused a disconnection. Thus the failure of the flash/torch LED could have been diagnosed, by anyone who knows how the phone is designed, to be caused by incipient battery bulge long before it got to the point of screen ejection.

Any comments?

Mike.

Reply to
Mike Coon
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  1. Find a USB ammeter and measure the current your phone is drawing. Something like this: If you see any current being drawn after you battery is officially done charging, then the Motorola charging circuitry in the phone is NOT working according to your quoted description. I have a 1st generation Motorola G3 phone that I can try it later tonite.
  2. LiPo batteries tend to bulge when charged. There are numerous examples of the problem: Here's a rather sane discussion on the causes of bulging batteries: Basically, what's happening is the electrolyte is breaking down into gasses inside the battery. I don't know what might happen if you take a needle and punch a hole in the battery, but I wouldn't recommend doing that. In any case, replace the battery.
  3. When something like this happens, there is always a tendency to search for a suitable culprit. Is it the charger circuit in the phone? Is it a faulty battery? Is it something that you're doing? Do you discharge the battery until it's totally discharged, which incidentally is a great way to kill a LiIon/LiPo cell? It the charging system sensitive to temperature, humidity, usage, or phase of the moon? Maybe the battery has hit its limit of charge cycles? Perhaps you might have a counterfeit battery? Or is it some combination of these factors? I can't tell without more information.
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Jeff Liebermann     jeffl@cruzio.com 
150 Felker St #D    http://www.LearnByDestroying.com 
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Reply to
Jeff Liebermann

Hi Jeff, apologies for the apparent lack of appreciation for your reply (th ough some of it was a bit obvious!).

I am actually quite familiar with bulging lithium batteries and have a coll ection of mildly obese ones, mostly due to keeping a device on a charging c radle unnecessarily. Fortunately they are user-replaceable batteries. What is new to me is a non-user-replaceable battery with instructions that state it cannot be damaged by overcharging. However since I am not a mere "user" I have obtained and fitted the new battery. At least disassembly was large ly achieved by the battery!

A smart phone has enough potential intelligence to cycle its battery throug h whatever charge/discharge routine is required to keep it in lean health. It is a pity this routine is not enforced...

Mike.

Reply to
coon.mj

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