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I have no idea, so when I recently got rid of all the phone/tablet chargers in the house I bought them from Argos rather than Amazon as at least then, if one goes tits up at least there's a shop I can rant at. Amazon is more and more like eBay lately.
Terrible idea, poorly executed.
Sadly the crooked politicians have shoved these down our throats so the market is chock full of utter dross whilst their backers are coining it.
Awful idea.
Injured Veteran and head injury survivor. Bouts of grumpy behavior and brutal humor are to be expected.
Red meat and functional mushrooms.
Persistent and inconsistent guitar player.
A lefty, hence a fog of permanent frustration
Not enough guitars, pedals, and cricket bats.
USA Deluxe Strat - Martyn Booth Special - Epi LP Custom
FX Plex - Cornell Romany
https://www.kentonline.co.uk/maidstone/news/van-inferno-at-petrol-station-278657/
or cars
I really don't know why otherwise sane people have to be nutso-pro/anti during this ICE -> EV transition. It's going to happen, and there are new risks and new opportunities. It is not unproblematic - the tech, the infrastructure, the second-life safety (which is that Prof's area - all have significant challenges.
It's like Brexit / Covid jabs / etc all over again.
Our lives - and the planet - would be a lot better off if we could have a calm, reasoned, informed, educated and intelligent debate in which different views are heard and discussed, rather than being shouted down because they're at odds with whatever someone else last watched on a SM channel.
But then SM channels and "calm, reasoned, informed, educated and intelligent" don't often go together.
And if they feel they are right, then they are!
And if they feel VERY STRONGLY that they are right then they are even RIGHTER!!
Sanity sneaked out the backdoor at least 10 years ago....
Proper safety standards and enforcement of them are critical - this is one major reason why keeping e-scooters only 'semi legal' is stupid - the kind of people who buy them and use them, knowing that they're illegal to ride on a public road, probably aren't as concerned as they should be about other aspects of their legality. Bring the whole industry into a proper UK framework, regulate effectively and impose draconian penalties for importing substandard ones, and we can learn to live with them too - in any case, there's a good chance that the technology will itself be superceded within a decade or two. It's not a reason to stop the transition away from fossil fuels.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
The battery problem to a large degree is caused by cost cutting. People want a battery that has a high WHr and one that can give a high current on demand but the cells that can do this are more expensive to buy. The price difference between an Ebike / skooter battery pack built with something like Samsung or Panasonic 8650 cells and one built with no name cells can be £200 or so and the end user won't know the difference unless they cut the pack open. It's one of the easiest things to forge. Then there's the welding. These joints need to be reliably spot welded on every single cell, at these currents even the slightest bad joint will produce a lot of heat. The actual cells need to be matched closely in their voltage and capacity otherwise they will
discharge through their neighbours.
Then the BMS has to be carefully implemented to ensure no cell is overcharged or allowed to drop below it's critical voltage. With Lipo batteries this is a very small range. Then all the cells have to be monitored temperature wise to cut charging current before the pack overheats.
So it's an expensive thing to build properly but has a big profit margin for people who are willing to build it cheaply and then sell it under the guise of a quality product.
What's really needed is for online marketplace's to take responsibility for the products they allow their sellers to list. It's their site, their name and they take a cut of the profits. They need to do more to remove dangerous goods.
The company that had a battery pack banned by HMG ships with cheapo batteries instead of the Samsung. Even when the buyer asked for and paid for the Samsungs:
They're mostly very safe. Lithium batteries are not new. I carry one just inches from my genitals every day and I don't worry it'll explode.
There is a counterfeit market that needs addressing, but the core tech isn't the problem.