10 Ways to DESTROY Your Batteries 

Hey guys, I work for Recology, the recycling company in San Francisco. LiPo fires are problem at recycling facilities and landfill transfer stations across the country on a daily basis. Recycle your LiPo's through a Household Haz Waste Facility in your area or local Best Buy or hardware store. Don't bank on they are discharged and safe. They life you save may be my own! Thanks

I like the vanover option the most :-)

Small nitpick on 2:07: The electrolysis of water does indeed produce H2 and O from H2O. However since they are using saltwater the electrolysis here will actually produce Chlorine and Sodium. The sodium then reacts pretty much immediately with the water which will release hydrogen. But the chlorine will be mostly released which is important to note since elemental chlorine is not really healthy to breath. Chlorine is also the reason why the metal contacts corrode so quickly.

Surprised Joshua didn't bust out the big green hand-wound resistor for this one.

The VanOverCharge 💯😂😂😂😂

I honestly think the fly till its dead method is pretty good, then you still get a flight out of it, just dont fly full throttle and melt xt60s, i feel like its a good method if you just fly normally

0:42 You know Joshua dropped some knowledge on him.

I was gifted a six cell 4500ma lipo. I put it on the charger and was watching tv when I heard a sound resembling a mouse scurrying in the wall, so I sez to self "buy mouse traps. A few minutes later I heard the same sound again and brain set " shrink wrap breaking." I jumped up, ripped the pack and opened the door, promptly chucked battery onto lawn at our field. Within a few seconds a flame started that attained around two feet. I didn't measure, trust me it was at least two feet. It continued to burn, slowly lessening to a couple of inches and then another cell kicked in. This went on for at least ten minutes. No stopwatch handy. But kids, you don't ever ever want to do something like this in your house if you want something to live in. Really scary stuff here

"It's a pretty big wire, it's probably absorbing a ton of the current". It may not be intuative, but It actually doesn't work that way.

LMAO!!!!! 9:16. dude running with the camera trying to film dru running while running beside him. lol. lol

"just get a bunch of em they're 85 cents I think we can afford them" 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣

"A great way to tell if your pac really is done is if it's on fire!" LOL priceless Vanover

" A great way to tell if your pack is almost done is if it is on fire" I was listening intently and waiting for this great revelation...I got a good laugh from that, thank you :)

Here's the real pro tip for getting batteries down to 0V: Most chargers will actually parasitically drain batteries at a pretty similar rate to one of those "Lipo Killers" if you leave a battery plugged into them without them being plugged into the wall.

That was helpful thanks guys. Keep up the awesome work you guys do!! 👍🏻👍🏻

It all makes sense now.. when I was there at RR warehouse I seen that battery in a bucket of salt water and I was thinking “ what a bunch of nerds” now I see y’all are still cool dudes haha! Great video! Love it guys!

Been flying since '14 and never really knew the best way to deal with lipo since my local Best Buy stop accepting lipos. I've gotten some decent suggestions on social media, but this video was one of the first I've seen address it on this scale. Plus it was entertaining!

Love the video concept, and you guys did a great job. Only thing I'd say is it wasn't exactly clear and concise. Us seasoned pilots know these methods and which ones are best but for beginners, there was no clear recap at the end saying which methods you do and don't recommend and which one may or may not be the best. Think it could help a lot of people out. Otherwise great job! Love the full throttle death haha!

Plug into your quad, arm it, and use it to blow the dust out under your bed. Or use it as a leaf blower:)

same test again with a lipo safe bag! this would be interessting !

Being out in the middle of nowhere, the best way I dispose is to fully discharge, and then follow up with a nail through the whole pack. There is usually very little to no smoke (No Flames), but this ensures every little bit of energy left is completely gone.

Great chemistry. Both in & outside the bucket.

Had one blow up in my living room last weekend. I use to charge em in the oven but over time I got to comfortable with em. Cant trust no lipo

LoL the look on Vanovers face when Drew said all the amps 😁

There’s a few brands who make a multifunction cell checker/balancer/discharged. That uses 3 50w lightbulbs to drain a pack. You can set to drain to whatever voltage you want...brings a 1300mah 4s down in like 10 mins or so. Very good discharger

the salt water does 2 things: 1. It discharges due to electrolysis which is not my favorite way to go. 2. if the saltwater hits the lithium it completely neutralizes it forever. I drain my batteries with a light or heavy duty resistor once completely drained I put it in a bucket of saltwater, pierce all the way through with an ice pick WHILE IT IS SUBMERGED and let sit for a bit letting the saltwater to get inside, it renders the lithium completely inert and can be tossed without ever worrying about a landfill fire.

Nice video keep up the great work👌

The timing of this video is wild. I had a 16amp battery puff on me while charging yesterday. It was in my E-skateboard. I tried to discharge the most puffed pack first in salt water. Unfortunately when I put it in water it rapidly caught on fire. And that’s the story of how I almost burnt down my dorm

8:48 completely ignoring Vanover, this isn't the first video I saw this in 😂

Leave it to captain flame over to make a fire✌🏽😅

Awesome video like always

Great video . U guys were cracking me up

Fun episode, loved it! I usually just use the RDQ discharger and I stick the battery in an ammo can at the end of the driveway and leave it for a day or two. I kinda like the last method more though, maybe I'll try that next time!

Great fun , and funny vid , I learned and laughed , you guys had me rollin'.

I just use my smoke stopper shorted like JB was suggesting, works great. I put the battery in a lipo bag in a small BBQ on the sidewalk in the backyard and let it do it's thing. it discharges to a fairly safe level within 30 minutes and probably fully discharged within a few hours, give some extra for good measure. so far so good. I do always have anxiety that I will see a news report of my local hardware store burning down for a day or two following dropping them in the recycle bin though. 😅 on the salt water trick I have heard it's not effective because the salt water can actually cause the tabs to detach and no longer release current. much like what happened when trying to short the battery leaving you with a pack that has charge and no way to get it out.

Loved the episode guys

This Episode was Extremely Gratifying! 🤟

Creating a short with a resistive heating wire. Choose enough wire so that it lights up but doesn't melt . Works relatively quickly too, and it heats up your house in the winter.

8:31 the laught lol

That edit is hilarious! 9:55

I actually have one of those RDQ discharges. The problem that I had with it is it almost completely discharged 2 cell, one was about half discharged and one was almost full. They all started at storage voltage. Might be better to put one together that used the balance leads so you could discharge each independently. I also tried the salt water method. This works well, but I had to keep stripping the leads down farther and farther until it was dead because of the corrosion. The biggest problem I ran into was nobody wants to recycle them. The Best Buys near me don't accept any batteries anymore. About the only place I could find that still take batteries is Batteries + but they won't take LiPos. They said they've had too much trouble with them.

I made a device to monitor the cells and discharge - connect any load depending how fast I want it to discharge but I generally use Peltier or a hho cell (open to air). dumps lots of energy fast... Generally I use it for unused packs down to 3.7v or use the 'kill' option...

Salt water discharging method was the best!

Homemade electromagnet by wrapping a 30’ roll of wire and attaching xt60. My daughter got to learn about electricity and magnetism and I discharged my lipos. I bought bardwell’s resister that he recommended. Works like a charm.

My friend stabbed my lipo with scissors in the middle of science class. Yah we both got in trouble

awesome, looove it

So, with HV, those flames are actually mostly coming from the power connected to the pack,. (because energy is neither destroyed). (which is why they don't pop so violently when punctured when compared). So, , when my batteries went flamethrower right next to MY head,,, I unplugged them and it went out a lot quicker than when I didn't unplug them yet. (which was when it was like a blowtorch next to my head). .... it's amazing how long you can have huge flames right next to you before you figure out that's what huge flames looks like when so close.

These guys are a riot

Vanover for the win! 🤘🏻

that moment when the drone fell from the sky and i think bardwell let out a loud ass laugh.......fucking ded

I have an iSDT 608AC and it has an extra option to destroy the battery, so I assume discharge it to 0V. Haven't tried it yet though

I keep thinking I left Liftoff running in the background hahaha Cool way to dispose of batteries guys!

Great Job Guys 😎 Greetings from Germany 🤘

2:20, salt water makes chlorine gas not hydrogen

Well golly! That was just great fun 😁

I have a heater element from an electric 120 volt hand dryer. It's 8 ohms and really takes the battery down quickly. Clamp it in a vice because it will get red hot. I added an alligator clip and can clamp it to any part of the resistance wire coil if I want to draw more amps. It can serve to test amp hour of a battery if you put one of those watt meters in line. Use with caution! Also I had some 1s batteries that I discharged to 0 and after I killed them I ran a staple through it to make sure it was dead dead dead. One last idea. After verifying a battery is dead cut the mains and wire them to each other and put it in a safe place for a few hours than do the same for the balance leads after checking each cell for voltage first, you never know.

The Vanovercharge!!!

Just leave it plugged into any rc gear overnight. An esc, fpv goggles. I've done this accidentally, I'm not sure if they got truly fully discharged though

There are HV cells out there, like in Hyperion Graphene HV packs, IMO, that`s what the HV setting is for on those chargers lol..

AOK Cellmeter 8 is cheap, fast (150W) and can discharge safely to zero. I prefer it over the iSDT discharger (I think it is called FT100).

I looked for that old light bulb type of smoke stopper can’t fun it anymore. Instead you can use a 20W resistor for led car headlights.

12:21 it's fan club now mate

Oh my batteries sag to 13.5 volts every flight😂😅. That will destroy them real quick

Part II: The dead battery comes back to life..😂

I set my battery charger to sealed lead acid mode and discharge the pack down to around a volt at half an amp discharge rate. Then I cut the connector off and solder the leads together to make sure it stays discharged, leaving the pack out in an ammo can filled with sand out on the balcony for a few days. Then it goes out in the trash.

I had to kill a small 3s in the field and I did it with the puncture method. I just surrounded it with rocks so it would be a controlled thing . It just generated smoke , no flames. I still had to do one cell at a time however. It was badly deformed on the side so I did NOT want to take it home with me .

I use a 9005 high beam headlight. From a chevy truck. It plugs right in to the xt60. It will completely discharged it down to 0 volts in less than an hour

Holy cow, that fire looked like it was of the “flamethrower” variety, LOL.

The ISDT Q8 has a destroy function that will discharge below 3v as Joshua Bardwell mentioned, and will discharge to 0v

Firearms work well if you live in a place where it can be done safely. On top of all gun safety rules, Discharge the batteries down as far as your charger goes 1st, then put a 22 thru the center from 25yds plus, (make sure the cells are face on) and it's safe to dispose of or recycle. The contents contain solvents, so let them air out a few days outside before recycling. Most towns have recycling day where you can take in a box of dead ones.

Let's be real, driving a nail through a lipo or over charging like Captain Vanover is completely safe if you do it on a parking lot or sidewalk. Of course you shouldn't do it in your basement!! I personally always just fly until they die and then put a nail (or knife) through them just to be sure it's dead. Also, if the pack is drained to 3.3v per cell, it hardly smoke at all when you stab it. Just gets a little bit warm.

I puncture them with a knife but I puncture the edge of the cells and puncture one at a time, it usually smokes and sometimes you get a few flames and I have a container of water nearby to drop them in afterwards. It’s not that eventful and you can salvage the leads afterwards instead of trying to cut them off before puncturing it.

2:03 LOL

U are supposed to cut the wires, then leave it in the salt bucket in the garage for 2-3 days, then bingo, sink a nail through to finish the job, then swish that baby into the trash/recycle bin. Boom. Or u can do all this stuff I guess...

Number one is always the best way to do things!

Overcharging is the main thing that makes lipo dangerous. Watch out when storage charging i accidentally storage charged a 3s on 4s mode the charger didn't notice it was a 3s pack. luckily i heard a cracking sound and saw my pack puffing and put it out the window into the garden asap.

hey guys, this might be to much of a hassle etc. but what i would like to see is a staged lipo fire in like a living room or bedroom environment (purpose build for the test in a shipping container or something) simply to demonstrate what would happen and maybe show some proper reactions to it like extinguishing, throwing it out or what ever someone should be doing if shyt hits the fan. (no not that fan :P ) loved this video, learned a lot from it

Great episode guys. Not sure why the thumbs down. You kept repeating do not do this lol. But it does definitely show what not to do with a pack. I just use the salt water method and the smoke stopper method personally. I’ve only killed one by fire one time and that was bc I crashed right on a fence right on the battery and the fence wire went straight thru it.

Definitely funny as hell to run your quad full bore till she blows... if ya can afford more than just the battery! Lmao! Awesome vid guys

Great vid.

Instead of using that ineffective battery killer, just hook up a cell checker/beeper. It will drain the battery in a few hours. Nice video.

I know of a good way to destroy lipos, send them to the hydraulic press channel... 😂

So before recycling one needs to put them in salt water? Or this is the method when one wants to throw them away?

how about shorting it when its not fully charged, but as low as your balancer will go? Should limit the current maybe even to manageable levels if you use a long enough thinner wire.

Great video!!!! However unfortunately still seems like there is no good/efficient way to fully discharge lipos.

If you slow the video down when Joshua plugs up the battery with the jumper cables you can see when it blew the battery's balance board component

So instead of using a smoke stopper(light bulb version) with a shorting plug just have a light bulb hooked to the XT60. It's a single use item, unless you need a flashlight, and you can just let it run down PLUS there's no zombie pack killing plug banging around waiting for a chance to strike. Crazy Quad racer guys put us old combat pilots to shame. Or maybe not. I remember "normal" guys looking at us shaking their heads. What do they know about fun?

You don't have to use a soldered connector to complete the circuits on a smoke stopper. I just clipped the ends off of a safety pain and used that.

funniest rotor riot video

I didn’t even overcharge a lipo but I had one blow up in my bedroom and melt a hole in the subfloor, luckily it was while I was home and attentive so I put it out before it got the rest of my house

I use to make hydrogen trash bags through electrolysis, using a rc car charger. Twice the hydrogen comes out H2O, and it floats. I would light the fuse rope and let it float and it made a spectacular giant fire ball. It never made noise since the container wasn’t under pressure.

When you have electrolysis with salt water you don't produce H2 and O but the product is clorine and something else that I don't remember now

I have done this before, throw them in a bucket of salt water, leave them overnight or a couple days in the patio and they turn into foil paper and 0 current. Usually I wait till i have 5 or 6.

Do you have to discharge before dropping them off at Best buy?

In extreme cases, discharging a badly imbalanced pack with a single resistor could reverse charge the low cell in the process, and that could also start a fire. I'm pretty sure the safest way to discharge to zero would be a balance connector with a resistor (or light bulb) between each adjacent cell. (3s needs 2 resistors, 4s needs 3 resistors, etc) That way each pack drains to zero at its own speed, instead of forcing current through the low cell, and reverse biasing it.

Lol I remember when Jeff took off on that lipo burn lmfao

Vanover way is awesome😀

Van-overcharge :D

OMG! cameraman FAIL film the FIRE dude! =P

4:26 LeDrib trying to lose his sight.