At TITAN Lithium, we have focused on battery safety since day one. We believe no customer should have to worry about their battery being the cause of failure, damage or worse - we've all seen the many news segments and videos of lithium batteries going up in unstoppable flames but with the right standard of quality, proper controls and tests, LiFePO4 batteries should be safer than their lead-acid counterparts.
The leading cause for failure in LiFePO4 batteries that we have seen/heard about is quality. With so many brands and types already in the lithium market, some vendors will attempt to get market share by selling as cheaply as possible; in order to do so, some will lower the quality standards of the cell, BMS and other components, as well as skip vital tests that prove quality. A lower quality battery will not perform as most users expect, and so even in normal use, the cell could be subject to its failure thresholds - charging is the most 'dangerous' part of any lithium battery - it's why lithium has strict charging instructions and can include heaters for optimal charging. Cheaper BMS types can fail to sense problems and activate their protections which can allow further extreme conditions to hit the cells.
Some may use pouch cells rather than cylindrical or prismatic - a pouch cell is the cheapest lithium cell to make and if punctured, can cause fires. When pouch cells get abused/used outside of their specifications and the BMS isn't good enough to protect them, they can expand (like phone batteries) and start to put pressure on themselves and other internal components, which can easily puncture the cell lining and cause problems. Since day one we've always recommended customers to spend a little extra and go for a battery with known qualities, but the low prices attract a lot of attention. Simply put, a good quality, genuine quality LiFePO4 cell should not catch on fire with normal or even extreme use as the BMS should catch 100% of any extreme threshold events.
When comparing brands, we recommend looking for safety certificates like UN38.3, CE, UKCA and EMC, and checking what cell type is installed - prismatic cells currently provide the best capacity and are considered the safest, cylindrical is second best and we'd recommend staying clear or pouch for deep cycle applications.
There are of course exceptions to this and some brands will have decent-quality pouch cells, but it can be difficult to verify.
We currently have every available test conducted on our batteries, and our strict quality standards ensure we are selling genuine, reliable batteries. We even have dangerous goods inspections at the time of shipping and delivery to ensure our certificates are valid.
Our tests include crush, drop and extreme charge/discharge currents as part of our UN38.3 requirements, electromagnetic interference compliance as part of our EMC tests and material safety compliance as part of our RoHS test to name a few.
As of writing, each of our batteries has been tested and certified according to:
UN38.3
CE
RoHS
UKCA
EMC
Below are some proof of test certificates (some contact details and addresses have been redacted for data protection reasons):
Full test certificates & reports are available on request.
