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My Bose QC-35 II headphones burst into flames and left me with chemical burns

438 points by sgwizdak 5y ago

underscore_ku 5y ago
i'm returning my Bluetooth jbl headphones right now
- Synaesthesia 5y ago
  It's like a one in 10 million event
tinyhouse 5y ago
I never touch Bose headphones anymore. Once bought an expensive Bose that fell apart within a year. Learned my lesson.
- mft_ 5y ago
  A contrasting anecdote would be that I've got a pair of QC 15s, which are now probably ~6 years old. I quickly dumped the awful bulky case, so they've been thrown unprotected into all manner of rucksacks and other luggage, and have been squeezed into multiple overhead lockers. A cat chewed one of the cables, and I had to replace the ear cushions (for a few bucks from eBay) but they're otherwise going strong, despite a fairly tough life.
SergeAx 5y ago
I once considered buiyng Bose noise-cancelling headphones to use them on the plane or in the train. Turned out I am not as much music fan, and a good book has similar noise-cancelling effect for me (like in I stop paying attention to noise). I wonder what would happen if those earphones got burned midflight. My guess is urgent plane landing.
penjelly 5y ago
I, for one, am happy the author made this post. I never considered this a possibility and while i probably wont change my current headphones ill hopefully be vigilant to excess heat coming from them in the future, and not touch the product afterwards with my bare hands to avoid the described chemical burns.
deleted 5y ago
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jen729w 5y ago
I mean I’m glad it didn’t happen to me, but a billion people are carrying around billions of Lithium-ion batteries. Those batteries sometimes catch fire because Lithium is highly flammable. It’s gonna happen.
- sgwizdak 5y ago
  I never thought it would happen to me either. I knew the risks. I took care of my devices. I treated my devices with lithium ion as a loaded gun. But it happened. It happened suddenly, and if I wasn't present, it would have taken out my home and killed my pets and possibly my wife. I wrote this not to shame Bose. But to highlight the risk of personal wearables and lithium ion technologies.
  - mitigating 5y ago
    Everyone is aware of the risks, there were a bunch of stories about airplane cell phone fires a few years ago. What are suggesting people do? Headphones only function while on your head.
    - 5e92cb50239222b 5y ago
      > Everyone is aware of the risks Everyone here, maybe. Almost everyone I know of is certainly not aware of any dangers (or goes with the classic "it will certainly not happen to me, what are the chances of that?"). I still have to remind my relatives not to just throw a charging phone wherever it lands (like under the pillow). The risk of it going off may be small, but the cost would be very high.
    - sgwizdak 5y ago
      I never thought that my wireless headphones had enough juice to fill my house with smoke, to burn for 15 minutes, or result in chemical burns to the user.
      - RL_Quine 5y ago
        They're made of thermoplastic, practically everything plastic burns except for the few things around which are regulated to be impregnated with fire retardants (children's clothes, furniture, etc). Unless what you're holding is made entirely of metal or ceramic, you can be pretty sure that it is some degree of fire risk, if it contains a battery or not.
BadassFractal 5y ago
I had the same happen to a mid-tier brand portable bluetooth speaker that was charging from the wall outlet on my night stand. Burst into a massive chemical flame right next to me, splattered the wall with molten plastic. It took me a few seconds to understand what was happening, at first I assumed it was my SO playing a really dumb fireworks prank on me. Took a few good inhalations of whatever black smoke came out of it while trying to put the fire out with a pillow. I was very, very lucky that this happened while I was in the same room, and not out at work with nobody at home to put out the fire. It would have easily caused a building-wide fire. The company behind it offered to replace the product with whatever I wanted from their store as long as I signed a "I won't sue you" form and sent them the unit back for investigation. They said it was a manufacturing defect. I wasn't feeling like spending months or years in litigation, so I took the offer (no batteries this time) and moved on with my life. No regrets since. The reality is that we're all surrounded by these ticking battery timebombs, and we're all at the mercy of manufacturing quality control and luck. Ever since that incident I never charge any new device unless I'm sitting next to it for a few hours, just to make sure nothing of the sort happens without my supervision. I realize it doesn't accomplish much, since these issues often happen hundreds of hours into the device's regular operation, but it gives me a false sense of safety.
Animats 5y ago
Call a negligence lawyer. It won't cost you anything.
CTDOCodebases 5y ago
I wondered how long it was going to be before this happened. As the amount of devices with lithium ion batteries increases the risk of house fire increases. To the OP I wish you a speedy recovery from your injuries and would encourage you to seek legal recourse so that bose is fully motivated to resolve this issue for you and other Bose customers.
spekcular 5y ago
If you're up for it, I suggest: 1) Find a lawyer. I'd guess that personal injury lawyer is the right kind, and that you can easily find one who works on contingency. 2) File a complaint with the consumer product safety commission, and any other applicable government agencies. The lawyer may be able to help with this. You deserve compensation for this, and I wish you all the best with extracting it. I hope you recover soon. Also: Take photos and document everything. A massive number of photos, of the damage to your house and your body and anything else you can think of. This will help with the lawyer.
- jen729w 5y ago
  The American response, to a non-American, is fascinating. You believe that you “deserve” compensation, but at the same time you guys are all crazy on independence and don’t-tell-me-how-to-behave and whatever else. But as soon as a thing goes wrong you want money for it. It’s like you don’t believe in the concept of an accident.
  - puszczyk 5y ago
    > The American response … You believe that you “deserve” compensation, but at the same time you guys are all crazy on independence and don’t-tell-me-how-to-behave and whatever else. But as soon as a thing goes wrong you want money for it. Do you believe that all Americans share these exact traits?
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    Getting injured in America is expensive
    - jen729w 5y ago
      Yeah because you all want money for it. Insurance in America is famously expensive. Does anyone ever wonder why? I live in Australia. If I tripped on the kerb and broke my leg I’d go to the hospital and it’d get fixed for free and that’d be the end of it. If that happened in the US you’d go to the hospital, the bill would be $50k, you’d sue for $50k, and you’d bitch that your insurance was too high!
shimonabi 5y ago
I'd take up on his offer. I also have this exact model, bought them in 2019 at an airport and right at the time when they were warning about a particular Samsung device bursting into flames before every flight. There must be hundreds of thousands of them in the wild. I won't charge mine when I'm not around anymore.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  That should be the norm for any kind of rechargeable system: be there. Charging is the risky time for all those devices, especially where you can't remove the battery from the device and so you don't know what is happening to it thermally and whether or not it has already started expansion.
xupybd 5y ago
So one small battery on your head is scary. What happens if this happens in an electric car where you are sitting on a huge bank of batteries?
- beefok 5y ago
  https://californianewstimes.com/sleeping-couple-wake-to-find-house-in-flames-after-their-tesla-caught-fire-while-it-was-charging/469130/ https://californianewstimes.com/sleeping-couple-wake-to-find... I worry about this too. Cripes!
- colechristensen 5y ago
  They burn quite vigorously. You get out of the car. They don’t tend to explode like in an action movie. Like any of dozens and dozens of things, they might burn down your house albeit quite rarely. People really need to start accepting that risk is never zero.
  - rmetzler 5y ago
    > You get out of the car. Not always. Electric cars are also quite dangerous for firefighters to put the flames out (you can't use water for instance and it's even more dangerous in rain) and since they are relatively new not all firefighters know how to extinct them properly.
  - jacquesm 5y ago
    There is a video of a bunch of Chinese battery powered buses that go up in flames faster than that I think those buses could have been evacuated had they been in service at the time. Not an explosion, but scary fast.
- loxs 5y ago
  This battery is not small at all, I was astonished how big it is in my B&O headset. Here is a short video showcasing it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeKc4GZwcIo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeKc4GZwcIo
nabilhat 5y ago
HF exposure is a possibility from lithium battery fires. It's definitely something to be aware of, although it sounds like the doctor(s) you spoke with might be aware. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5577247/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5577247/
- Kliment 5y ago
  There's very little fluorine-containing anything in the size of cell used in wireless headphones. Note that the article you linked used many amp-hours worth of batteries for each test, and they took multiple minutes to get to over 50ppm of HF. Scaling that down to headphone cell size (~600mAh) it would take tens of minutes to produce any significant amount. My theory is outer material containing vinyl decomposing to chlorine which caused the direct reaction. Would also make sense as thermal decomposition of PVC is only dependent on temperature and would be in direct contact with the person holding it.
- userbinator 5y ago
  I know HF is generated when primary lithium cells burn, here's someone who got HF poisoning that way: https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/flashlight-explosion.340028/ https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/flashlight-explosi... On the other hand, it doesn't seem that the amount from rechargeable lion is anywhere near as much, or we'd be hearing a lot more about everyone who got lung damage from all the "stupid things people do with lithium batteries" videos on YouTube...
14 5y ago
I bought my kids a hover board for Christmas a few years back. Then it was in the news that some, a different brand, were catching fire on people. I never liked the thought of lithium ion batteries charging unattended after that. I started placing it to charge away from the walls on on ceramic tiles in case it start to burn. Even cell phones I feel better with them charging in a glass dish. Call me paranoid but I’ve seen too many internet videos of these types of batteries spontaneously bursting into flames.
- PawBer 5y ago
  Most of those hoverboards are actually from the same place in China with a different company importing it. I would keep away from any of them.
  - 14 5y ago
    They did recall several brands, I checked and mine was not recalled. I bought a name brand one, Airwalk to be exact. Yes I know many are just rebranded but there was some issues in the ones that caught on fire which the air walk brand did not have. It is 3 years old and running strong still, on it's second shell as they bashed the shit out of the first one cracking it. Sounds like the perfect match for an incident bashing walls with a possible explosive battery inside. It could go off any day but some risk I will take because they are a lot of fun. I just charge it on ceramic tiles and keep it away from the walls. I have told my kids if it catches on fire they need to get outside immediately and not breath the smoke.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  There is no way I would let a device like that into my house. In the (detached) garage, maybe, but even there I'd be very careful about how it is stored and charged.
baybal2 5y ago
Bose don't manufacture, or design anything themselves. Last time I heard they were buying from Goertec.
ajxs 5y ago
A few years ago, the charging port in my Samsung Galaxy S7 caught fire while charging in my car. Luckily in this case I was present, and was able to disconnect the phone when I smelled the smoke. The fire just fizzled out as soon as I disconnected the charger. In this case it wasn't the battery burning, but something else in the system. It took a bit of arguing with the technician at the Samsung store, however in the end they just replaced the phone. In this case there was no damage to anything else, so I was happy with them just replacing the phone.
- userbinator 5y ago
  That is commonly caused by bad contacts, which have a high resistance and thus dissipate heat, which then leads to higher resistance, more heat, etc. The tendency of manufacturers to make each generation of connector smaller and with more fragile contacts, for aesthetic reasons, certainly doesn't help.
neartheplain 5y ago
There's a lot to be said for products which take traditional disposable alkaline batteries, such as my pair of older Bose noise-cancelling headphones. Alkaline cells don't spontaneously combust and may be packed in checked airline baggage. Products themselves are easier to dispose of and recycle without the concern of residual charge in an integrated lithium-ion power cell. If the user desires rechargable or longer-lasting lithium batteries, these can still be obtained in disposable battery form factors.
- xyzzy123 5y ago
  My favourite is equipment with user-replaceable 18650's. It solves disposal, storage and transport problems and it decouples device lifetime from battery lifetime. Alkalines are nice but produce a lot of waste. Lots of things don't work quite right with rechargeable AAs but I agree, the things that do are perfect also.
- Dylan16807 5y ago
  Alkalines don't spontaneously combust but they do spontaneously leak caustic chemicals.
- throwaway81523 5y ago
  > There's a lot to be said for products which take traditional disposable alkaline batteries, such as my pair of older Bose noise-cancelling headphones. Alkaline cells don't spontaneously combust NiMH is rechargeable and seems better than alkaline in almost every way. It also doesn't spontaneously combust. Energy density is not quite as good as lithium ion but for something like headphones it is fine.
userbinator 5y ago
It would be good to see an autopsy, to find out if it's actually the battery that went into thermal runaway, or something else that shorted and dumped all of its energy. I have no idea how much heavy metals I've been exposed to by inhaling the toxic smoke. I don't know how much smoke my pregnant wife inhaled. I worry how much chemical residue is on my desk, floor, walls, how much is getting recycled by my HVAC system, how much exposure my pets had. That sort of paranoia doesn't help. In fact it may cause psychosomatic symptoms (nocebo effect). You've probably inhaled far worse if you've ever been to a barbeque, gas station, or just took a walk in one of the more crowded areas of the city.
- bluedino 5y ago
  I partially melted an electric kettle on the stovetop and my girlfriend at the time went to her moms house for three days
- baybal2 5y ago
  No, lithium battery fires are really nasty, and that's why he got a chemical burn. LiPF6 is a contact irritant, PF5 it decomposes to is a gas, and also a respiratory irritant, and HF PH5 decomposes in the air is a dangerous poisonous acid. This is what everybody visiting a lithium battery factory is told on safety orientation. In case there is fire in the factory, run, preferably until you are few blocks away. If enough hot aqueous LF6 in solvent gets on the skin, you will get a chemical burn. In worst case, the same thing as HF poisoning will happen (it pulls electrolytes out of blood, and then death from heart failure.)
  - userbinator 5y ago
    A lithium battery factory has many orders of magnitude more chemicals than a single low-capacity cell. "The dose makes the poison." It's not even clear if the battery caught fire, or if something else shorted out.
    - romwell 5y ago
      What's clear is that Bose QC-35 II headphones caused bodily damage to the consumer who used it in a completely normal way and in accordance to the instruction manual, without any potential of such damage being indicated on the product that is generally assumed to be safe. We should stop nitpicking of which part of Bose QC-35 II headphones malfunctioned and caused the product to be deadly dangerous. Instead, we should focus on the following problems: * How do we incentivize the manufactures to take safety of their products seriously? * How do we make sure the manufacturers don't skirt the responsibility of selling unsafe products as safe ones? One doesn't get enter the free market without agreeing to some rules first. The rules are what differentiates a market from a scam. Actually delivering the product for which the money was paid is one such rule. Clearly warning about lethal dangers of the stuff you try to sell is another. Violations of either rule come with a cost - because these violations damage not only the customer, but the entire free market.
adamredwoods 5y ago
Scary. Are we, as the consumer, pushing for safer batteries? Is there a shut-down mechanism available for lithium battery faults?
- PawBer 5y ago
  The leakage of a battery isn't something you can stop. It's a big amount of stored energy released in a short while like a bomb. One Chinese company actually invented a flexible and solid battery that can even be cut without a risk of explosion but it doesn't scale to bigger capacities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJXRyWQgOY4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJXRyWQgOY4
  - romwell 5y ago
    And there's not going to be a market for it even in devices which don't need large capacities, unless we force manufacturers like Bose to inform the public of the hazards of the products that they sell if they put dangerous batteries in them. Which is why some of us here are urging the OP to sue: to make sure the safety innovation has demand in the free market.
- romwell 5y ago
  >Scary. Are we, as the consumer, pushing for safer batteries? Nope, we aren't. We, as the consumer, say this on HN: >There is an inherent risk of loss of life whatever you do. We as a society just agreed that there's an acceptable level of it. Lithium-Ion batteries are on the higher level of it but their usefulness outweights it completely. To answer your question, there's a lot of things that have much higher chance of happening on an airplane e.g. a bird flying into the engine or a terrorist attack. Why push for innovation when you can just accept the inherent risk of death?
camkego 5y ago
I don't think the big picture on lithium ion battery fire risk is well understood yet. I posted another comment about this recently. It appears that NYC is having about 1 e-bike fire per year, per 100K persons. (see below) It also appears the NYC is having about the same rate of e-bike fire injuries: About 1 injury per 100K persons, per year. I actually bought a nice e-bike and returned it, cause I didn't want to lose sleep over the possibility of an e-bike fire. The estimated probability is very low, granted. References: https://www.consumerreports.org/electric-bikes/how-to-preven https://www.consumerreports.org/electric-bikes/how-to-preven... "E-bike ownership has skyrocketed in New York since the pandemic began, and with it, e-bike fires, according to the New York City Fire Department (FDNY). There have been 75 e-bike fires so far this year, which is on pace to double last year’s total, officials said. The fires have caused 72 injuries and three deaths."
- viktorcode 5y ago
  > I don't think the big picture on lithium ion battery fire risk is well understood yet. It is the most common type of batteries on the planet, which has been used for decades. What is your estimate on when the risk will be well understood, if ever?
  - foepys 5y ago
    Using and understanding something does not necessarily go hand in hand. Asbestos for example was used for quite a few years and seen as a safe and cheap building material. Then it turned out that it gives people cancer. A similar thing happened with lead, although some people knew how dangerous it is but kept quiet about it for profit.
    - fsh 5y ago
      Are you seriously comparing asbestosis, which develops decades after exposure to invisible fibers, to a literal fire? Billions of people are carrying around lithium ion batteries all day. If they were unsafe, we would have noticed a long time ago.
    - 5y ago
kalal 5y ago
I purchased Bose QC-35 II as well. I don't have chemical burns, but after a while of wearing my ears become really sensitive. I feel strange pain while wearing them. This applies only when the noise cancelation is ON. When it is off the pain immediately disappears. My explanation is that these phones actually generate inverse signal to the noise, but due to various factors such as delay, the cancellation is not perfect and what I am actually getting into the ear is the residual high frequency noise, which may in fact be quite dangerous. Anybody else experienced this? There might be some study about it ...
- foepys 5y ago
  There have been several reports about a similar problem with the Apple AirPods. I guess some people are just very sensitive to this.
  - arendtio 5y ago
    I can confirm that I had a similar feeling after wearing the the AirPods Pro for just about an hour. I tested them for a few days and returned them in the end. However, my Sennheiser over-ear ANC headphones (MB660) have a much better ANC effect compared to the AirPods but the strain on the ears is a lot less intense. I would expect, that the Bose QC-35 II are much closer to the MB660 than to the AirPods Pro.
- sgwizdak 5y ago
  I actually never cared for the noise cancellation on the QC-35 II. I did use it on planes though. I liked the feature a bit better on the earlier wired model. I think Sony has a comparable product where it has a finer grained toggle of the inverse wave.
  - kalal 5y ago
    I am not expert, but if you don't use noise cancellation you would probably do better with standard headphones where you pay for the sound quality instead.
ALittleLight 5y ago
The chemical burns part seems the worst to me. I suppose the thing to do (from a little light googling) is to quickly remove any visible stuff on you and then wash with lots of water ASAP. Anyone correct me on that?
- sgwizdak 5y ago
  Yes. That's exactly what I did. Doctors think this significantly helped, but we'll know more in a few weeks.
deleted 5y ago
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dave_sullivan 5y ago
I wonder if all these "shit happens" commenters would be saying the same thing if this happened on a plane to the guy sitting next to you.
- PawBer 5y ago
  There is an inherent risk of loss of life whatever you do. We as a society just agreed that there's an acceptable level of it. Lithium-Ion batteries are on the higher level of it but their usefulness outweights it completely. To answer your question, there's a lot of things that have much higher chance of happening on an airplane e.g. a bird flying into the engine or a terrorist attack.
  - m-s 5y ago
    I think there have been more in-flight battery fires than (attempted) terrorist attacks.
    - Macha 5y ago
      What is the rate of escalation from a battery fire to multiple deaths? Especially when you move away from the flashy cases like plane highjacking to smaller scale incidents like school/nightclub shootings it's not at all clear to me that LiIon batteries cause comparable deaths to terrorism. But also on the subject of risk vs reward, I think its pretty clear that cars cause more deaths than terrorism, if you want a clearer example of society deciding risks are worth the rewards
  - Macha 5y ago
    And of course inactivity has its own risks (blood clots, heart disease, etc)
- bittercynic 5y ago
  I think the core of the disagreement between the "shit happens" camp and the "you're an insensitive clod" camp is differing understandings of the context of the conversation. I'm pretty sure we all, in a personal conversation with someone who just went through this, would be somewhere close to "That sucks. Are you OK?" In a public discussion about whether it is appropriate to continue using Li-ion powered portable electronics, it seems natural that it's an entirely different discussion.
fxtentacle 5y ago
My bose QC-35 II broke twice during the warranty period. Additionally, one of their temporary failures was that suddenly the music stopped and instead they froze while playing a very loud high pitched beep. It was so painful in my ears that I literally punched them off my head. I've been hesitant to use them since. But this story, together with my own 2 warranty repairs, confirms my suspicion that Bose has serious QC issues.
- chakerb 5y ago
  I see what you did there! Aside, I had QC-35 v1 for more than two years now and I use it daily for work. I only needed to change the cushions once.
hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago
This is an important reminder to all of us using battery-powered devices: there is just a tiny bit of electronics separating us from a fire. There is a non-zero risk this electronics can malfunction. It does happen en-masse like with Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and it happens in individual cases like with Samsung Galaxy A21. It is important to be always aware of this possibility, because the consequences can be fatal. For that reason, unless it's necessary, I prefer not to keep my phone in my pocket. I know I will probably be fine, but if there is a safe option, I prefer to reduce the risk.
jakub_g 5y ago
@OP: can you clarify on this? What brand of cable/charger? I wonder if this can play any role > I used the stock USB charger connected to a Macbook Pro. The headphones were connected to charger or MBP? (MBP uses USB-C, QC35ii uses micro-USB, are there cables like this?)
- 3np 5y ago
  > are there cables like this Yes and they’re not super rare
- jacquesm 5y ago
  This is a crucial question that really deserves an answer. If only because it all by itself could shed some light on what exactly happened here.
- sgwizdak 5y ago
  I used the stock charging cable which is USB A -> micro-USB. That either connected to a laptop with a USB-A or through the apple dongle.
TedShiller 5y ago
Why are we trying to figure this out, and not Bose?
Krisjohn 5y ago
There are a lots of good reasons not to go cordless if you honestly don't need to. This is one of them.
jacquesm 5y ago
This obviously should not have happened, and I hope that you will get this resolved to your satisfaction, I also applaud your effort at documenting this. A couple of questions for you: - were the headphones recently dropped? - otherwise damaged? - what was the environment like at the time of charging (extreme temperature / humidity)? - what exactly was the charging setup, I don't quite understand your description about the 'the stock USB charger connected to a Macbook Pro', do you mean you used the stock charging cable? Or that you used a Macbook Pro charger? Or something else? - Was there anything that might have given an earlier warning? Such as: the last charge cycle not working well requiring a recharge much sooner than you expected it, a deep discharge or other anomaly? - Was there any sound (not headphone sounds, but sounds of something popping or cracking) prior to the combustion? - Do you know what kind of batteries are in the QC-35, are these Lithium Polymer or something else? - Approximately how many charge/discharge cycles did your headphones have? Thank you for answering these, if you can, it may help get a grip on how bad the risk is for other users of these devices and whether or not there are any special circumstances that may have caused this. I have a long article about Lithium Ion battery safety in the works and this is a pretty heavy thing that happened here, it could have easily been a lot worse though, but to imagine what could have happened had you not been in the house or if you had responded even a little bit slower is horrifying, you were - in spite of the bad stuff - extremely lucky that this ended the way it did.
robinduckett 5y ago
So you accidentally pierced the lipo battery and it spewed hot lithium juice on you. It sucks but it's not horrendously dangerous and obviously they should replace the product if it doesn't turn out to be due to personal negligence. Every wireless product you buy is almost guaranteed to have this same "flaw". If the battery gets damaged, it can ruin your product and maybe even hurt you. Why did you switch from the wired version? You never explained. I got into Remote Control quadcopters this last year and some of the bare unprotected lipo batteries I have bought as part of this hobby could probably burn my whole house down. You just have to be careful and follow the guidelines given when buying these sorts of products.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  I think it is safe to conclude the battery housing was breached, but so did the containment chamber but it is not a given that it was the OP that did the piercing. Agreed that every LiIon powered product carries these risks, but even when you are very careful material defects can and do occasionally crop up. But here there is - for now - not enough information to determine whether this was a a charger issue, a manufacturing defect, a case of abuse or even a combination of some of these.
- ghusbands 5y ago
  Nowhere in the article is there an indication that the user pierced the battery. It's more likely that the breach was from inside, via extreme pressure. In any case, it's reasonable for someone to be bothered at being burned by their headphones and certainly not something to be expected, as you imply.
Graffur 5y ago
I use these headphones.. I think I will continue to use them even after reading this. They're expensive and I have nothing to replace them with.. Off topic - Jorg Baller's comment on the blog post is confusing and seems rude.
Hnrobert42 5y ago
It’s interesting that the author notes taking them off the charger. Those headphones charger really fast. Like in 20 minutes when you first get them. I wonder if they were overcharging them and if that contributed to this.
- ajb 5y ago
  Li-ion powered electronics anyways contains a battery controller IC. It doesn't leave charging duration to user behaviour. So if so this would be a bug in the product.
celdon25 5y ago
> "Occasionally you have the teammate without an optimal AV setup for conference calls where everytime they speak there's an echo, and I'd be like, "psst... get a pair of these, the mic quality is great and they're portable." I knew a lot of people who grabbed a pair." I don't dispute the possibility of the burns, but I stopped reading here. The "echo" effect is caused from somebody using speakers instead of headphones as an output device during a call. Sometimes, having a good microphone or good software noise removal can mitigate this, but to solve the problem at the root, simply stop using the laptop speakers as the sound output device during meetings. You could use a pair of $20 earbuds to solve this. By the way, the echo isn't caused from them speaking, and if it is, the configuration fault lies with someone other than the speaker. Also interesting that the author uses "portable" as the other selling point, as if the alternative were to use a boom mic. If the author is thinking about suing, they'd be wiser to not eviscerate their own credibility as an engineer, in comments that could become designated as evidentiary material in such a case. It may not change the fact that they were burned and deserve compensation, but it may make it harder to win in court. The optimal thing to do is to say nothing public at all until clearing it with legal counsel. I'm not a lawyer though.
- romwell 5y ago
  >I don't dispute the possibility of the burns If you don't, why bring it up? Nothing in your comment is about burns. The "I'm not saying <something>, but...." is just a roundabout way to imply <something> without being held accountable for saying it directly. Please avoid this in your communication. > I stopped reading here. The "echo" effect is caused from somebody using speakers instead of headphones ...which is exactly why the OP suggested they use headphones. The echo appears when they start speaking while other people speak. It doesn't happen when they're on mute. And echo cancellation does a great job if only one person speaks at a time. But echo cancellation is complicated when a person's speech is mixed with the speakers output. Hence, if you have a bad setup, there's going to be an echo when you speak. >You could use a pair of $20 earbuds to solve this. Yes. And? We can't recommend things we like because there are cheaper things? >they'd be wiser to not eviscerate their own credibility as an engineer The author is not writing as an engineer. Also, given the above, I hope you heed your own advice.
XorNot 5y ago
Calcium Gluconate gel would be a good idea for the burns. If you were exposed to any HF from the battery fire, it's the standard low-dose treatment used in laboratories where HF is handled (source: worked in a lab where we handled HF, was hit by a tiny droplet once). That said, beyond 24 hours not sure how useful it would be. Lithium Ion batteries don't have heavy metals in them, so there's no risk there.
saltmeister 5y ago
About me: I'm a software engineer with one of the FANGs. I've been in the industry for 20 years.
everdrive 5y ago
This is one of the reasons why unnecessary complexity and the general wireless trend is a bad thing. Wired headphones cannot have this problem. They can't have bluetooth syncing issues, they can't rarely catch fire or explode, and their batteries never need to die or be replaced. Reliance on these sorts of technologies is a new kind of sloth.
- vladharbuz 5y ago
  I'm all for simple technology, and I use wired headphones. However, I can also understand that people like their wireless headphones, they like noise cancellation and so on. I think it's fine to increase complexity when it's necessary to get a better product (depending on your measure of “better”) — I would rather focus on making that additional complexity safe and reliable. A lot of things we rely on today are incredibly complex but work quite well and are quite safe.
  - snek_case 5y ago
    > A lot of things we rely on today are incredibly complex but work quite well and are quite safe. I took the time to run ethernet cable to my home office because while the wifi works well 99% of the time, I don't want to be in a situation where I'm in a work meeting and it cuts off or starts becoming choppy. Wireless headphones introduce multiple new modes of failure, like connection issues, and running out of battery. If you want reliability, it's good to stick with safe, reliable technologies, and eliminate potential modes of failure. Sure, you could also use a wireless keyboard and a wireless mouse while you're at it, but then, between your wifi, your wireless headset, your wireless keyboard and your wireless mouse, the odds of a connection or battery failure happening when you need your computer to work is quite a bit higher. One of my colleagues uses a wireless headset and it's happened at least 10 times during meetings that people tell him "sorry, we can't hear you, could you check your audio". Don't be that guy, use wired headphones ;)
  - whyoh 5y ago
    >people like their wireless headphones, they like noise cancellation and so on Just to be clear, "noise cancellation and so on" doesn't in any way require the headphones to be wireless. I think many people would appreciate it if features, which are typically found in wireless headphones, were available in wired headphones too (which have some other benefits, like lower weight, no charging...). There's a reason many of us prefer wired mice and keyboards, even though the wireless alternatives are pretty decent nowadays.
01100011 5y ago
There seem to be two camps here: - Bose is an evil megacorp who recklessly endangered its customers by selling dangerous and poorly designed products. - Accidents happen and when a device explodes on your head you should accept it as a fact of life and move on. The chemical burns are nothing and OP is a pussy. I think the reality may be different. My take on it is that Li batteries possess inherent dangers and it is incumbent upon manufacturers to take reasonable steps to mitigate the dangers while informing their consumers of the risk. Unfortunately, even when presented with the risks, most folks are unable to comprehend the probabilities and consequences and will nearly always choose convenience, features and value over the avoidance of danger. It seems we, as a society(not as individuals, as some will surely object) have chosen Li technology and deemed it safe enough to deploy ubiquitously. I hope a review of this incident will shed light on the safety practices followed by Bose and will inform future engineers of unforeseen risks, giving us all safer, convenient devices. Overall I find the discussions in this thread unbecoming of the types of folks I thought frequented HN. I hope we can all strive to elevate the dialogue and treat each other with a moderate amount of respect.
- romwell 5y ago
  >There seem to be two camps here... Third camp reporting! Here's my take (as a Bose product user): 1) Bose QC-35 II headphones are a hazardous product that, in at least one instance, has spontaneously burst into flames and caused chemical burns while being operated according to the manual 2) This product does not come with appropriate warnings[0] that this is a possibility, while, according to comments here, hazards of the battery used are common knowledge among engineers 3) The product's manual instructs the user to take the headphones off if they experience a "warming sensation"[0], indicating that the engineers were aware of the risks, but neither the risks nor mitigation were not described in the instruction manual (compare this with the labels on something as common as epoxy resin) 4) The OP should report this incident to CPSC (as they did[1]!), since this is the body responsible for keeping track of such incidents and that will be able to act upon them if there's a pattern of them happening 5) The medical injuries sustained by the OP are unacceptable; and at the very least, Bose should pay for the medical treatment and resulting productivity loss, as they occurred at no fault of the OP, who trusted Bose's device to be safe to use as described by Bose. (Reminder for our friends outside the US: we don't have universal healthcare) 6) There needs to be some incentive for companies to ensure the safety of their products or actions. In the US, this seems to be (punitive) damages, whereas in Europe it's more through stronger regulations.[2] 7) If the OPs report is true, I also hope they sue Bose. It is important for all of us - people who use Bose products, their roommates etc - that they thoroughly check this incident and make sure it never happens again. They will not do it unless it costs them money and bad publicity.[3] Please let me know what's so radical about it, as many people seem to get angry about it. And fully with you regarding treating others with respect (particularly, it's sad to see the OP being called "hypochondriac" and their concerns dismissed as "paranoid"). It is, as you said, unbecoming. ____________________ Disclaimer: I love my Bose SoundLink Mini II speaker. I bought it, for myself, with my money, which was fully worth it. IMO, it sounds better than any other speaker of the same size that I tried. That doesn't excuse this situation happening, nor how Bose handled it so far. [0] Bose QC-35 II manual: https://assets.bose.com/content/dam/Bose_DAM/Web/consumer_electronics/global/products/headphones/qc35_ii/PDF/811772_og_quietcomfort-35-wireless-ii_en.pdf https://assets.bose.com/content/dam/Bose_DAM/Web/consumer_el... [1] As per https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29602614 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29602614 [2] In the words of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603800 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603800 [3] In the words of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603321
solfox 5y ago
I’m not sure which is more alarming - that this happened in the first place, or reading some of the hateful negative comments here and on his post. Can we not just acknowledge that a fellow human got hurt and see how we can do better? Personally I find OP’s experience helpful - it never occurred to me that a failure like this might happen, and it causes me to question if I want to keep using my wireless headphones.
- hatware 5y ago
  How is it alarming that a battery powered device failed in 2021? Widespread issues would be alarming. This is an anomaly. I feel bad for OP, but this is just a "luck-of-the-draw" thing. Trying to make it into anything else is disingenuous at best. I don't think these "negative" comments are as negative as you are reading them, I think they're being realistic.
pipeline_peak 5y ago
Imagine having your pair of expensive headphones exploding, leaving chemical burns only to be offered another pair of potentially explosive headphones. If I were in this guys shoes, I probably wouldn't even want a Bose aux cord. Excellent customer relations by the way.
siproprio 5y ago
Certain stories, I think, are very clear "bring your lawyer with you" situations!
snvzz 5y ago
One more reason I'm never giving up my headphone jack or my Sennheiser HD600.
alkoprontas 5y ago
taking conference calls with those - bad idea. Really shitty microphone.

438 points by sgwizdak 5y ago

underscore_ku 5y ago

i'm returning my Bluetooth jbl headphones right now

Synaesthesia 5y ago
It's like a one in 10 million event

tinyhouse 5y ago

I never touch Bose headphones anymore. Once bought an expensive Bose that fell apart within a year. Learned my lesson.

mft_ 5y ago
A contrasting anecdote would be that I've got a pair of QC 15s, which are now probably ~6 years old. I quickly dumped the awful bulky case, so they've been thrown unprotected into all manner of rucksacks and other luggage, and have been squeezed into multiple overhead lockers. A cat chewed one of the cables, and I had to replace the ear cushions (for a few bucks from eBay) but they're otherwise going strong, despite a fairly tough life.

SergeAx 5y ago

I once considered buiyng Bose noise-cancelling headphones to use them on the plane or in the train. Turned out I am not as much music fan, and a good book has similar noise-cancelling effect for me (like in I stop paying attention to noise). I wonder what would happen if those earphones got burned midflight. My guess is urgent plane landing.

penjelly 5y ago

I, for one, am happy the author made this post. I never considered this a possibility and while i probably wont change my current headphones ill hopefully be vigilant to excess heat coming from them in the future, and not touch the product afterwards with my bare hands to avoid the described chemical burns.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

jen729w 5y ago

I mean I’m glad it didn’t happen to me, but a billion people are carrying around billions of Lithium-ion batteries. Those batteries sometimes catch fire because Lithium is highly flammable. It’s gonna happen.

sgwizdak 5y ago
I never thought it would happen to me either. I knew the risks. I took care of my devices. I treated my devices with lithium ion as a loaded gun. But it happened. It happened suddenly, and if I wasn't present, it would have taken out my home and killed my pets and possibly my wife. I wrote this not to shame Bose. But to highlight the risk of personal wearables and lithium ion technologies.
- mitigating 5y ago
  Everyone is aware of the risks, there were a bunch of stories about airplane cell phone fires a few years ago. What are suggesting people do? Headphones only function while on your head.
  - 5e92cb50239222b 5y ago
    > Everyone is aware of the risks Everyone here, maybe. Almost everyone I know of is certainly not aware of any dangers (or goes with the classic "it will certainly not happen to me, what are the chances of that?"). I still have to remind my relatives not to just throw a charging phone wherever it lands (like under the pillow). The risk of it going off may be small, but the cost would be very high.
  - sgwizdak 5y ago
    I never thought that my wireless headphones had enough juice to fill my house with smoke, to burn for 15 minutes, or result in chemical burns to the user.
    - RL_Quine 5y ago
      They're made of thermoplastic, practically everything plastic burns except for the few things around which are regulated to be impregnated with fire retardants (children's clothes, furniture, etc). Unless what you're holding is made entirely of metal or ceramic, you can be pretty sure that it is some degree of fire risk, if it contains a battery or not.

BadassFractal 5y ago

I had the same happen to a mid-tier brand portable bluetooth speaker that was charging from the wall outlet on my night stand. Burst into a massive chemical flame right next to me, splattered the wall with molten plastic. It took me a few seconds to understand what was happening, at first I assumed it was my SO playing a really dumb fireworks prank on me. Took a few good inhalations of whatever black smoke came out of it while trying to put the fire out with a pillow. I was very, very lucky that this happened while I was in the same room, and not out at work with nobody at home to put out the fire. It would have easily caused a building-wide fire. The company behind it offered to replace the product with whatever I wanted from their store as long as I signed a "I won't sue you" form and sent them the unit back for investigation. They said it was a manufacturing defect. I wasn't feeling like spending months or years in litigation, so I took the offer (no batteries this time) and moved on with my life. No regrets since. The reality is that we're all surrounded by these ticking battery timebombs, and we're all at the mercy of manufacturing quality control and luck. Ever since that incident I never charge any new device unless I'm sitting next to it for a few hours, just to make sure nothing of the sort happens without my supervision. I realize it doesn't accomplish much, since these issues often happen hundreds of hours into the device's regular operation, but it gives me a false sense of safety.

Animats 5y ago

Call a negligence lawyer. It won't cost you anything.

CTDOCodebases 5y ago

I wondered how long it was going to be before this happened. As the amount of devices with lithium ion batteries increases the risk of house fire increases. To the OP I wish you a speedy recovery from your injuries and would encourage you to seek legal recourse so that bose is fully motivated to resolve this issue for you and other Bose customers.

spekcular 5y ago

If you're up for it, I suggest: 1) Find a lawyer. I'd guess that personal injury lawyer is the right kind, and that you can easily find one who works on contingency. 2) File a complaint with the consumer product safety commission, and any other applicable government agencies. The lawyer may be able to help with this. You deserve compensation for this, and I wish you all the best with extracting it. I hope you recover soon. Also: Take photos and document everything. A massive number of photos, of the damage to your house and your body and anything else you can think of. This will help with the lawyer.

jen729w 5y ago
The American response, to a non-American, is fascinating. You believe that you “deserve” compensation, but at the same time you guys are all crazy on independence and don’t-tell-me-how-to-behave and whatever else. But as soon as a thing goes wrong you want money for it. It’s like you don’t believe in the concept of an accident.
- puszczyk 5y ago
  > The American response … You believe that you “deserve” compensation, but at the same time you guys are all crazy on independence and don’t-tell-me-how-to-behave and whatever else. But as soon as a thing goes wrong you want money for it. Do you believe that all Americans share these exact traits?
- wlesieutre 5y ago
  Getting injured in America is expensive
  - jen729w 5y ago
    Yeah because you all want money for it. Insurance in America is famously expensive. Does anyone ever wonder why? I live in Australia. If I tripped on the kerb and broke my leg I’d go to the hospital and it’d get fixed for free and that’d be the end of it. If that happened in the US you’d go to the hospital, the bill would be $50k, you’d sue for $50k, and you’d bitch that your insurance was too high!

shimonabi 5y ago

I'd take up on his offer. I also have this exact model, bought them in 2019 at an airport and right at the time when they were warning about a particular Samsung device bursting into flames before every flight. There must be hundreds of thousands of them in the wild. I won't charge mine when I'm not around anymore.

jacquesm 5y ago
That should be the norm for any kind of rechargeable system: be there. Charging is the risky time for all those devices, especially where you can't remove the battery from the device and so you don't know what is happening to it thermally and whether or not it has already started expansion.

xupybd 5y ago

So one small battery on your head is scary. What happens if this happens in an electric car where you are sitting on a huge bank of batteries?

beefok 5y ago
https://californianewstimes.com/sleeping-couple-wake-to-find-house-in-flames-after-their-tesla-caught-fire-while-it-was-charging/469130/ https://californianewstimes.com/sleeping-couple-wake-to-find... I worry about this too. Cripes!
colechristensen 5y ago
They burn quite vigorously. You get out of the car. They don’t tend to explode like in an action movie. Like any of dozens and dozens of things, they might burn down your house albeit quite rarely. People really need to start accepting that risk is never zero.
- rmetzler 5y ago
  > You get out of the car. Not always. Electric cars are also quite dangerous for firefighters to put the flames out (you can't use water for instance and it's even more dangerous in rain) and since they are relatively new not all firefighters know how to extinct them properly.
- jacquesm 5y ago
  There is a video of a bunch of Chinese battery powered buses that go up in flames faster than that I think those buses could have been evacuated had they been in service at the time. Not an explosion, but scary fast.
loxs 5y ago
This battery is not small at all, I was astonished how big it is in my B&O headset. Here is a short video showcasing it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeKc4GZwcIo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeKc4GZwcIo

nabilhat 5y ago

HF exposure is a possibility from lithium battery fires. It's definitely something to be aware of, although it sounds like the doctor(s) you spoke with might be aware. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5577247/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5577247/

Kliment 5y ago
There's very little fluorine-containing anything in the size of cell used in wireless headphones. Note that the article you linked used many amp-hours worth of batteries for each test, and they took multiple minutes to get to over 50ppm of HF. Scaling that down to headphone cell size (~600mAh) it would take tens of minutes to produce any significant amount. My theory is outer material containing vinyl decomposing to chlorine which caused the direct reaction. Would also make sense as thermal decomposition of PVC is only dependent on temperature and would be in direct contact with the person holding it.
userbinator 5y ago
I know HF is generated when primary lithium cells burn, here's someone who got HF poisoning that way: https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/flashlight-explosion.340028/ https://www.candlepowerforums.com/threads/flashlight-explosi... On the other hand, it doesn't seem that the amount from rechargeable lion is anywhere near as much, or we'd be hearing a lot more about everyone who got lung damage from all the "stupid things people do with lithium batteries" videos on YouTube...

14 5y ago

I bought my kids a hover board for Christmas a few years back. Then it was in the news that some, a different brand, were catching fire on people. I never liked the thought of lithium ion batteries charging unattended after that. I started placing it to charge away from the walls on on ceramic tiles in case it start to burn. Even cell phones I feel better with them charging in a glass dish. Call me paranoid but I’ve seen too many internet videos of these types of batteries spontaneously bursting into flames.

PawBer 5y ago
Most of those hoverboards are actually from the same place in China with a different company importing it. I would keep away from any of them.
- 14 5y ago
  They did recall several brands, I checked and mine was not recalled. I bought a name brand one, Airwalk to be exact. Yes I know many are just rebranded but there was some issues in the ones that caught on fire which the air walk brand did not have. It is 3 years old and running strong still, on it's second shell as they bashed the shit out of the first one cracking it. Sounds like the perfect match for an incident bashing walls with a possible explosive battery inside. It could go off any day but some risk I will take because they are a lot of fun. I just charge it on ceramic tiles and keep it away from the walls. I have told my kids if it catches on fire they need to get outside immediately and not breath the smoke.
jacquesm 5y ago
There is no way I would let a device like that into my house. In the (detached) garage, maybe, but even there I'd be very careful about how it is stored and charged.

baybal2 5y ago

Bose don't manufacture, or design anything themselves. Last time I heard they were buying from Goertec.

ajxs 5y ago

A few years ago, the charging port in my Samsung Galaxy S7 caught fire while charging in my car. Luckily in this case I was present, and was able to disconnect the phone when I smelled the smoke. The fire just fizzled out as soon as I disconnected the charger. In this case it wasn't the battery burning, but something else in the system. It took a bit of arguing with the technician at the Samsung store, however in the end they just replaced the phone. In this case there was no damage to anything else, so I was happy with them just replacing the phone.

userbinator 5y ago
That is commonly caused by bad contacts, which have a high resistance and thus dissipate heat, which then leads to higher resistance, more heat, etc. The tendency of manufacturers to make each generation of connector smaller and with more fragile contacts, for aesthetic reasons, certainly doesn't help.

neartheplain 5y ago

There's a lot to be said for products which take traditional disposable alkaline batteries, such as my pair of older Bose noise-cancelling headphones. Alkaline cells don't spontaneously combust and may be packed in checked airline baggage. Products themselves are easier to dispose of and recycle without the concern of residual charge in an integrated lithium-ion power cell. If the user desires rechargable or longer-lasting lithium batteries, these can still be obtained in disposable battery form factors.

xyzzy123 5y ago
My favourite is equipment with user-replaceable 18650's. It solves disposal, storage and transport problems and it decouples device lifetime from battery lifetime. Alkalines are nice but produce a lot of waste. Lots of things don't work quite right with rechargeable AAs but I agree, the things that do are perfect also.
Dylan16807 5y ago
Alkalines don't spontaneously combust but they do spontaneously leak caustic chemicals.
throwaway81523 5y ago
> There's a lot to be said for products which take traditional disposable alkaline batteries, such as my pair of older Bose noise-cancelling headphones. Alkaline cells don't spontaneously combust NiMH is rechargeable and seems better than alkaline in almost every way. It also doesn't spontaneously combust. Energy density is not quite as good as lithium ion but for something like headphones it is fine.

userbinator 5y ago

It would be good to see an autopsy, to find out if it's actually the battery that went into thermal runaway, or something else that shorted and dumped all of its energy. I have no idea how much heavy metals I've been exposed to by inhaling the toxic smoke. I don't know how much smoke my pregnant wife inhaled. I worry how much chemical residue is on my desk, floor, walls, how much is getting recycled by my HVAC system, how much exposure my pets had. That sort of paranoia doesn't help. In fact it may cause psychosomatic symptoms (nocebo effect). You've probably inhaled far worse if you've ever been to a barbeque, gas station, or just took a walk in one of the more crowded areas of the city.

bluedino 5y ago
I partially melted an electric kettle on the stovetop and my girlfriend at the time went to her moms house for three days
baybal2 5y ago
No, lithium battery fires are really nasty, and that's why he got a chemical burn. LiPF6 is a contact irritant, PF5 it decomposes to is a gas, and also a respiratory irritant, and HF PH5 decomposes in the air is a dangerous poisonous acid. This is what everybody visiting a lithium battery factory is told on safety orientation. In case there is fire in the factory, run, preferably until you are few blocks away. If enough hot aqueous LF6 in solvent gets on the skin, you will get a chemical burn. In worst case, the same thing as HF poisoning will happen (it pulls electrolytes out of blood, and then death from heart failure.)
- userbinator 5y ago
  A lithium battery factory has many orders of magnitude more chemicals than a single low-capacity cell. "The dose makes the poison." It's not even clear if the battery caught fire, or if something else shorted out.
  - romwell 5y ago
    What's clear is that Bose QC-35 II headphones caused bodily damage to the consumer who used it in a completely normal way and in accordance to the instruction manual, without any potential of such damage being indicated on the product that is generally assumed to be safe. We should stop nitpicking of which part of Bose QC-35 II headphones malfunctioned and caused the product to be deadly dangerous. Instead, we should focus on the following problems: * How do we incentivize the manufactures to take safety of their products seriously? * How do we make sure the manufacturers don't skirt the responsibility of selling unsafe products as safe ones? One doesn't get enter the free market without agreeing to some rules first. The rules are what differentiates a market from a scam. Actually delivering the product for which the money was paid is one such rule. Clearly warning about lethal dangers of the stuff you try to sell is another. Violations of either rule come with a cost - because these violations damage not only the customer, but the entire free market.

adamredwoods 5y ago

Scary. Are we, as the consumer, pushing for safer batteries? Is there a shut-down mechanism available for lithium battery faults?

PawBer 5y ago
The leakage of a battery isn't something you can stop. It's a big amount of stored energy released in a short while like a bomb. One Chinese company actually invented a flexible and solid battery that can even be cut without a risk of explosion but it doesn't scale to bigger capacities: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJXRyWQgOY4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJXRyWQgOY4
- romwell 5y ago
  And there's not going to be a market for it even in devices which don't need large capacities, unless we force manufacturers like Bose to inform the public of the hazards of the products that they sell if they put dangerous batteries in them. Which is why some of us here are urging the OP to sue: to make sure the safety innovation has demand in the free market.
romwell 5y ago
>Scary. Are we, as the consumer, pushing for safer batteries? Nope, we aren't. We, as the consumer, say this on HN: >There is an inherent risk of loss of life whatever you do. We as a society just agreed that there's an acceptable level of it. Lithium-Ion batteries are on the higher level of it but their usefulness outweights it completely. To answer your question, there's a lot of things that have much higher chance of happening on an airplane e.g. a bird flying into the engine or a terrorist attack. Why push for innovation when you can just accept the inherent risk of death?

camkego 5y ago

I don't think the big picture on lithium ion battery fire risk is well understood yet. I posted another comment about this recently. It appears that NYC is having about 1 e-bike fire per year, per 100K persons. (see below) It also appears the NYC is having about the same rate of e-bike fire injuries: About 1 injury per 100K persons, per year. I actually bought a nice e-bike and returned it, cause I didn't want to lose sleep over the possibility of an e-bike fire. The estimated probability is very low, granted. References: https://www.consumerreports.org/electric-bikes/how-to-preven https://www.consumerreports.org/electric-bikes/how-to-preven... "E-bike ownership has skyrocketed in New York since the pandemic began, and with it, e-bike fires, according to the New York City Fire Department (FDNY). There have been 75 e-bike fires so far this year, which is on pace to double last year’s total, officials said. The fires have caused 72 injuries and three deaths."

viktorcode 5y ago
> I don't think the big picture on lithium ion battery fire risk is well understood yet. It is the most common type of batteries on the planet, which has been used for decades. What is your estimate on when the risk will be well understood, if ever?
- foepys 5y ago
  Using and understanding something does not necessarily go hand in hand. Asbestos for example was used for quite a few years and seen as a safe and cheap building material. Then it turned out that it gives people cancer. A similar thing happened with lead, although some people knew how dangerous it is but kept quiet about it for profit.
  - fsh 5y ago
    Are you seriously comparing asbestosis, which develops decades after exposure to invisible fibers, to a literal fire? Billions of people are carrying around lithium ion batteries all day. If they were unsafe, we would have noticed a long time ago.
  - 5y ago

kalal 5y ago

I purchased Bose QC-35 II as well. I don't have chemical burns, but after a while of wearing my ears become really sensitive. I feel strange pain while wearing them. This applies only when the noise cancelation is ON. When it is off the pain immediately disappears. My explanation is that these phones actually generate inverse signal to the noise, but due to various factors such as delay, the cancellation is not perfect and what I am actually getting into the ear is the residual high frequency noise, which may in fact be quite dangerous. Anybody else experienced this? There might be some study about it ...

foepys 5y ago
There have been several reports about a similar problem with the Apple AirPods. I guess some people are just very sensitive to this.
- arendtio 5y ago
  I can confirm that I had a similar feeling after wearing the the AirPods Pro for just about an hour. I tested them for a few days and returned them in the end. However, my Sennheiser over-ear ANC headphones (MB660) have a much better ANC effect compared to the AirPods but the strain on the ears is a lot less intense. I would expect, that the Bose QC-35 II are much closer to the MB660 than to the AirPods Pro.
sgwizdak 5y ago
I actually never cared for the noise cancellation on the QC-35 II. I did use it on planes though. I liked the feature a bit better on the earlier wired model. I think Sony has a comparable product where it has a finer grained toggle of the inverse wave.
- kalal 5y ago
  I am not expert, but if you don't use noise cancellation you would probably do better with standard headphones where you pay for the sound quality instead.

ALittleLight 5y ago

The chemical burns part seems the worst to me. I suppose the thing to do (from a little light googling) is to quickly remove any visible stuff on you and then wash with lots of water ASAP. Anyone correct me on that?

sgwizdak 5y ago
Yes. That's exactly what I did. Doctors think this significantly helped, but we'll know more in a few weeks.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

dave_sullivan 5y ago

I wonder if all these "shit happens" commenters would be saying the same thing if this happened on a plane to the guy sitting next to you.

PawBer 5y ago
There is an inherent risk of loss of life whatever you do. We as a society just agreed that there's an acceptable level of it. Lithium-Ion batteries are on the higher level of it but their usefulness outweights it completely. To answer your question, there's a lot of things that have much higher chance of happening on an airplane e.g. a bird flying into the engine or a terrorist attack.
- m-s 5y ago
  I think there have been more in-flight battery fires than (attempted) terrorist attacks.
  - Macha 5y ago
    What is the rate of escalation from a battery fire to multiple deaths? Especially when you move away from the flashy cases like plane highjacking to smaller scale incidents like school/nightclub shootings it's not at all clear to me that LiIon batteries cause comparable deaths to terrorism. But also on the subject of risk vs reward, I think its pretty clear that cars cause more deaths than terrorism, if you want a clearer example of society deciding risks are worth the rewards
- Macha 5y ago
  And of course inactivity has its own risks (blood clots, heart disease, etc)
bittercynic 5y ago
I think the core of the disagreement between the "shit happens" camp and the "you're an insensitive clod" camp is differing understandings of the context of the conversation. I'm pretty sure we all, in a personal conversation with someone who just went through this, would be somewhere close to "That sucks. Are you OK?" In a public discussion about whether it is appropriate to continue using Li-ion powered portable electronics, it seems natural that it's an entirely different discussion.

fxtentacle 5y ago

My bose QC-35 II broke twice during the warranty period. Additionally, one of their temporary failures was that suddenly the music stopped and instead they froze while playing a very loud high pitched beep. It was so painful in my ears that I literally punched them off my head. I've been hesitant to use them since. But this story, together with my own 2 warranty repairs, confirms my suspicion that Bose has serious QC issues.

chakerb 5y ago
I see what you did there! Aside, I had QC-35 v1 for more than two years now and I use it daily for work. I only needed to change the cushions once.

hdjjhhvvhga 5y ago

This is an important reminder to all of us using battery-powered devices: there is just a tiny bit of electronics separating us from a fire. There is a non-zero risk this electronics can malfunction. It does happen en-masse like with Samsung Galaxy Note 7, and it happens in individual cases like with Samsung Galaxy A21. It is important to be always aware of this possibility, because the consequences can be fatal. For that reason, unless it's necessary, I prefer not to keep my phone in my pocket. I know I will probably be fine, but if there is a safe option, I prefer to reduce the risk.

jakub_g 5y ago

@OP: can you clarify on this? What brand of cable/charger? I wonder if this can play any role > I used the stock USB charger connected to a Macbook Pro. The headphones were connected to charger or MBP? (MBP uses USB-C, QC35ii uses micro-USB, are there cables like this?)

3np 5y ago
> are there cables like this Yes and they’re not super rare
jacquesm 5y ago
This is a crucial question that really deserves an answer. If only because it all by itself could shed some light on what exactly happened here.
sgwizdak 5y ago
I used the stock charging cable which is USB A -> micro-USB. That either connected to a laptop with a USB-A or through the apple dongle.

TedShiller 5y ago

Why are we trying to figure this out, and not Bose?

Krisjohn 5y ago

There are a lots of good reasons not to go cordless if you honestly don't need to. This is one of them.

jacquesm 5y ago

This obviously should not have happened, and I hope that you will get this resolved to your satisfaction, I also applaud your effort at documenting this. A couple of questions for you: - were the headphones recently dropped? - otherwise damaged? - what was the environment like at the time of charging (extreme temperature / humidity)? - what exactly was the charging setup, I don't quite understand your description about the 'the stock USB charger connected to a Macbook Pro', do you mean you used the stock charging cable? Or that you used a Macbook Pro charger? Or something else? - Was there anything that might have given an earlier warning? Such as: the last charge cycle not working well requiring a recharge much sooner than you expected it, a deep discharge or other anomaly? - Was there any sound (not headphone sounds, but sounds of something popping or cracking) prior to the combustion? - Do you know what kind of batteries are in the QC-35, are these Lithium Polymer or something else? - Approximately how many charge/discharge cycles did your headphones have? Thank you for answering these, if you can, it may help get a grip on how bad the risk is for other users of these devices and whether or not there are any special circumstances that may have caused this. I have a long article about Lithium Ion battery safety in the works and this is a pretty heavy thing that happened here, it could have easily been a lot worse though, but to imagine what could have happened had you not been in the house or if you had responded even a little bit slower is horrifying, you were - in spite of the bad stuff - extremely lucky that this ended the way it did.

robinduckett 5y ago

So you accidentally pierced the lipo battery and it spewed hot lithium juice on you. It sucks but it's not horrendously dangerous and obviously they should replace the product if it doesn't turn out to be due to personal negligence. Every wireless product you buy is almost guaranteed to have this same "flaw". If the battery gets damaged, it can ruin your product and maybe even hurt you. Why did you switch from the wired version? You never explained. I got into Remote Control quadcopters this last year and some of the bare unprotected lipo batteries I have bought as part of this hobby could probably burn my whole house down. You just have to be careful and follow the guidelines given when buying these sorts of products.

jacquesm 5y ago
I think it is safe to conclude the battery housing was breached, but so did the containment chamber but it is not a given that it was the OP that did the piercing. Agreed that every LiIon powered product carries these risks, but even when you are very careful material defects can and do occasionally crop up. But here there is - for now - not enough information to determine whether this was a a charger issue, a manufacturing defect, a case of abuse or even a combination of some of these.
ghusbands 5y ago
Nowhere in the article is there an indication that the user pierced the battery. It's more likely that the breach was from inside, via extreme pressure. In any case, it's reasonable for someone to be bothered at being burned by their headphones and certainly not something to be expected, as you imply.

Graffur 5y ago

I use these headphones.. I think I will continue to use them even after reading this. They're expensive and I have nothing to replace them with.. Off topic - Jorg Baller's comment on the blog post is confusing and seems rude.

Hnrobert42 5y ago

It’s interesting that the author notes taking them off the charger. Those headphones charger really fast. Like in 20 minutes when you first get them. I wonder if they were overcharging them and if that contributed to this.

ajb 5y ago
Li-ion powered electronics anyways contains a battery controller IC. It doesn't leave charging duration to user behaviour. So if so this would be a bug in the product.

celdon25 5y ago

> "Occasionally you have the teammate without an optimal AV setup for conference calls where everytime they speak there's an echo, and I'd be like, "psst... get a pair of these, the mic quality is great and they're portable." I knew a lot of people who grabbed a pair." I don't dispute the possibility of the burns, but I stopped reading here. The "echo" effect is caused from somebody using speakers instead of headphones as an output device during a call. Sometimes, having a good microphone or good software noise removal can mitigate this, but to solve the problem at the root, simply stop using the laptop speakers as the sound output device during meetings. You could use a pair of $20 earbuds to solve this. By the way, the echo isn't caused from them speaking, and if it is, the configuration fault lies with someone other than the speaker. Also interesting that the author uses "portable" as the other selling point, as if the alternative were to use a boom mic. If the author is thinking about suing, they'd be wiser to not eviscerate their own credibility as an engineer, in comments that could become designated as evidentiary material in such a case. It may not change the fact that they were burned and deserve compensation, but it may make it harder to win in court. The optimal thing to do is to say nothing public at all until clearing it with legal counsel. I'm not a lawyer though.

romwell 5y ago
>I don't dispute the possibility of the burns If you don't, why bring it up? Nothing in your comment is about burns. The "I'm not saying <something>, but...." is just a roundabout way to imply <something> without being held accountable for saying it directly. Please avoid this in your communication. > I stopped reading here. The "echo" effect is caused from somebody using speakers instead of headphones ...which is exactly why the OP suggested they use headphones. The echo appears when they start speaking while other people speak. It doesn't happen when they're on mute. And echo cancellation does a great job if only one person speaks at a time. But echo cancellation is complicated when a person's speech is mixed with the speakers output. Hence, if you have a bad setup, there's going to be an echo when you speak. >You could use a pair of $20 earbuds to solve this. Yes. And? We can't recommend things we like because there are cheaper things? >they'd be wiser to not eviscerate their own credibility as an engineer The author is not writing as an engineer. Also, given the above, I hope you heed your own advice.

XorNot 5y ago

Calcium Gluconate gel would be a good idea for the burns. If you were exposed to any HF from the battery fire, it's the standard low-dose treatment used in laboratories where HF is handled (source: worked in a lab where we handled HF, was hit by a tiny droplet once). That said, beyond 24 hours not sure how useful it would be. Lithium Ion batteries don't have heavy metals in them, so there's no risk there.

saltmeister 5y ago

About me: I'm a software engineer with one of the FANGs. I've been in the industry for 20 years.

everdrive 5y ago

This is one of the reasons why unnecessary complexity and the general wireless trend is a bad thing. Wired headphones cannot have this problem. They can't have bluetooth syncing issues, they can't rarely catch fire or explode, and their batteries never need to die or be replaced. Reliance on these sorts of technologies is a new kind of sloth.

vladharbuz 5y ago
I'm all for simple technology, and I use wired headphones. However, I can also understand that people like their wireless headphones, they like noise cancellation and so on. I think it's fine to increase complexity when it's necessary to get a better product (depending on your measure of “better”) — I would rather focus on making that additional complexity safe and reliable. A lot of things we rely on today are incredibly complex but work quite well and are quite safe.
- snek_case 5y ago
  > A lot of things we rely on today are incredibly complex but work quite well and are quite safe. I took the time to run ethernet cable to my home office because while the wifi works well 99% of the time, I don't want to be in a situation where I'm in a work meeting and it cuts off or starts becoming choppy. Wireless headphones introduce multiple new modes of failure, like connection issues, and running out of battery. If you want reliability, it's good to stick with safe, reliable technologies, and eliminate potential modes of failure. Sure, you could also use a wireless keyboard and a wireless mouse while you're at it, but then, between your wifi, your wireless headset, your wireless keyboard and your wireless mouse, the odds of a connection or battery failure happening when you need your computer to work is quite a bit higher. One of my colleagues uses a wireless headset and it's happened at least 10 times during meetings that people tell him "sorry, we can't hear you, could you check your audio". Don't be that guy, use wired headphones ;)
- whyoh 5y ago
  >people like their wireless headphones, they like noise cancellation and so on Just to be clear, "noise cancellation and so on" doesn't in any way require the headphones to be wireless. I think many people would appreciate it if features, which are typically found in wireless headphones, were available in wired headphones too (which have some other benefits, like lower weight, no charging...). There's a reason many of us prefer wired mice and keyboards, even though the wireless alternatives are pretty decent nowadays.

01100011 5y ago

There seem to be two camps here: - Bose is an evil megacorp who recklessly endangered its customers by selling dangerous and poorly designed products. - Accidents happen and when a device explodes on your head you should accept it as a fact of life and move on. The chemical burns are nothing and OP is a pussy. I think the reality may be different. My take on it is that Li batteries possess inherent dangers and it is incumbent upon manufacturers to take reasonable steps to mitigate the dangers while informing their consumers of the risk. Unfortunately, even when presented with the risks, most folks are unable to comprehend the probabilities and consequences and will nearly always choose convenience, features and value over the avoidance of danger. It seems we, as a society(not as individuals, as some will surely object) have chosen Li technology and deemed it safe enough to deploy ubiquitously. I hope a review of this incident will shed light on the safety practices followed by Bose and will inform future engineers of unforeseen risks, giving us all safer, convenient devices. Overall I find the discussions in this thread unbecoming of the types of folks I thought frequented HN. I hope we can all strive to elevate the dialogue and treat each other with a moderate amount of respect.

romwell 5y ago
>There seem to be two camps here... Third camp reporting! Here's my take (as a Bose product user): 1) Bose QC-35 II headphones are a hazardous product that, in at least one instance, has spontaneously burst into flames and caused chemical burns while being operated according to the manual 2) This product does not come with appropriate warnings[0] that this is a possibility, while, according to comments here, hazards of the battery used are common knowledge among engineers 3) The product's manual instructs the user to take the headphones off if they experience a "warming sensation"[0], indicating that the engineers were aware of the risks, but neither the risks nor mitigation were not described in the instruction manual (compare this with the labels on something as common as epoxy resin) 4) The OP should report this incident to CPSC (as they did[1]!), since this is the body responsible for keeping track of such incidents and that will be able to act upon them if there's a pattern of them happening 5) The medical injuries sustained by the OP are unacceptable; and at the very least, Bose should pay for the medical treatment and resulting productivity loss, as they occurred at no fault of the OP, who trusted Bose's device to be safe to use as described by Bose. (Reminder for our friends outside the US: we don't have universal healthcare) 6) There needs to be some incentive for companies to ensure the safety of their products or actions. In the US, this seems to be (punitive) damages, whereas in Europe it's more through stronger regulations.[2] 7) If the OPs report is true, I also hope they sue Bose. It is important for all of us - people who use Bose products, their roommates etc - that they thoroughly check this incident and make sure it never happens again. They will not do it unless it costs them money and bad publicity.[3] Please let me know what's so radical about it, as many people seem to get angry about it. And fully with you regarding treating others with respect (particularly, it's sad to see the OP being called "hypochondriac" and their concerns dismissed as "paranoid"). It is, as you said, unbecoming. ____________________ Disclaimer: I love my Bose SoundLink Mini II speaker. I bought it, for myself, with my money, which was fully worth it. IMO, it sounds better than any other speaker of the same size that I tried. That doesn't excuse this situation happening, nor how Bose handled it so far. [0] Bose QC-35 II manual: https://assets.bose.com/content/dam/Bose_DAM/Web/consumer_electronics/global/products/headphones/qc35_ii/PDF/811772_og_quietcomfort-35-wireless-ii_en.pdf https://assets.bose.com/content/dam/Bose_DAM/Web/consumer_el... [1] As per https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29602614 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29602614 [2] In the words of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603800 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603800 [3] In the words of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603321 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29603321

solfox 5y ago

I’m not sure which is more alarming - that this happened in the first place, or reading some of the hateful negative comments here and on his post. Can we not just acknowledge that a fellow human got hurt and see how we can do better? Personally I find OP’s experience helpful - it never occurred to me that a failure like this might happen, and it causes me to question if I want to keep using my wireless headphones.

hatware 5y ago
How is it alarming that a battery powered device failed in 2021? Widespread issues would be alarming. This is an anomaly. I feel bad for OP, but this is just a "luck-of-the-draw" thing. Trying to make it into anything else is disingenuous at best. I don't think these "negative" comments are as negative as you are reading them, I think they're being realistic.

pipeline_peak 5y ago

Imagine having your pair of expensive headphones exploding, leaving chemical burns only to be offered another pair of potentially explosive headphones. If I were in this guys shoes, I probably wouldn't even want a Bose aux cord. Excellent customer relations by the way.

siproprio 5y ago

Certain stories, I think, are very clear "bring your lawyer with you" situations!

snvzz 5y ago

One more reason I'm never giving up my headphone jack or my Sennheiser HD600.

alkoprontas 5y ago

taking conference calls with those - bad idea. Really shitty microphone.