iPhone 4 bursts into flames, burns hand

Boy Genius Report ^ | 07/08/10

[TXnMA]

Of course, a look at the computer end of the cable (and the computer (or charger) would be most instructive...

[PugetSoundSoldier]

Good thing he didn’t have the rubber band on it, or he’d have a ring of fire, too!

IMHO, this is a short in the phone, probably the battery charging circuit. USB is limited to a maximum of 2.5W output, and there’s no way that 2.5W (the maximum power output for a hub under USB 2.0) will cause that much damage.

Something discharged the battery in a hurry - shorted it out - and pumped 10+ amps through the connector back towards the computer. USB cables are almost always 28 AWG, which means they can carry 1.4A comfortably, and won’t fuse until you hit 13-14A.

The iPod/iPhone connector can handle even more current before it melts, about 15A (experimentally determined for UL listing some Apple-compatible accessories). Since the connector melted and the cable did not, then we know the current surge did NOT come down the cable, but from the phone.

If it was a bad USB port on the computer (as some have suggested), we’d see the cable itself fried, not the connector; you wouldn’t damage the connector without damaging the cable first. Since it is just the connector that’s toast, it was the phone that failed, and the cable most likely shorted right at the connector, saving the computer from catastrophic failure as well (at least most USB hubs have voltage-and-current protection on their outputs).

Definitely not a good thing...

[Fichori]

Lithium-ion/Lithium-polymer batteries can ‘outgas with flame’ under certain circumstances.

Looking at the photos, that would be my first guess.

[Doomonyou]

Shouldn’t have plugged it in to 220.

[Bubba Ho-Tep]

People have been known to burst into flames and be reduced to ashes without adjacent furniture or bedding catching fire.

What actually happens is that someone grossly overweight, in a sealed room, next to an ignition source (a cigarette or an open fireplace), dies of natural causes then catches fire. With little oxygen in the room, the fire slowly consumes the fat in the body, burning it like a candle. Eventually the oxygen runs out and the fire goes out before doing more damage.

[Vicki]

Looks more like the USB cable fried, not the phone.

[Nik Naym]

I nominate your post as “Tech Post of the Day”.

[RachelFaith]

Battman is correct. It was the cable, as clearly can be seen in this second photo. While some posters have been all too quit to speak FUD about the iPhone itself, they have failed to use due diligence in examining all the facts.







The first error is obvious as one looks at this 2nd picture. The cable IS burned and much further down than a "single flash" or "Battery Arc" would contribute. We do not have a 3rd pic to show if the cable is burned all the way down or connected to a charger or PC. But absent any PC claim, it would stand to reason that this was plugged into a wall charger.

Second of course, as others have pointed out, is the very little damage to the iPhone. One small single spot of black? No cracking of the glass? No melting of any of the black plastic between the frame? If the very larger battery was the problem, then we would expect to see issues like happened with those Dell Laptops. We do not see evidence of battery flash.

Look at the original picture again, and you will see something. But only if you OWN an iphone and are mechanically familiar with the design.

The burn mark on the metal of the plug and the single burn mark on the iphone show clearly what the problem is.

Look. Do you see it? This user had forced the connector in upside down! The dock connector cable is not showing the correct orientation. This is a simple user error. A moron who DID "plug it in wrong". And as is obvious by the other pics of the cable, it did not FLASH or get hot in his hand. He is LYING to get a new phone and his 15 minutes of fame. This was a text book slow short which after some period of time, over headed the cable and cause this melting, NOT a fire, NOT a flash.

The objective evidence is clear. Apple 1, Morons & Trolls 0.

[PugetSoundSoldier]

Unfortunately, no USB hub will source anywhere near the current required to melt the plastic; 2.5W simply cannot do that. The power came from the iPhone, meaning it’s outputs are not isolated from the battery to prevent a short condition.

That’s the electrical fact; add in that the connector is highly damaged and the cable is relatively intact, and that the cable has a lower fuse/melt current limit than the connector, and the surge could NOT have come from the PC, or even the wall power supply. If it came from the PC/wall power end, the cable would have burned up well before the connector toasted. The only logical conclusion is the power for this damage came from the phone.

As far as orientation, that’s completely inconclusive; you have zero corroborating information about that. In fact, looking at the pinout of the iPhone connector we see the damage occurred around pins 18-20, which would be the high current +3.3V and +12V rails. Not good to short those together.

If the cable was plugged in upside down (and who even designs a connector that can be inserted backwards) it would have been the video outputs connected to the phone, which would do absolutely nothing as they are isolated lines and are not connected on any USB cable connection or wall power supply. So a backwards connection would result in open lines being charged with voltage, but no current flow. No current flow, no power dissipation, no damage.

Conclusion: something was damaged on the connector side (either the end of the cable or the iPhone itself) that caused the higher power outputs of the iPhone to short together, and caused the meltdown. Apparently the iPhone does not have sufficient short-circuit protection to prevent a meltdown if the Firewire +12VDC and +3.3VDC outputs are shorted together.

Technical information 1, Mac fanatic 0.

[RachelFaith]

First, neither of us have said the source CAME FROM the usb end. So discussing all the technical specs on the power plug is a meaningless red herring. The the battery and USB together would provide exactly this kind of short if the connector was forced in backwards.

In typical FUD fashion, you pejoratively prejudice your comment with the inane "who even designs a connector that can be put in backwards". NO ONE. It was FORCED in and this obviously CAUSED the short between the voltage coming from the USB and the voltage already IN the battery which were designed to go together not be cross circuited. It is very HARD to force the wrong end in.

So you spend 4 paragraphs disparaging Apple, adding ad hoc insults to the design and spouting off techno-babble about irrelevant specs, only to come to the SAME CONCLUSION AS US.

Conclusion: something was damaged on the connector side (either the end of the cable or the iPhone itself) that caused the higher power outputs of the iPhone to short together, and caused the meltdown.

Your words. The only problem is your very indirect conclusion which leaves again the open suggestion that Apple has a design problem. It does not. This is the same exact battery plug ipod layout for HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS of ipods for a decade.

The SOMETHING your end analysis is looking for is called HUMAN ERROR. The SOMETHING you seem unwilling to even consider is PLUGGING IT IN BACKWARDS TO SHORT IT.

SOMETHING must be wrong with YOU, because you never give any other answer than "Apple is horrid and screwed up again, stay away from crappy Apple". And you avoid any other possible conclusion 100% of the time.

And at least you got the right word. MELT down. Unlike the mac haters at Boy Genius, who want to suggest a FLASH fire. The fire would have had to have been so unbelieveably hot to have melted all that in a flash as the guys hand would need skin graphs. No, this article itself is full of half truths, if that.

But your last line is without any factual support at all. How do you know that he didn't also have this phone soaking wet? Or damaged it in some other way PRIOR to plugging it in wrong? You do not. There are hundreds of ways to get the end result in these pics that have nothing to do with design issues. Should Apple design a "don't stick a butter knife in the outlet app? Not good enough for you... you always just go for the throat like a rabid dog.

Sane people 2, rabid mac hating dogs still zero.

[PugetSoundSoldier]

Yet you provide ZERO technical reason for your conclusion. None. Nada. I have provided technical facts, and you have none. But you are right, somehow.

Short of facts, Rachel, or even a technical understanding of the materials and parts in question, you are engaging in completely baseless prognostication. Nothing you have stated makes sense, given the actual damage that occurred. Groundless guesses just to cover an issue.

Come back with some facts, dearie, and we can see what you have...

[RachelFaith]

No. Not true yet again.

I already pointed out the problems with your “technical” conclusion. Basically, you posted a bunch of jargon which, might make you look smart, as if anyone reading this hasn’t already become very familiar with this pattern of your behavior, but is nothing more than a litany of specifications.

I can go out to wiki and grab all sorts of information on which pins supply what voltage to which other pins, and I could zoom in on close ups of the pics and say that pin X is darker than pin Z and on and on and on but to NO END. A fire or melted end does not have to conform to just the voltage elements as the cause.

As I stated clearly, there is NO evidence for or against the introduction of WATER or a BUTTER KNIFE. Nothing to prove either way that either or both of these extraneous elements were or were not factors. Thus, there is NOTHING of any technical manifestation you can use to PROVE your point of bad design.

Nothing.

All your google searching techocrap talk is YOUR subjective guess. Period. You can pretend to be the know it all and post line after line of Ohms law and it won’t change the simple fact that YOU DO NOT KNOW AND JUST MADE A GUESS.

So did I. I don’t know that the whole thing isn’t staged. I don’t know that they didn’t spend 4 hours TRYING to make it catch fire to drive hits to their web blog. Nor do you.

So, we are ALL guessing.

And my complaint is this: You ALWAYS take the Apple is bad, we got ya this time fanwanker fools. Ha ha ha ha.

Then, when you are proven wrong, like on the other dozen posts this month, you VANISH only to pop up with more FUD on the next post as if somehow we have all forgotten the previous day’s FUD.

So you make this whole post about “my baseless” conclusions while all the time PUSHING your baseless conclusions to the least likely, least logical, and lowest possible threshold of a negative guess.

And I am calling you out on it. Again.

Occams Razor dear Pug.

How many of these phones are out there? How many of these SAME EXACT ipod connectors are out there? How long has this same exact proprietary connector been in use?

And HOW MANY FLASH FIRES?

Let’s do that math. Over 100,000,000 ipods with this connector sold over a span greater than ten years of time. And ONE FIRE?

That is 3,650 or more days, times 110 million units. 3,650,000,000. Assuming you only charge it once a day at the end of the day. I actually charge mine many times a day, but we don’t need to go further than 1 in 3.65 billion to make this case.

I see a 1 in 3.65 billion odds and GUESS... USER IDIOT.

You see a 1 in 3.65 billion odds and say “Eureka, Apple screwed up again and this is finally the proof we’ve wanted all along, to show how terrible Apple products suck”.

See, all your technobable is irrelevant, because BOTH of us are just guessing...

But one of us is much much much much more likely to be right than the other....

Thought I doubt you will be able to admit which...

[driftdiver]

Yeah PSS, you could take all logic, technical jargon and thought out of your posts. If you did that you’d sound a lot like rachel though.

Get in touch with your emotions, get a mac.

[RachelFaith]

I’d settle for you guys just putting some unbiased objectivity in once in a while.

Gosh, maybe even a benefit of the doubt? Occasionally? Would it be so bad?

I know... half the time Apple is evil and the other half maybe, just maybe, you can suppose that there is some other problem? Could ya?

Heck, just posting at RANDOM would give you that 50/50 split !! Try it !!

Come on... it would go a long way to raising your credibility score... which I think it somewhere south of zero these days.

Besides... doesn’t the 100 posts of FUD a day gets old... I mean, reaaaaaaaly old!?!?!

[for-q-clinton]

The USB software in the iPhone sometimes indicates you have more fire than you actually think you have.......

Now that is funny!

[driftdiver]

“I’d settle for you guys just putting some unbiased objectivity in once in a while.”

You wouldn’t know unbiased if it burned up your iPhone.

[for-q-clinton]

I would tend to agree possibly a shoddy cable, but shouldn’t there be an internal safety mechanism that prevents this?

I remember sony batteries blowing up a couple years ago and some laptops would allow them to blow while others prevented it from happening (but they still replaced the bad battery).

I’d think the iPhone would have such a safety feature. So I’m not sure why/how this would happen.

[for-q-clinton]

I’m thinking Rachel just loves apple and doesn’t know why.
I think this cartoon was made in response to people like Rachel: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL7yD-0pqZg

[RachelFaith]

Well, at least you didn’t try and lie about YOUR intentions.

I’ll give ya half a point for that...

THIS time.

LOL

[TheBattman]

You mistake me for one of the Apple-hating trolls (that you grouped my name with). Notice, if you read my post, I didn’t disparage Apple. I simply stated that I fully expect them to investigate this to get to the bottom of the situation. I have seen cheap 3rd party power adaptors do something similar. My original Apple-supplied USB cord (came with my iPHone 3G) had some pretty poorly assembled wire insulation on the phone end (though I haven’t seen any signs of a short).

Now - Rachel, while a reverse-plugged power cord might provide enough juice to cause a big problem, one would have to FORCE it it - such a reverse insertion of the plug is not easy - That’s why I can plug my iPhone in in complete darkness - Feel the hole, and try to insert cord. If it won’t go, turn it around.