Tips for Discharged Nokia BL-5J 1430 mAh 3.7 Battery?

[KenO]

Have a fully discharged Nokia BL-5J 1430 mAh 3.7 Battery that would like to safely test for charge retention.

Did some forum searching and found some general info.

Did not find anything concerning:

1. how to test if the battery fuse and protection circuit is intact. Just guessing that if infinite Ohms something is blown but have no idea what the normal Ohms should be.

2. Use another battery to try to charge the Nokia to get it above the charger cutoff point?

Hope someone has solved this problem and would like to share any tips.

Googled and found "Li-ion should never be discharged too low, and there are several safeguards to prevent this from happening. The equipment cuts off when the battery discharges to about 3.0V/cell, stopping the current flow. If the discharge continues to about 2.70V/cell or lower, the battery's protection circuit puts the battery into a sleep mode. This renders the pack unserviceable and a recharge with most chargers is not possible. To prevent a battery from falling asleep, apply a partial charge before a long storage period."

Also found by another Ken who does not want to share his method "On February 4, 2011 at 2:21pm
Ken wrote:
The article mentions how dangerous it is to attempt charging cells that have been @<1.5v for just a few days. Well, that has not been in agreement with my experience. I occasionally salvage discarded Li-ion laptop battery packs...disassembling them to harvest the 18650's for personal r/c and flashlight use. I commonly pull cells that are totally flat: 0v, sometimes even with polarity reversed by a few millivolts. In addition, some of the battery packs I ripped into were prehistoric by lithium chemistry standards (10 years+). More often than not all cells would recharge to their FULL original rated capacity and perform as new. I always test each cell individually with my iMAX B6 charger, manually putting them through at least a couple 500mA to 1Amp discharge/charge cycles. I have *never* experienced any safety nor reliability issues to date.
I would also like to brag of having had success restoring substantial capacity to the occasional cells that truly were worn. I will never share my method_IT'S MINE !_do not ask. ...Additionally, that procedure IS potentially dangerous and requires mandatory attentive supervision.
I suppose I've been laughing all the way to the battery bank. I know, horrible joke!"
http://batteryuniversity.com/learn/article/charging_lithium_ion_batteries

Thanks

Ken

[mike]

No idea about your battery, but here are some of the issues.
It probably has a protection circuit.
If it has been discharged below threshold, it's turned off and cannot
be turned on externally. You'll see zero volts and high ohms.

Disclaimer:
What follows is for educational purposes only. DO NOT DO IT!
IT's unsafe.

IF you take the battery apart, you can get past the circuit
board and connect directly to the cell, you can charge it.
If I were to ever do this unsafe procedure, I might start with
100 mA charge current voltage limited at about 3.7V depending on
the exact chemistry involved. Do NOT get in a hurry...do not
set it up and go away...watch it, through your safety glasses,
for any signs of overheating.
You need a laboratory supply with precise control of the current
and voltage limits. DO not rely on some marking on a wall wart.
NEVER, EVER TRY TO CHARGE ONE BATTERY FROM ANOTHER BATTERY!
You risk setting yourself on fire. The protection circuit is there
for a reason.
I'd put it in a metal pot with a lid so I'd have a handle to
use to carry it outside if it catches fire. THIS IS NOT A SAFE
PROCEDURE.

At this point, I might try charging it in the phone.

Sometimes, the protection circuit will NOT reset.
If it's still dead, give up, you've done all you can do.

Even if you're successful, you are still at risk. Maybe
your phone will catch fire weeks from now.

Bottom line, go buy a new battery. They're much cheaper
on ebay than the cost of a hospital visit or a burned-down
house.

[Tim R]

I came across an interesting thread on a flashlight battery explosion.

http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?120888-ROAR-of-the-Pelican-(CR123-Explosion-during-use-firsthand-account)

Read down to page 5, where the delayed effects of HF poisoning hit the victim. I understand he has never recovered fully.

[KenO]

mike,

"educational purposes only" have you taken a cellphone battery apart?

"I might start with 100 mA charge current voltage limited at about 3.7V depending on the exact chemistry involved." Agree it is best to start very conservatively.

Do you know of any websites that give reliable info concerning cellphone battery protection circuits?

Thanks

Ken

[KenO]

Tim R,

Read "I came across an interesting thread on a flashlight battery explosion.
http://www.candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?120888-ROAR-of-the-Pelican-(CR123-Explosion-during-use-firsthand-account)"

While it shows what can happen to Li cells this is different from my cellphone battery.

This was 2 primary CR123 lithium cells.

SilverFox said "The most likely cause is that one battery was drained more than the other one. As things warm up, the fuller charged cell tries to reverse charge the under charged cell and things heat up fast. Hydrogen gas is vented and when ignited, blows up. Once one cell is burning, it doesn't take much to ignite the other cell."

Believe the Nokia BL-5J Battery is 1 cell and different chemistry.

Googled "Nokia BL-5J" Battery explosion but did not find anything. This was quick search.

Totally agree you can not be too careful with Li Batteries!

Ken

[Ian Field]

"mike" <ham...@netzero.net> wrote in message
news:m5rovc$su8$1...@dont-email.me...

My usual salvage source sometimes gives up the odd mobile phone - in every
case so far, the battery has been discharged dead flat.

Most were revived by "tickling" the contacts with the leads from an old
fashioned car battery charger.

The next stage involves a universal lithium charger from the Lidl discount
store - it has automatic polarity sensing, so it won't start charging the
cell till you've put a spark of life into it. When that indicates fully
charged, its time to see what the phone makes of it.

The only failure so far was was a dodgy Motorola knock-off from Ebay.

[mike]

On 12/6/2014 12:07 PM, KenO wrote:
> mike,
>
> "educational purposes only" have you taken a cellphone battery apart?

Yes, in virtually every used cellphone I've bought.
Protection board is usually held on the end of the cell by the plastic
over-wrap.

>
> "I might start with 100 mA charge current voltage limited at about 3.7V depending on the exact chemistry involved." Agree it is best to start very conservatively.
>
> Do you know of any websites that give reliable info concerning cellphone battery protection circuits?
>
> Thanks
>
> Ken

Problem is that there are many different types of protection circuits/chips.
Individual battery details are usually not available to the public.
Check the numbers on the protection chip.
bq29311 is one such chip. There are others in the BQ series.

Another thing that happens with laptop batteries is the fuse.
The fuse has a heater in it. When the protection chip decides
that you should no longer have use of your battery, for whatever
reason, it activates that heater and smokes the fuse. You're
dead in the water until you replace the fuse.
Never seen one on a cellphone battery, but all mine are OLD.

If the cell is completely discharged, you can't measure the volts
to determine which is the + terminal. It's probably not the one
you'd expect by looking. Make SURE.

I can't overstress the safety aspect.
You cannot assume that the designer of the system followed
reasonable design procedures.
I had a Dell laptop that had nothing but a fet between the
charge port and the battery. Current limit was in the wall wart.
Charging it from a voltage source burned a hole in the motherboard.
I got lucky. If the FET had failed shorted, it would probably have
exploded the battery.

I had a battery start sizzling. Got it out the front door
before it exploded. I never found the guts of the cell that
went boom.

Nothing drives it home like asking yourself, "Hey, what are those
drops of hot electrolyte doing on my glasses?"

What's a battery cost?
What's the value of your eyesight?
Does your kid ever use your phone?
It's just not worth it.

[KenO]

Ian,

"Most were revived by "tickling" the contacts with the leads from an old
fashioned car battery charger."

Did you check what the Voltage was for "Revival"so you could use universal lithium charger?

Do you know the output specs for the "universal lithium charger from the Lidl discount store"?

Also what does "LiDl" mean? Googled and found http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lidl but do not think this is it.

Thanks for the suggestions.

Ken

[KenO]

Mike,

Since asking the "taking cellphone battery apart?" found some good views for the Nokia. Seems like mine is an early version that has small screws holding the end plate on.

If you (or anyone else) are interested would post photos but need to be told how.

Thanks again for the help.

Ken