A Unique Failure Mechanism in the Nexus 6P Lithium-Ion Battery

Saurabh Saxena, Yinjiao Xing and Michael Pecht
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Saurabh Saxena: Center for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Yinjiao Xing: Center for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Michael Pecht: Center for Advanced Life Cycle Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA

Energies, 2018, vol. 11, issue 4, 1-13

Abstract: Nexus 6P smartphones have been beset by battery drain issues, which have been causing premature shutdown of the phone even when the charge indicator displays a significant remaining runtime. To investigate the premature battery drain issue, two Nexus 6P smartphones (one new and one used) were disassembled and their batteries were evaluated using computerized tomography (CT) scan analysis, electrical performance (capacity, resistance, and impedance) tests, and cycle life capacity fade tests. The “used” smartphone battery delivered only 20% of the rated capacity when tested in a first capacity cycle and then 15% of the rated capacity in a second cycle. The new smartphone battery exceeded the rated capacity when first taken out of the box, but exhibited an accelerated capacity fade under C/2 rate cycling and decreased to 10% of its initial capacity in just 50 cycles. The CT scan results revealed the presence of contaminant materials inside the used battery, raising questions about the quality of the manufacturing process.

Keywords: smartphone; lithium-ion; battery; CT scan; failure mechanism; battery drain; reliability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
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