Yes and no.

Different approximate voltages: yes, different connectors are a good idea. Don’t put 150VDC into an input that expects 12V, its protection circuitry might not be able to block it.

Custom connectors for exact voltages, cell numbers and charging currents: next to impossible. Even within the traditional Li-ion family there is too much variation, let alone now that we have LiFEPO4, high-voltage Li-ion and sodium-ion on the market. You still need to integrate the charging controller OR at least a protection circuit into the pack itself.

I don’t know exactly what happened in this fatal fire based off just the coroner’s report, it mentions that much of the evidence was burned and destroyed. It’s worth keeping an open mind for unexpected things like adaptor cables that come with the charger or mislabelled connectors that both say the same (wrong) things.

I do not like the central focus on the ABC article on just the incompatible charger. Events like this are not caused by a single point of failure, multiple failures have to occurred (including social & regulatory) for this to occur.

Link to full copy of the coroner’s report (8 pages, contents are about the same level of intensity as the ABC article, mentions burns and treatment).

The coroner concludes with TWO recommendations, not just one:

The circumstances in which Tyson died serve as a tragic reminder of the importance of only using chargers that are supplied with the equipment or device, or certified third-party charging equipment that is compatible with the battery specifications. Using chargers with incorrect power delivery (voltage and current) can cause damage to the battery that can lead to rapidly developing, intense and self-sustaining fires. The circumstances in which Tyson died serve as a tragic reminder of the importance of only using chargers that are supplied with the equipment or device, or certified third-party charging equipment that is compatible with the battery specifications. Using chargers with incorrect power delivery (voltage and current) can cause damage to the battery that can lead to rapidly developing, intense and self-sustaining fires. Large batteries and equipment such as e-scooters should be charged away from living spaces and in an area equipped with a compliant smoke alarm.

Two points of failure for us to improve on is better than only one. But I still think it’s poor for the coroner to not mention all of the other factors that could have individually prevented this.

Using the wrong charger should (ideally) be something that any big battery pack can survive – every big battery pack should (ideally) contain protection circuitry that shuts it off when abnormal conditions are detected. But I know this gets omitted (it costs a few dollars) and it’s something we need to change.

I also wonder if it was a charging system without a cell balancer. Those can work safely sometimes (with very matched cells), but again that single layer of protection can be the difference between fire and no fire.

Let’s not put all the blame on the poor guy that died because of this. Using the wrong charger is only one mistake, there should be other layers to protect you.

Replacing a TCP socket with a UNIX socket doesn’t affect the amount of headers you have to parse.

Sorry to hear you’re feeling crap.

I’m having trouble looking for work for the past few months. Very few replies, the first “no” I got actually made me feel a bit more human.

I’m convinced that some of the jobs I’ve applied for or enquired about are not real or just for external-advertising-before-hire requirements. I’ve gotten some rude responses after daring to ask questions (eg: jobs funded by research money tend to have fixed funding start dates that might not be for another several months). Most straight up ignore me.

An old boss of mine thinks that my CV isn’t conforming and mundane enough, so I’m giving his suggestions a go.

What sort of work are you looking at? I design electronics and get into arguments with computers.

I have some uploaded image problems.

(1) The Lost Powers of Childhood is missing an inline image upload on the first comment (“Bonus: in this…”). According to the message source the image should be at https://aussie.zone/pictrs/image/ecc05d82-7a5e-48a4-a304-446aba2078db.jpeg. I think this might have occurred before the upgrade, I recall having to look for it a week ago, but I’m not sure.

(2) The new Profile -> Uploads page has lots of odd gaps:

It’s not showing some images I’ve uploaded, eg this MSY catalog screenshot isn’t listed there.

EDIT: (3) Front page isn’t showing thumbnails for posts made after the transition date either:

Home made biccies > timtams anyday

This is an inexcusable breach of the SLA. Lodion must be offered free Timtams by all of us as recompense.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KmXPcSxz2g

“Eat now, …” is terribly depressing. It sounds like you’re trading financial autonomy in exchange for another basic human right.

I wouldn’t know, but it’s totally not on there, or so I’ve been told.

There have been constant news articles coming out over the past few years claiming the next big thing in supercapacitor and battery technologies. Very few actually turn out to work practically.

The most exciting things to happen in the last few years (from an average citizen’s perspective) are the wider availability of sodium ion batteries (I believe some power tools ship with them now?), the continued testing of liquid flow batteries (endless trials starting with the claim that they might be more economic) and the reduction in costs of lithium-ion solid state batteries (probably due to the economics of electric car demand).

FWIW the distinction between capacitors and batteries gets blurred in the supercapacitor realm. Many of the items sold or researched are blends of chemical (“battery”) and electrostatic (“capacitor”) energy storage. The headline of this particular pushes the misconception that these concepts can’t mix.

My university login no longer works so I can’t get a copy of the paper itself :( But from the abstract it looks first stage, far from getting excited about:

This precise control over relaxation time holds promise for a wide array of applications and has the potential to accelerate the development of highly efficient energy storage systems.

“holds promise” and “has the potential” are not miscible with “May Be the Beginning of the End for Batteries”.

Only for certain types of capacitors. In practice they can overlap quite a bit, especially with common aluminium electrolytic capacitors (these form & dissolve complex aluminium oxide & hydroxide layers on the plates).

WTF? A bag of powdered cement?

Make sure to get a second opinion just in case (10-15K is nothing to sniff at!). Some photos from a snake cam would be good too. More information will empower you.

N.B. “Tiles need to be redone” is an understatement. A proper job will involve ripping ALL tiling from the bathroom, removing all adhesives (may be easy or hard depending on what they used), probably re-rendering, re-waterproofing (ideally twice), then laying new tiles. Cheaping out on these steps can lead to earlier ones ruining later ones, requiring you to do the entire thing all over again (it’s a horror).