After-market video game device may have contributed to burning of Farmington Hills bo

[wraggster]

Investigators said today an after-market charging device could have played a role in overheating a hand-held video game system that burned a 12-year-old Farmington Hills boy.


Sheilah Clay, whose son Harold is recovering from second-degree burns in the Feb. 6 incident, said the family has retained an attorney. She said representatives from Sony and Pelican Accessories, the company that makes the charger, will be in Michigan in the coming weeks to inspect the device. The Clays have not filed a lawsuit. Clay declined to give the name of their attorney.

“We’re just trying to figure out what happened,” said Sheilah Clay, who is a member of the Farmington Public Schools’ Board of Education. “That’s all we’re focusing on. I want to get the word out to other parents so we can avoid another child being hurt.”

Lt. Denny Hughes of the Farmington Hills Fire Department said today he device was turned over to the Clays’ attorney. He said investigators haven’t identified a specific cause for the Sony PSP overheating, but said the charging unit — which the Clays bought to replace the original one after it was misplaced — likely played a role.

“I think it overheated the unit by overcharging it,” Hughes said.

Sheilah Clay said her son, who is in the seventh grade, is back in school and playing on the basketball team but has a lot of pain when the burns on his left thigh are cleaned. The device was in his pocket when it overheated.

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, said there have been no recalls of the Sony PSP, is also looking into the incident.

Officials from Sony and Pelican did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...EWS03/80226047

[Fastload]

I call BS on this.

The charger as nothing to do with any kind of "overchaging", the charging circuit is in the game, not the charger...

I would say that the game had a glitch or else and didnt stop or regularize the current to the battery when it was done charging.

My 2c

[John Vattic]

I have just read two complete bs posts

[Fastload]

I have just read two complete bs posts

I beg your pardon?

[Airdevil]

Hang on...... what?

He was charging the psp inside his pocket?

Since when has ANYONE EVER done that? lol and if they do they are clinically insane.

[LilSwish722]

...You can charge a PSP in your pocket? lol

[MZeroEW2]

people. the charger overcharged the battery and Lithiums don't take that to well. he pulled it off the charger put it in his pocket. the battery is still overcharged mind you. and explodes later in his pocket. and the charging circut is in the battery and the charger. they both have one. but it only takes one to fail to cause a problem like this!

and fastload a game controls it? are you kidding me. games are software. a charging circut is hardware. again the battery and the charger control this.

[Art]

The Sony smart batteries have the charger built in.
The PSP "charger" isn't a charger, it's a regulated 5 Volt power supply.
It's the PSP that decides when to stop charging, and the battery that decides what
temperature it is, not any external charger.
That's why you can charge from car lighter sockets, and other external batteries,
as long as the external power source provides regulated 5 Volts at the PSP power socket.

I have just read two complete bs posts

And I've read at least one.

[bah]

I know it's still being charged at the time, but just to give an idea of how much these kinds of batteries love being overcharged:



That in your pocket could certainly do some damage, I liked the 'check your battery' prompt on the display at the end.

I figured the charge time was regulated by the PSP as its just a constant 5v that the AC adaptor provides, but the battery itself has something to prevent overcharging also?
If thats true, then even if the charger was the type where you took the battery out of the PSP to charge it, you couldn't totally blame the charger could you?
If Its all up to the charger, and it was an external charger, then I guess they could be liable. Wouldn't the battery have felt awful warm while handling it though?

[Art]

There's obviously something that went wrong.
It's hard to go for the story about the kid charging it while in his pocket.

The temperature sensor in the battery is only there to detect
charge condition.

Then again, something could have gone wrong with the charger
to cause it to fluctuate from the voltage it was supposed to deliver.