SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20200113-D17F1-2147375429. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: LG "XCharge" SP320 (LG "XCharge" SP320 cell phone LG "Stylo4", LGQ710 cell phone). Incident: We purchased an LG "XCharge" SP320 cell phone in April 2018. In November 2019 we discovered that the cell phone had swollen due to expansion of the (non-removable) Li-ion battery. The device case is swollen to 13.3 mm thick at max, asymmetric; the screen is convexed out slightly, also. Thickness specification is 8.4 mm. We are very concerned about potential fire/explosion. Device has been used in airplane mode on wifi as continuous monitor screen for front-door camera. We have, in our home, multiple other devices with Li batteries that are kept constantly plugged in to chargers. This includes 2 [REDACTED], 3 laptop, 4 [REDACTED], 2[REDACTED], & 1 [REDACTED] from [REDACTED]. The oldest are from 2006. All obviously have well-designed supervisory circuits that avoid overcharging, and have never swollen. This LG cell phone apparently has an unsafe charge supervisory circuit. LG, the manufacturer denies responsibility as they have only one-year warranty. Yet other phone makers, including [REDACTED and [REDACTED, have several times extended specific warranties due to the inherent danger of explosion and fire. LG suggests sending it to them for repair, but I can not trust this dangerous condition to not recur. Also, please note that a second LG device (a "Stylo4", LGQ710) is also showing signs of swelling, causing us to disconnect all LGs from charging at all from now on.