What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks? • Hacker News Board

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#71

Post by Spooky23 » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:35 PM UTC

yegle wrote: post #58

nomel wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I work in manufacturing in the US. Incoming quality control, for Chinese vendors, is necessarily set up with zero-trust. This isn't a "trust but verify" sort of thing, it's strictly "do not trust". Assume that, at every step of the chain, there will be a lie: change of process, material change, collected data, and that the product being given to you is even yours (delivering a knockoff at the final step, and resellin…

This seems to be startlingly contrast to all the talks about "US manufacturers are absolutely doomed w/o Chinese vendors' great products and quality control" when Trump increased the tariffs. I can only find https://youtu.be/3ZTGwcHQfLY but earlier this year it was all over YouTube.

Suppliers are always low/no trust unless you’re a sucker.

The only difference is that is more difficult to hold Chinese suppliers accountable. Americans will happily cheat you as well.

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#72

Post by bazingakiller » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:37 PM UTC

nomel wrote: post #52

yegle wrote: post #21

FWIW this has caused a big storm in China. The root of the issue is known to be caused by the battery cell vendor Amprius changing the battery design w/o notifying the power bank manufacturers. AFAIKT Amprius lost the 3C certification (a certification in China) because of this incident. This is one of the Chinese reports on the issue: https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_31048287 Excerpt from the report above (tr…

I work in manufacturing in the US. Incoming quality control, for Chinese vendors, is necessarily set up with zero-trust. This isn't a "trust but verify" sort of thing, it's strictly "do not trust". Assume that, at every step of the chain, there will be a lie: change of process, material change, collected data, and that the product being given to you is even yours (delivering a knockoff at the final step, and resellin…

[dead]

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#73

Post by consp » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:37 PM UTC

mmh0000 wrote: post #55

I have two of these powerbanks, one ordered in 2019 and another in 2021. Amazon sent me scary emails saying these things will kill me. Anker's recall site says I'm not affected and the product is safe to use. I'm not sure who to trust, but I've erred on the side of caution and trashed the batteries. Because it's not worth dying in a fire over $30 in batteries.

Brought them to a special pickup/disposal point? Cause otherwise they will light on fire somewhere else.

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#74

Post by cm2187 » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:37 PM UTC

nomel wrote: post #52

yegle wrote: post #21

FWIW this has caused a big storm in China. The root of the issue is known to be caused by the battery cell vendor Amprius changing the battery design w/o notifying the power bank manufacturers. AFAIKT Amprius lost the 3C certification (a certification in China) because of this incident. This is one of the Chinese reports on the issue: https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_31048287 Excerpt from the report above (tr…

I work in manufacturing in the US. Incoming quality control, for Chinese vendors, is necessarily set up with zero-trust. This isn't a "trust but verify" sort of thing, it's strictly "do not trust". Assume that, at every step of the chain, there will be a lie: change of process, material change, collected data, and that the product being given to you is even yours (delivering a knockoff at the final step, and resellin…

reminds me of this old but crazy if true comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18138699

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#75

Post by kube-system » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:38 PM UTC

Zak wrote: post #47

turnsout wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%... I'm seeking products that take AA or AAA batteries instead of built-in lithium batteries, for the same reason.

I wish more devices took field-replaceable cylindrical Li-ion cells. They're pretty common in flashlights and rare in other products where they would be advantageous.

That's probably an advantage for people who know what they're doing, and more dangerous for people who don't.

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#76

Post by godelski » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:40 PM UTC

First off, I love Luma Field. Always incredible to see what's going on inside things. Even just fun to scroll through their Twitter.

Second, Anker is one of the few companies I actually have a very high trust for. A few years back I bought a wall charger[0] from them, it has 2 USB-C and a Type A. A month in, one of the Type-C ports wouldn't charge if the other port was being used. If you send a support ticket they annoyingly give you a response with very basic trouble shooting. But if you respond to that you get a person. They just sent me a new one right away (I wanted to say this because I think a quality matters. Quality often takes nuances and this can often run counter to maximizing profits (Lemon Markets and all that). Looking at Luma's report, I don't get the indication that they had this issue because they were cutting corners but looks like it must be upstream[1]. But am happy to see they were giving gift cards along with the recall. Companies should minimize mistakes as best as they can, but it is important to judge them by how they handle mistakes. It can be easy to get caught in the negativity but I personally don't think I'll stop buying Anker products.

[0] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09Q52CXX1

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44639759

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#77

Post by apronchenkov » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:42 PM UTC

It was fun to explore the CT scan on my own, then read the article to see what was actually identified, and go back to the scan to find those things myself (despite the limitation of having scans from only one unit -- it was still great!). Initially, I thought there were no details of insides of the battery units, but after adjusting the settings, I was able to see the internal layers!

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#78

Post by consp » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:43 PM UTC

Pxtl wrote: post #29

meemo wrote: post #27

Even though this is a recall, a bad thing, it actually makes me more likely to buy from Anker than a no-name brand on Amazon. Those no-name brands almost definitely have problems like this (or worse), but we rarely hear about them.

Honestly, when shopping no-name slop I'm seeking out products that don't have batteries, or at least don't have powerful ones (non-vibrating game controllers are probably pretty safe). One less risk.

If they have flat batteries you could be safe if they are LiFePO which are quite hard to light on fire. YMMV depending on the actual battery. Usually the come from batches of old phones which went out of production are put into these kind of things since they can be bought on the cheap.

If they put in a round cell I'd stay away. I usually replace the cell with one I know is good and check the circuit for protection. Wouldn't be the first time I've seen something with no over or undervolt protection whatsoever.

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#79

Post by Spooky23 » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:43 PM UTC

meemo wrote: post #27

Even though this is a recall, a bad thing, it actually makes me more likely to buy from Anker than a no-name brand on Amazon. Those no-name brands almost definitely have problems like this (or worse), but we rarely hear about them.

Eh. Anker did the bare minimum to address their liability.

They won’t pay for devices that Amazon says are in scope, but the black on black serial number is illegible.

For devices that are covered, they advise you to not dispose of them at a retailer like Home Depot that accepts lithium batteries, but provides no means to safely dispose of this fire hazard. So I got my $40 payment, but I assume now that will disclaim any liability when my house or car goes on fire while I try to find a facility that accepts dangerous batteries.

Re: What went wrong inside recalled Anker PowerCore 10000 power banks?

#80

Post by maxglute » Mon, Jul 21, 2025, 9:45 PM UTC

nomel wrote: post #52

yegle wrote: post #21

FWIW this has caused a big storm in China. The root of the issue is known to be caused by the battery cell vendor Amprius changing the battery design w/o notifying the power bank manufacturers. AFAIKT Amprius lost the 3C certification (a certification in China) because of this incident. This is one of the Chinese reports on the issue: https://m.thepaper.cn/newsDetail_forward_31048287 Excerpt from the report above (tr…

I work in manufacturing in the US. Incoming quality control, for Chinese vendors, is necessarily set up with zero-trust. This isn't a "trust but verify" sort of thing, it's strictly "do not trust". Assume that, at every step of the chain, there will be a lie: change of process, material change, collected data, and that the product being given to you is even yours (delivering a knockoff at the final step, and resellin…

>Chabuduo mindset [1] is a very real thing

IMO high tech cost optimization is like the opposite of chabuduo - it's not half-assing, but over value engineer under pressure. The PRC's "amazing" manufacturing system fosters adversarial competition down the supply chain because there are so many competitors, packed with technical talent incentivized to value-engineer the shit out of everything to squeeze out fractions of a RMB more per unit. Some engineering team probably poured thousands of man-hours and retooled $$$ manufacturing lines just to gain a tiny margin edge. Sometimes that backfires. But the pressure isn't about laziness - it's involutionary effort. The result is still a zero-trust environment, since when manufacturing base is so dense, everyone incentivized to cut corners or optimize/tweak silently, they usually do, forcing everyone upstream to stay hyper vigilant. So we end up in default equilibrium where it's cheaper/more optimal to squeeze downstream and inspect.