iPhone 3gs exploding expanding battery

I work as a mobile developer. This only starting to happen from 3GS and up. We have about 2 dozen iDevices in house, only the 3GS pops, and one of the iPhone 4 starts to expand but not pop yet.The original iPhone and iPhone 3G seems to be ok. Btw, when it first happened last year Apple Canada wants to charge me $179 for the replacement and I declined.

Not according to Apple Man. He told me it was normal.

If it is so minor I would of expected Apple to just quickly and politley replace the phone. My guess is this is a ticking time bomb for them and we are going to see loads of people complaining that their 3 year old iPhone has blown up.

I wonder if they can catch fire?

I don't know why I am keeping this conversation going, not much point but does tickle me a bit.

Lithium batteries expanding (very, very seldom "exploding") is a rare occurence, usually, as intimated, caused by manufacturing defect. The suggestion that batteries are designed to explode after a certain duration is obviously, to those with double figure IQs, a nonsense. If anybody in Apple's employ says this is the case, I would report hnim/her and trust that the person is fired for idiotic information.

I suggest to the carriers of the hysteria here that they use Google to explore the facts behind lithium batteries.

I found a senior advisor who was actually sympathetic and was also scared about what might happen if the battery kept bludging, so he gave me a CS code to take to the store and get it replaced. I walked out of the store yesterday with a refurbished iPhone 3GS, so all worked out well. Hopefully this iPhone won't have the same problem as last time, as this one was just remanufacted in April of 2013.

my 3gs just popped 2 days ago exact same as everyone else's when the nano did this apple put in an excellent replacement program.

what has happened to this company.

does this mean my ipad will do the same ?

my wifes 4s?

ipod touch?

the devices are not safe, but they will be the first to put in the media people using fake clone chargers just to sell more of there own.

this looks like an issue for watchdog uk

My iphone, after first inquiring about dead spots on my touch screen for no reason ended up getting worse and not. getting Past the apple logo after charging. Deciding I won't be able to take it away on holiday I put it away only to fibnd the screen popped off, but tHe insides warped and couldn't press back together. When I turned it over I noticed the bulging and the cracks on the back from stress on the plastic.

With an old cybershot phone still going strong I'm dissapointed in the apple prodct to say the least. I've never seen a phone do this.

Maybe a small % of batteries overall. I'd be interested ti know what percentage in the 3GS compared to any other model, it there is something with comparable circulation at this venerable age. From looking at the the posts on here - it seems to be happening now for the 3GS and Im sure its a consequence of leaving the phone out of use for a while then coming back to it.

I dont know what diagnostics they can perform with the OS but I would be surprised if they cant predict the failure with some accuracy if they know the phone history and battery conditioning.

Like others on here, I'd just like to know before the next device goes belly up!

Another one bites the dust... Same thing happened to my iPhone 3GS. Didn't realise it was a battery problem until my uncle posted a pic of his phone.. and then thought.. "uuuhhh.. that happened to mine too!" That's when I realised. It's crazy. Am going to contact Apple tomorrow when I have the phone with me to make a complaint.. and somehow resolve this. I was only looking for my iPhone to loan someone as a spare phone.. and then saw it.. It wasn't plugged in or anything at the time..

Lawrence Finch wrote:

Complete discharge is a death warrant for Lithium chemistry batteries, as it is for most other secondary batteries. (If you did the same with your car battery you would get the same results.)

Last time I looked I didn't have a Li-on battery in my car, you can't compare a car battery with a mobile phone battery

Message was edited by: superjaz1

Add another 3GS phone. I bought mine in '09, used it as phone until last year then used it less n less as music, kid app or in other words as itouch. The apps stopped working a few months ago so it went into a drawer until I had time to deal with it (had I known about the battery replacement issue this would've been the time I could've done that). Pulled it out this week to reset phone. Put it on dresser to set up with iTunes this weekend only to find this morning expanded! Apple store is skirting around my questions/concerns seeing is how my other 3GS is used by a toddler and 2 other children. They keep referring me to replace the phone. If us consumers do not address/complain about this issue on a global level that we were completely unaware of, then Apple has no reason to be accountable or even proactive to other consumers. The money I spent in my devices is the least of my worries right now but absolutely feel bamboozled or even worse scammed in a sense that they withheld highly important info from us at the time of purchase and by not issuing a recall or warning?

In the spirit of collecting data on this issue, my 3gs has suffered the same fate. My 5 year old said to me, "look at my phone daddy." When AppleCare told me i would have to pay $150 for an out of warranty replacement, I indicated I would try to continue using it to which the AppleCare reps said, "I am concerned. We do't think you should use the iphone anymore." I said, "why should i stop using it?" he said, "it is a safety issue." I wanted to document this phone call, so that if any of you get injured you can point to this being as a known safety issue in which Apple advised customers not to use the device, but neither recalls the device, replaces it, or offers any other reparation. Nor does Apple make effort to reach out to customers proactively.

If anyone is ever injured as a result of this, then it would become a product liability issue and you may contact me for names of the rep and supervisor to which I spoke.

This issue has not gone away. Two years ago my iPhone 3GS started swelling, slightly cracking the screen. Last month the expanding battery cracked the back of the case. At the very least, Apple should replace the battery for the usual charge, and replace the iPhone at the same time at no additional cost. This is a safety issue and should be handled. I am a rather large investor in Apple and would expect my company to do this.

efithian wrote:

This issue has not gone away. Two years ago my iPhone 3GS started swelling, slightly cracking the screen. Last month the expanding battery cracked the back of the case. At the very least, Apple should replace the battery for the usual charge, and replace the iPhone at the same time at no additional cost. This is a safety issue and should be handled. I am a rather large investor in Apple and would expect my company to do this.

You need to contact Apple about this.

Did you contact Apple two years ago when you first noticed a problem? Have you contacted Apple at all? If so, what did they say?

Same thing happen to my White 32gb 3gs last week. My 8 year old son was using it as an ipod and while it was charging the back broke open and the screen popped out. It was charging on the night stand next to his bed. First thing I did was move all the chargers out of the kids rooms. I called Apple and they made an appointment for me at the Apple Store. They made it sound like they had ever heard of this. I bought it in the the Park Meadows apple store and the told me he had never heard of one exploding like this. The only thing they could do was charge me $149 to replace it with a refurbished one and could charge me for a battery replacement because they don't the parts anymore. He took it in the back to show someone to see if they could do anything else. When he returned, without the phone, and said that was all they could do. I asked him were my phone was and he told me that they needed to Professionally recycle it and it wasn't safe for me to handle. He then asked me if I would like to talk to a sale staff about a new ipod for my son. Great Customer support. I hope they have fixed the battery issue because I don't want my iwatch to explode on my wrist.

I also filed a complaint with the Consumer Product Safety Commission and they later confirmed that my report has been sent to Apple. I hope everyone in this thread does it.