Analysis of Manufacturing-Induced Defects and Structural Deformations in Lithium-Ion Batteries Using Computed Tomography

Premature battery drain, swelling and fires/explosions in lithium-ion batteries have caused wide-scale customer concerns, product recalls, and huge financial losses in a wide range of Gift Pack products including smartphones, laptops, e-cigarettes, hoverboards, cars, and commercial aircraft.Most of these problems are caused by defects which are difficult to detect using conventional nondestructive electrical methods and disassembly-based destructive analysis.This paper develops an effective computed tomography (CT)-based nondestructive approach to assess battery quality and identify manufacturing-induced defects and structural deformations in batteries.Several unique case studies from commercial e-cigarette and smartphone RECT DRM Counter TBL Set(3/CN) applications are presented to show where CT analysis methods work.