New button battery laws (Australia)

[Ed.Kloonk]

I figured it was only a matter of time before james_s turned up to complain that his life is unduly hard again.

Personally I prefer screws. Screwed on battery covers stay there, rather than working their way to being loose after a while and promptly falling off. But I also don't bury my screwdrivers under concrete or need to constantly 'mess' with battery powered devices.

In a previous decade, I had a problem with a glouclometer (blood sugar checkerer) that only liked one brand of coin cell which had a wafer indent and any other cell with the same number either failed to make contact when the door was closed or prevented to the door from being closed.

The diabetes association eventually updated the thing to a later model. But it was a curse there for a while, having to keep a supply of spare good exact batteries just for the one device. 

As for screwing(!) if they must, I like to see a metal thread not just fastened into the plastic. And if they really want to warm my dead heart, make the screw that it cannot separate itself from the door. And hinge the door. 

[BurningTantalum]

I work in a primary school and often find these coin cells are littered around. Many items are fitted with them (including BBC MicroBits).
I notice in my local store that coin cells are available on the rack that have some form of 'Bitrex' coating, to persuade anyone to spit out the item due to the vile taste. These cells were (3 months ago when I looked) more expensive than the plain tasting ones!

[james_s]

Is there any data showing that helps? Very young children will eat laundry soap, toilet tablets and other vile tasting things if they have access to it, taste does not seem to be much deterrent. Sensible parents will lock up anything like that and keep an eye on their kids. It's common knowledge that very young children will put anything they can find in their mouth and they cannot be left unattended in the presence of anything they could get into.

[tom66]

This article suggests that there are about 3,500 button-battery ingestion events per year in the USA, by children:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8223456/

of which around 3% have a "serious" outcome which includes fatalities. The rate is increasing, most likely due to the prevalence of button batteries increasing over time with smaller/lower power devices.

Preventing ingestion of these batteries seems like a worthwhile goal if it can be done with a few simple methods, like a screw door instead of a clip.  You don't necessarily need data on this point if you can deduce from an engineering analysis you've made it much more difficult for kids to get batteries.   Yes, being a good parent is important, but with 56% of cases being unwitnessed, even the best parenting couldn't prevent this.

[james_s]

I'm asking for data on whether making them taste bad (at additional cost) is an effective deterrent.

I don't mind the presence of a screw, provided the battery door will still stay closed without the screw. That seems like a win-win situation, people with children can use a screw to secure the battery door, the rest of us can discard it if we choose and have easy access.

[Monkeh]

I dare say most manufacturers are not going to implement a second retention mechanism because you have a screw phobia.

[Kerlin]

I figured it was only a matter of time before james_s turned up to complain that his life is unduly hard again.

Personally I prefer screws. Screwed on battery covers stay there, rather than working their way to being loose after a while and promptly falling off. But I also don't bury my screwdrivers under concrete or need to constantly 'mess' with battery powered devices.

I thank him very much for once teaching me that offering technical help is a waste of time.
It has helped by stopping me arguing with people who cant read and understand.


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[Cerebus]

How about childproof battery packaging? I think that would make just as much of a difference.

You haven't bought coin cells in consumer packaging for a while I take it? It's in adult proof packaging nowadays. There's no way you can get at the battery without cutting the (tough PET) packaging off it. The last few times I've had to do it I've had genuine concerns about shorting the cell out with the scissors that I was using to extricate the cell with.

Just found an unopened one. That PET film is on both sides of the cell and is heat sealed around the edges.

[AndyBeez]

Whose gonna tell Karen?

[Black Phoenix]

Whose gonna tell Karen?

Sorry there isn't any comparison. One is an item that parents should buy in accordance to the age of the kid (the ones for young age kids don't have pieces small enough to be swallowed) and it's the responsability of the parents to always be in supervision when the kid is playing with.

The other is a everyday household that if products and package don't account for kids (by using a screw plus a latch for example) can cause serious health problems because it can go unnoticed for a while. A lego piece small enough to me swallow may cause asphyxiation (and it is something you see right away) and if in the stomach doesn't cause the problems a battery cause (although both need extraction from the body) as burns.

Regarding James_S and his aversion against screws, I never saw a workbench from a EE that doesn't have a set of precision screwdrivers at an arms length, normally in a nice desk stand, all propped up.

[Zero999]

How about childproof battery packaging? I think that would make just as much of a difference.

You haven't bought coin cells in consumer packaging for a while I take it? It's in adult proof packaging nowadays. There's no way you can get at the battery without cutting the (tough PET) packaging off it. The last few times I've had to do it I've had genuine concerns about shorting the cell out with the scissors that I was using to extricate the cell with.

Just found an unopened one. That PET film is on both sides of the cell and is heat sealed around the edges.

Yes, those can be difficult to open, but I'm not talking about the single packs. The multipacks of button cells are notorious for spontaneously opening, after being stored for a year or so.

[Wallace Gasiewicz]

I have had multipacks like the one Zero999 showed.
They do fall apart easily with time.

In my professional experience, kids will swallow anything and no amount of prevention is perfect. Some adults do pretty stupid things also.
The severity of complications of battery indigestion is bad enough to require some sort of packaging safety.
This might seem silly, but how about putting them in child proof prescription containers? Perhaps something like that could be made for the different sized batteries?

About bad taste: some kids will eat anything regardless of the bad taste, like soap and the really bad one: dishwasher detergent. I do not think this imaginative idea works well enough.

[AndyBeez]

I do support secure battery compartment design, as this is just good product design. Last thing I need is my AG6 cells rolling off under the sofa when I drop my pound store flashy zappy gimmick pen toy thing.

As for children eating random stuff, it's been a problem for centuries. I bet even the Romans had laws on child proof amphora lids. Parents, worrying as it is, it's what children do.

[Geoff-AU]

It doesn't seem to apply to the UK, every pack of button cells I've got is a simple cardboard and plastic tray arrangement, which is trivially opened.

Enjoy it while it lasts.  Here, the batteries are all coming hermetically sealed in very strong plastic.  I have to cut the battery out of the plastic in order to use it, very annoying.

[Zero999]

As for children eating random stuff, it's been a problem for centuries. I bet even the Romans had laws on child proof amphora lids. Parents, worrying as it is, it's what children do.

True, but people only started really worrying about safety and making laws, as society became a much safer due to technological developments. It seems to be the safer we are, the more we worry about safety and fear danger. We're getting to the point of diminishing returns, where it's doing more harm than good in many cases.

[tom66]

True, but people only started really worrying about safety and making laws, as society became a much safer due to technological developments. It seems to be the safer we are, the more we worry about safety and fear danger. We're getting to the point of diminishing returns, where it's doing more harm than good in many cases.

I think this is true in a lot of cases, but it is not universally true.

The problem is humans are really bad at estimating risks where the consequences are very high but the probability very low.  We overcompensate for these - assuming that the event is extremely bad without considering the likelihood.

An example is the money spent on the military or on anti-terrorism measures,  versus the money spent on healthcare and prevention of early morbidity.