SMC almost exploded
 

So it is swollen? That can happen if it loses too much charge in storage as well. My first and most expensive battery sadly suffered that fate last spring. You could check the voltage with a charger or something if you're curious, but if it is indeed badly swollen the best practise is to fully discharge it and then dispose of it.

salt water bath does nothing to make a lipo safe only thing a salt water bath does is dissolve the battery terminals. discharge with a brake light then recycle it best option .

Salt water is slightly conductive, it'll slowly discharge the battery.

keep it in the back yard or whatever in the mean time. I would not let that thing in my house!

I store all of the lipos in my house and garage in metal, locking ammo cans. That includes the ones for my rc cars, power tools, and yard tools. Can't be too safe.

Glad it didn't explode on you. If you have a bb gun and a fire pit, you could always have some fun with them.

I "played" with an old lipo and my pneumatic framing nailer. Can definitely be fun.

I had a venom pack do this shortly after purchase. It was under warranty at the time, so when I contacted venom they had me give the bad battery a salt water bath for about a week. I had to take pictures of the process, send them in, and was taken care of quickly after that. Salt water will allow the pack to safely discharge to nothing and then can be thrown right in the garbage.

Ouch, that's indeed a very dead battery. I had one swell a lot when it was (luckily) near empty and I accidentally shorted it - moved a metal object on top of it so that it touched both bare wires as the battery didn't have a connector at the time. But it was a softcase so it didn't look as dramatic as that.

Seen this happen to a guy who charged his batteries in a nice cool house, put all his charged batteries in the trunk of his car and after a couple hour drive to his favorite bashing spot, all his brand new packs in the trunk were swollen up like this because of the extreme change in temps... heat will increase the voltage of a LiPo which will cause them to swell.

Don't touch it and keep it in an ammo box outside. It could catch fire (basically exploding) at any time.

That's not the case I was referring... If you charge a pack in a cool air conditioned house at around 70°F, the cells will increase voltage past 4.20V per cell if you take them outside into extreme heat, like the trunk of a car which can easily go past 140°F and cause the cells to swell/puff with both a combination of intense heat and over voltage :(

THE OP HAD DONE NONE OF THIS IT WAS PUT IN LONG TERM STORAGE IN HIS BASEMENT.

They can do this if you don't put them at a safe storage voltage first.

not to knock smc because I have spent a lot money on motors/esc/batteries. I am just saying what happen to me, I know it could happen to any brand. but I have had 3 smc batteries go bad in last couple seasons, all were never ran below 3.6 always put in storage and cycled over winter. I e mailed Danny and was told that they just aren't making batteries like they used to and basically shouldn't expect to get more than a season out of a lipo....

I guess it still have that explosive punch.

which is why I gave an example of what I fear the OP may have done something similar

Did he leave the battery fully charged?
What were the temps in the basement?

These are variables to consider that I question and provided an extreme example with storing packs in the truck of a car for a relatively short period of time :(

Never used is never charged ..

Thanks for the input. Storage is temperature controlled unit. I may have tried to charge once I got it. Didn't remember exactly. I just want to prevent not happen again. My other batteries are fine. I'll try to find a way to dispose safe. Much appreciated.

FYI, saltwater baths only work if the solution can enter the interior of the cells to neutralize them. Submerging the cells in the saltwater will do very little in the way of actually discharging the pack, the thin aluminum tabs on the cells will corrode away long before the pack is discharged.

https://forum.flitetest.com/index.ph...ad-idea.12467/

The safest way to discharge that pack is to set it on concrete, inside of a concrete block, and discharge it using either the NiMH discharge setting on your multicharger or using automotive lightbulbs. Once that pack is good and dead, short the main leads to prevent it from recovering any voltage, then wrap it up in duct tape and toss it. It's harmless at that point.

so this was total user error..knowing a batteries condition is a must when using a lipo.