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My power cord melted and almost caused a fire. What do I do?

My new MBP 13" got Very hot underneath it, hot to the touch in just 20 minutes of light internet use. I checked and didn't see any vent holes underneath which I was blocking. I had put a pillow on my lap and the MBP on the pillow to raise it up higher.
I then found that the vent is in back of the new MBP, underneath the spine/hinge. The back spine is the only non-aluminum external part (besides the apple symbol), it's a black plastic flat hinge, when you open the screen it rotates and creates a gap along the bottom of the hinge in back of the MBP. It's a long thin gap similar to the vent in the upper back of the aluminum imacs. But, since it's at the bottom of the opened spine, when the MBP sits on a non-solid surface such as a pillow or a couch, that vent is blocked! The MBP then overheats in minutes!
You don't want to leave it running on a soft surface and leave the house for any amount of time...
 
Gwardys said:
I just smelt burning plastic so I looked down and the part of the cord that is near the white box is all melted and the insides are showing. I'm scared as hell to plug it back in! Will Apple cover a new charger or no?
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This is exactly what happened to me.

FYI the damage at the magsafe charger is in the plastic portion, and does not, nor will/should effect the overall current and safety of the device.
 
NovemberWhiskey said:
Anyone that thinks the duty is on the customers is absolutely wrong.
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In response to that "Caveat Emptor" not taking some precaution as a consumer is a little sheepish don't you think? Even the highest quality products will have a chance of defect, why should consumers blindly trust even the best of products...so since ancient times as the old quoted saying above goes the customers do share some of the duty too--let the buyer beware.
 
harcosparky said:
Are any of those posters commenting on 'clean power' , Eletrical Engineers with a background in Power Supply Design???

I only ask because these Charger Bricks are in reality AC to DC Convertors.

They are designed to take in 100 to 240 Volts AC and down convert it to 18.5VDC, and 16.5 VDC.

I know the outputs are filtered through capacitors, and prior to that the AC is run through a rectifier and I am sure there are other circuits in there as well.

Dirty Power would be AC power coming in with noise components along with it. This commonly would manifest itself as RF in some equipment.

It seems to me that maybe some might be referring to a " power surge " where the input voltage spikes like crazy, and I am not so sure you would see the burning on the cable near the connector.

I have seen Wall Charger tested for voltage spike and they usually swell up, crack and smoke when they go.

Also if your house was hit with a Power Spike big enough to blow theses charger bricks, you would lose other devices in the house as well.

I know when I took a lightning hit years ago, we lost everything that was plugged into an outlet. Even stuff that was turned off. Computer, Television, Stereo, Phones. It almost takes lightning, or a failure on the part of the power generator to cause that kind of spike.
I dunno ... all this talk about 'dirty power' makes me think some may be confused.
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Even with coils capacitors resistors and bridge rectifiers in place rated for particular values to regulate and change voltage from AC to DC risk of a spike can cause a wire on the DC output to overheat at it's weakest point while under normal conditions electricity is not an exact science much is still being studied about quantum effects and there are no perfect materials even GFIs can fail but any reasonable precaution that can be made by both the company AND the consumer goes a long way to minimize the loss. Just because a capacitor has a certain rating for the amount of voltage it carries before that split second it can discharge it doesn't mean that that is the exact number it could be slightly higher or lower, just because a resistor is rated to block a certain percentage of current doesn't mean that it will block exactly that percentage, and just because a diode is designed to allow current to flow only in one direction doesn't mean absolutely that it won't allow a little bit to go the other direction accidentally. Copper wire carries natural resistance to current it is small but it exists and this resistance produces heat too. I worked in the recycling industry for a while too as well as an electrician among many things...when copper electrical wire is recycled (power cords, romex, electric motor windings, etc.) it is almost no longer usable in electrical devices or homes, when re-smelted it's electrical properties change the recycled copper is used in structural alloys (and a limited number of brass parts inside electrical connectors), and as copper pipe in plumbing applications, but recycled copper itself is not allowed to be reused in electrical applications in the US. Even with this as a standard precaution things will happen a wire with a particularly weak atomic structure at a certain point may overheat at that given point more often than the rest of its length. In this case under normal conditions (or as normal as they get) there is a defect that could be effected by these spikes but may show no sign of problems for the life of the machine. I never once said Apple shouldn't address this either, a lot of people are just jumping to the conclusion that I side with Apple. I do say that as a consumer you do share a small bit of the responsibility for safeguarding your property once you purchase it from any business.
 
Ttownbeast said:
Even with coils capacitors resistors and bridge rectifiers in place rated for particular values to regulate and change voltage from AC to DC risk of a spike can cause a wire on the DC output to overheat at it's weakest point while under normal conditions electricity is not an exact science much is still being studied about quantum effects and there are no perfect materials even GFIs can fail but any reasonable precaution that can be made by both the company AND the consumer goes a long way to minimize the loss. Just because a capacitor has a certain rating for the amount of voltage it carries before that split second it can discharge it doesn't mean that that is the exact number it could be slightly higher or lower, just because a resistor is rated to block a certain percentage of current doesn't mean that it will block exactly that percentage, and just because a diode is designed to allow current to flow only in one direction doesn't mean absolutely that it won't allow a little bit to go the other direction accidentally. Copper wire carries natural resistance to current it is small but it exists and this resistance produces heat too. I worked in the recycling industry for a while too as well as an electrician among many things...when copper electrical wire is recycled (power cords, romex, electric motor windings, etc.) it is almost no longer usable in electrical devices or homes, when re-smelted it's electrical properties change the recycled copper is used in structural alloys (and a limited number of brass parts inside electrical connectors), and as copper pipe in plumbing applications, but recycled copper itself is not allowed to be reused in electrical applications in the US. Even with this as a standard precaution things will happen a wire with a particularly weak atomic structure at a certain point may overheat at that given point more often than the rest of its length. In this case under normal conditions (or as normal as they get) there is a defect that could be effected by these spikes but may show no sign of problems for the life of the machine. I never once said Apple shouldn't address this either, a lot of people are just jumping to the conclusion that I side with Apple. I do say that as a consumer you do share a small bit of the responsibility for safeguarding your property once you purchase it from any business.
Click to expand...

condense this into 2 sentences and resubmit it...
 
Ttownbeast said:
Sorry, I'm not a writer.
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Aside from the length of your post, it doesn't really provide a valid reason for the failures of the AC adapter. Manufacturers usually design products with a safe operating area and expect occasional spikes that shouldn't cause a catastrophic failure.
 
Smoothie said:
Aside from the length of your post, it doesn't really provide a valid reason for the failures of the AC adapter. Manufacturers usually design products with a safe operating area and expect occasional spikes that shouldn't cause a catastrophic failure.
Click to expand...

i agree, regular usage should not cause fire ever.


there are tolerences in devices, these magsafe adapters obviously are not working within them.

that aside there is no proection circuit in these adapters from the brick to the inverter in the laptop.

that to me is a serious issue.....
 
Smoothie said:
Aside from the length of your post, it doesn't really provide a valid reason for the failures of the AC adapter. Manufacturers usually design products with a safe operating area and expect occasional spikes that shouldn't cause a catastrophic failure.
Click to expand...
Never put complete trust in quality control standards just because a manufacturer is well known in an industry and never trust that things will operate within predictable ranges. Batteries leak and explode, house wiring can cause house fires, lead paint is still in some kids toys, kids choke on small objects they shouldn't stick in their mouths and speaking of quality control and toy manufacturers I even have an older sister who owns a Teletubbies Tinky Winky doll that says "****** ****** bite my butt". They do not test every single item that leaves a factory either they may test 1 out of every 100 or 1000 or however the production run works who knows the amount of faults that occurred between testings that they don't catch perhaps once every thousand cycles in the manufacturing process of anything bought a tooth on a gear in the machinery is so worn it slips or a cracked mold makes it back to the line. Defects are not always detected and at that point it falls to the consumer to look out for it rather than just to expect perfection.
 
So just to update you guys:

I ended up bringing my Mac to the Apple Store, the guy at the Genius Bar had "never scene anything like it before" (reffering to the melted cord) and gave me a brand new charger and took my computer for 2 days. He updated the software, ran a full diagnostic test. Found nothing. He also documented the problem so if anything happens in the future that can be tracked back to this incident it will be covered.
 
Never let a good fire, no matter how small, go to waste.

2 words; mini steak.

ministeak.png
 
I have an idea for a T-shirt....

"My Magsafe power cord melted and all I got was this lousy T-shirt"
 
What's up with all the people making fun of the OP? This could have burned his house to he ground, killing him and his family. Just because this didn't happen doesn't mean Apple shouldn't do anything to prevent it.

What has come of our society that people will choose to defend the profits of a company over the lives of human beings.

Urgh.
 
cdover said:
What's up with all the people making fun of the OP? This could have burned his house to he ground, killing him and his family. Just because this didn't happen doesn't mean Apple shouldn't do anything to prevent it.

What has come of our society that people will choose to defend the profits of a company over the lives of human beings.

Urgh.
Click to expand...

I defend neither--complacency is stupidity
 
Ttownbeast said:
I defend neither--complacency is stupidity
Click to expand...

So shouldn't the MagSafe come with a clear warning about the potentially fatal consequences of using it?

I.e., "Warning: This charger may cause death and destruction...if you use it like a normal charger"
 
same happened to me...

I am overseas right now, and my cord fried itself to where the plastic burned and left the wire completely exposed. Had to spring over $100 for anew charger, too... VERY upset, and apple is nearly impossible to contact with complaints... guess they just don't wanna hear it.

I notice that if you look at the electrical info on the chargers, my block takes 210-240W, HOWEVER, the chunk and extension are both rated at 250W.

Unsafe? Possibly...

This explains why it gets soooooo hot to the touch; my replacement came bundled from an apple dealer, and the wattage issue was the same. I think apple has some serious explaining to do about this...

Maybe it's the European parts... dunno... but my new European block is rated the same as my old American one while the wall bits are rated higher.
 
cdover said:
So shouldn't the MagSafe come with a clear warning about the potentially fatal consequences of using it?

I.e., "Warning: This charger may cause death and destruction...if you use it like a normal charger"
Click to expand...

Certainly so, but even if it didn't the consumer should take the necessary precaution no matter what.
 
Generalizing is the most easy and common way to qualify things.
This is a serious situation that put anyone with common sense to think twice to keep using a MagSafe powered Mac like we use to.
We need to answer the following questions in order to draw fact based conclusions:
What is causing the problem?
Which models are affected?
Which manufacturing dates they have?
Which models and production runs are not affected?
Was it a manufacturing quality issue that generated this?
Or was it a design flaw?
This is quality 101.
 
christall109 said:
This is exactly what happened to me.

FYI the damage at the magsafe charger is in the plastic portion, and does not, nor will/should effect the overall current and safety of the device.
Click to expand...

plastic melted...due to excessive heat...doesn't affect the safety of the device?

What about your safety and the people surround you?

It is very safe touching a melting plastic magsafe charger, and the melting plastic in contact with you or whatever you use to put it on.
 
Originally Posted by harcosparky

....... these Charger Bricks are in reality AC to DC Convertors.

They are designed to take in 100 to 240 Volts AC and down convert it to 18.5VDC, and 16.5 VDC.
Click to expand...

Three years ago I had an iBook low voltage lead short and learned even then this was a known issue. I declined to pay $140 here in Chiangmai for a new one and soldered it up which worked for anothe year or so.
Last night my Macbook low voltage lead actually started to smoke....albeit gently.
I now find threads like this covered with photos of these chargers 6 years at least after they were first issued, and presumably when the problems first started and would surely be made known to Apple.
Now it is a mere $115 to replace the Macbook adapter here, whilst even the most expensive generics are available at a fraction of that.

Back to business.
Today I went into the Maczone and my friend there took in the charger as if it was a well known thing and said she would call me tomorrow so I live in hope of a replacement.
I'm here to ask about the voltage stated in the quote kindly given above, with a mind to getting a cheapo local adapter of †he right voltage and swapping over the low voltage plug.
I thought the stated voltage was 24v but I have seen another figure and it was the same as stated above, 16.5v.
Could anyone clarify about the voltage please?

cheers Cheeryble
 
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