I was recent contacted by Euroenergy that they had been informed by Yuasa that " GS Yuasa Coroporation cannot support any any applications for VRLA products in life-critical applications". In addition Yuasa NP2-12 batteries will in future carry the text "Not for any medical applications"
VRLA stands for Valve Regulated Lead Acid i.e. the most common type of battery commonly used in our equipment.
Browsing around, National Panasonic also state on their product literature ( Precautions for handling VRLA batteries)that their VRLA products should "... only be used for
non life critical medical equipment .... ".
I certainly wasn't aware of this. Surely the responsibility lies with the device manufacturer to ensure the components are fit for purpose and has designers and purchase teams in place in order to do just that. Do we then make the short jump to concluding the transformer, IC, capacitor manufacturers are also going to issue such discliamers?
A medical device manufactuer's view would be welcome on this.
We use both Yuasa and Panasonic batteries and have done for many years without complaint - how the users treat them is another matter!
In this increasingly litigious environment it leaves me wondering what is next.
Brian
