Batteries

[imamartian]

Nearly posted this in Electrics, then thought better of it !!

Anyway, all of us use batteries in some form, but i'm talking about your average AA, AAA, D, 9volt thing etc

I'm loathed to throw anything away, so when a tv remote stops working, or the Wii controller can't chuck a bowling ball anymore, i put the batteries in a box rather that in my blue bin receptical!

And then i check these batteries with my multi tester thing to determine their voltage...

and i've found...

a new battery is 1.5 or more volts, whereas, spent baterries are either 0.87volts or 1.2volts...

So my question is can old batteries be used at all? for example, do certain applications require less voltage? e.g. light bulb vs electric motor..

 

[foxhole]

Standard batteries can be recharged up to about 10 times, just requires the correct charger, standard chargers will charge continuously heating the battery until it explodes, the charger here
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&pf_rd_r=1AC8FZP86K0JGQPTPPEA
uses pulse charging avoiding this.
There are a variety some do a whole range of batteries.

 

[Burnerman]

You really need to test your batteries under load to get a true reading - sure a battery which will no longer drive a camera motor for example will certainly run a L.E.D. for a certain length of time, depending on the current requirements of the load.
John

 

[Alarm]

Too fookin risky,

The problem with recharging these types of batteries is that they are not designed to be recharged!
It should be done slowly over long time rather than very fast like most chargers today does.
You can not complain either if the batteries actually start leaking.
They might even "violently" crack open (Explode) if you try to charge them with a lot of current. This so called "explosion" is however not an actual explosion. Using the word "Explosion" causes un-needed fear. What actually may happen is that the pressure inside the battery increases during the charging process. the sealing of the battery may rupture and some of its content, acid or alkaline, may be forcefully sprayed out. This of which is harmfull to skin, espechially eyes. Slow recharging ensures low pressure and less chance of seal breaking.

And

As of not exactly knowing the capacity of a nonchargeable battery, it is a bit difficult to give a time frame for recharging. We can however somewhat count on a capacity comparable to similar rechargeable NiMh batteries. These batteries today are close to 2000 MAh. Easy math tells us that recharging such a battery at only 50 mAH takes time. Straight forward, 40 hours, but taken into consideration the loss factor of charging (approx 40%), it would take close to 60 hours to fully recharge.

Then

My battery charger is full of corrosion due to battery-fluid from alkaline batteries.
This mainly because I forget the batteries in there for too long a time, or try to recharge too many times.

Waste of time effort and money. Also the amperage will not be sufficient for anything drawing much power.

 

[Flyboytim]

You could Google "Joule Thief" - basically a minimalist electronic circuit which oscillates and bumps up the voltage enough to do some useful work, like lighting a LED torch or using the dregs in old disposable batteries to recharge rechargeble batteries.

Apart from that, just recycle responsibly.