"Standard" batteries

[Dave2002]

I should have known better - but didn't. In some parts there are pound shops, like Poundland, and some of the stuff is good, and cheap. One gadget we have is a card shuffler - which we use from time to time to play games. Sometimes it doesn't work well at all, and sometimes putting in new batteries helps. I had bought a pack of so-called "Heavy Duty" Kodak batteries from one of the pound shops, and putting those into the card shuffler gave an immediate improvement. The measured voltage of each battery is about 1.5 V.

Recently I wanted to read meters, and my technique of photographing the meter (see thread on meters ...) was put into action, but unfortunately one of my cameras had rechargeables which ran out, and I didn't have a charger with me. Since there was a pound shop nearby, I went and ought another £1's worth of these "heavy duty" batteries, but they hardly worked at all. I had been misled by my earlier experience with the card shuffler to think that this type of zinc chloride battery might at least last long enough for me to take a few photos. Wrong. Reading the details on the packaging suggests that the batteries won't work with high drain devices, including cameras - though I thought that the card shuffler might have been considered such. Perhaps its short burst operation means that it isn't quite a high drain device.

After that I looked up Zinc Chloride batteries, and found various articles, including this rather useful one
http://michaelbluejay.com/batteries/disposable.html which has a link to this - http://michaelbluejay.com/batteries/...tml#carbonzinc

See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zinc%E..._chloride_cell

It does seem to me that in 2015 describing batteries as heavy duty, when they are anything but, is unacceptable. However, I'm also interested in how it is that such zinc chloride batteries work - they must have some property/mechanism which means that high(ish) current flows almost immediately restrict the power which is available. Does anyone know?

[Beef Oven!]

Oh dear. I've just returned from the shops where I spent 99p of my hard earned cash on 10 (plus 1 free) Polaroid AA batteries. There were some Daewoo batteries for the same price, but the looked cheaper and nastier!

Anyway, the reason for my purchase was that I'd run out of the cheapies that I've bought from Costco down the years (I'm no longer a member of Costco). So a few weeks ago I bought some truly awful cheapies in a pound shop for the radio and atomic clock in the kitchen, bathroom scales etc.

The Costco ones used to last about 3 months in my radio with intermittent light use, say when I'm having a bath or shave and last thing at night. The cheapie "Plus Cell" ones I bought lasted two weeks of very light use. So today I decided to go upmarket and splash out on the Polaroid batteries. Sounds like I may have wasted my cash.

In all seriousness, these batteries ought not to be branded 'Super Heavy Duty' if they are quick-drain and only for light use. That's quite wrong. I need to get out more.

[Bryn]

Why are you not using NiMHs?

[Beef Oven!]

Why are you not using NiMHs?

Not in my houses.

[Dave2002]

I have started throwing out older rechargeables, such as NiCds and some NiMHs which don't work too well. Mostly I stock up on the low leakage NiMH batteries nowadays (e.g Eneloop or Hybrio), though they usually only "give out" about 1.2V - which doesn't work with everything. It dook me a while to find rechargeables which would work well with Apple wireless mice, for example - some devices really do need a higher voltage, close to 1.5V.

The zinc chloride batteries may not be a disaster, and not a waste of money if used in low current drain devices - such as remote controls. NiMHs may be a lot better though, but it doesn't have to be a total write off if one has bought 10 or more zinc chloride batteries for about a pound.

Usually Maplin have alkaline batteries cheap once or twice a year - typically 25 batteries for £5 - 20p each, and they are handy to have in. Again, I usually get a box of AAs and a box of AAAs.

Developments in NiMH batteries now mean that some AA batteries hold as much energy as some earlier D type batteries, and there are plastic cases to allow one or more AA size NiMH battery to be used in a D or C type container.

The latest development I've seen, which seems pretty much a gimmick to me, is that some batteries are now made partly from recycling old batteries, though the claims for this are down at the 4% level, so for virtually all small batteries, 96% or more of each is made from "new" materials. Of course, on a large scale, that 4% may be significant, but I'd suggest probably not greatly significant.

[Serial_Apologist]

I remember, about 20 years ago, my father buying two of those solar battery re-chargers from the catalogue that still comes with RT. Having inserted the two batteries for re-charging, you placed the device face-up (obviously!) on a south-facing windowsill all day. The result, initially was at most 5 minutes of power. After less than a year neither device functioned at all. It nevertheless seemed a good idea at the time, and if it could be made to work more efficiently and sustainably, could be a significant solution to the growing problem of what to do with used batteries - which (surely?) must be worrying someone out there???

[Anastasius]

It's not only dry cells that you need to be careful with. My elderly Wahl beard trimmer gave up the ghost recently. The battery charge in the old one was usually good for a couple of weeks. The replacement Wahl lasts precisely two days. But it was very cheap and so I guess you get what you pay for.