Batteries For Models

Safe Disposal

Before I offer any information I wish to emphasise that


UNLESS YOU ARE PREPARED TO TAKE THE TROUBLE TO CAREFULLY STORE, AND IMPORTANTLY DISPOSE OF, UNWANTED BATTERIES THEN I RECOMMEND


AVOID USING ANY BATTERY UNLESS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY - whether rechargable or not !


This may sound a bit harsh but batteries easily have the potential to cause burns and/or fire and certainly great damage to the environment if not disposed of responsibly. I have made many complaints to local councils and clubs because of their cavalier attitude to them which reflects the same attitude in society. We are all aware of the brain damage caused by lead which thankfully now has been removed from petrol yet the same still has not happened to Cadmium and other elements common in batteries and their harm is many orders of magnitude worse.


Frankly for environmental reasons I generally do not recommend the use of batteries anywhere where safe cabled electricity can be made available.

I AM NOT IN FAVOUR OF USING BATTERIES GENERALLY

GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS

Rechargable Batteries

The general characteristics for comparison are:

State Of Charge & General Battery Characteristics

My dislike of batteries over I’ve had many requests for simple information on how to determine the state of usefulness of non-rechargable dry cell batteries. Fortunately their open circuit (no load) voltage is a good indicator. So by removing them from a device and applying a digital multimeter (very cheap these days) one may ascertain the ‘life’ left in the battery by using the following table.

Some devices are designed to run for a very long time before they run the battery flat - notably clocks and remote controls. Therefore their circuits can still continue to work at unusually low voltages so even if your battery nolonger powers normal devices you can put almost expired batteries in these devices and they will continue to work - more bang for your buck ! I find it very frustrating if a remote control suddenly stops working so to reduce how often this happens I actually don’t do this with them but, hey, you may be happy with this.

* Beware Many babies and children have been badly injured by swallowing these.

Non-rechargable Batteries

The general characteristics for comparison are: