Renewable and biologically compatible battery chemistries.

industrialphreak

industrialphreak

Member
I understand this might be a flight of fancy or otherwise a pipe dream of sorts.

But has anyone every looked into building there own battery packs from scratch or at least from COTS (Common Off The Shelf) hardware store componants?

Particularly I've seen some youtube videos by LaserHacker and John hutchensen about Epson salt and Potasium chloride and borax batteries that are outputting about 1A at about 2-6V depending on how hydrated they are.

More on this guys crystal cell batteries on his official youtube page over here http://youtu.be/Mzq_qWIhamQ

One of the more exciting aspects about this battery chemistry is the fact they have a extremely long useful life span as per LaserHackers two year webcasted experiment with them driving a small dc motor and Light emitting diod over here. http://laserhacker.com/?page_id=20
 
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Thanks guys,

And Intrepid W Woman... I've seen some work on those earth batteries, thought it might be ubber cool to take a childs trailer and build a mini greenhouse and figure a way to tap into living root mass for a ion/electron exchange.

@16v4nrbrgr let me rephrase this. I want something I dont have to worry about having funny'er looking children after licking,consuming, or otherwise inadvertantly having party of the battery bank being crushed into my flesh or leaked out into the environment.

Kinda on the same train of thought there are some really cool biologically compatible thin film solid state batteries they use for mil-aerospace, and implantable applications over here. http://www.cymbet.com/ It may be promising if its scalable.
 
16v4nrbrgr said:
Use sealed lead acid batteries if you're worried about leakage.
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What happens if you get in a accident and or the widdow or the NTSB or simply throws out the frame and battery?

SLA batteries are nice there not 100% indestructable, seals and casings can break. And not very many people follow recycling regulations let alone would correct a improperly disposed of battery if they found one on the street or in a dumpster. Just down the street there is a automotive battery jammed into a sewer grate that has been there for years. I think some guy dropped it off at the good will collection bin a few years ago and they never picked it up and it ended up getting pushed into the drain by a snow plow.
 
Batteries require reactive elements to work. Generally speaking the stronger the reaction, the more energy density you get.

Lithium batteries are a perfect example. Lightweight, and very powerful. So powerful in fact that you can make some of them blow up if you mistreat them.

Lead acid in an AGM format is pretty safe. I watched the guy from Kinetik prove that one day when he cut one of their AGM batteries in half with a hacksaw.


Why have you walked past a battery for years and not properly disposed of it?
 
Ive been out of work for some time and cant afford the surcharge for properly disposing of someone elses gold. not to mention city works probably will need to get involved as the last time i tried to wedge it out it wouldnt budge.

FFV8 Ill have to look at those AGA cells sometime.

My idea for a safer battery is more or less something I can go to the local hardware store and purchase safe electrolyte or be able to build one from scratch.

Anyone seen a thread about reviving/resurecting SLA's here? Ive seen a few youtubes about popping tops and topping off the cells with distilled water, adding magnesium sulfate(epson salts) and zapping them to desulfate the electrode plates. has anyone here experimented doing so?
 
AGM = SLA = race car battery = safe if you box them, and don't crash hard enough to crush your boxes.

And not very many people follow recycling regulations
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The ecological safety of most batteries is only as good as the user who chooses to recycle them or not. Lithium is a relatively benign element to toss away, but unfortunately there are other nasty chemicals in the electrolyte and other toxic and/or carcinogenic heavy metals used in Li batteries which means that they too should be disposed of or recycled in a responsible manner.

I always get a chuckle when my local bike shop owner asks if the latest bike is electric, when electrics simply follow the mantra of "Not in my neighborhood!", simply offsetting the pollution or radiation elsewhere from where the energy is used, using batteries which, like FFV8 stated, use highly reactive compounds for strong oxy-reduction reactions to take place, most of which are NOT environmentally friendly if not recycled or disposed of in a controlled manner.

Unless you wanna carry around a 2000lb sack of potatoes with you...
One_Potato_LED.jpg

rotfl
 
You're neglecting to look into sufficient power density. Take Chem II with a segment on oxy-reduction reactions in batteries and you'll understand. You'd need a 100 gallon tank of piss to get a motorbike to go with that chemistry.
 
16v:

Yer killin' me here. All I can see now is a 100 gal whiz tank on a trailer behind a bicycle... can't stop laughing.

A couple of years ago I mentioned to someone that a Zinc Air battery was being tested in a transit bus. I got a long winded reply about an Aluminum Air battery. After he wound down, I asked if he knew how aluminum was made...

A 100 year old Edison Nickel Iron battery is still a better battery than the stuff these guys are cooking up at the kitchen table.
 
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