From: "Don Williams" Subject: Big power source
Okay. Today I connected the 6/12AH Lead Acid battery to the *ist D. I've marked it on my calender and we'll see how many weeks it lasts before needing a charge. I think it's full up now -- reading 6.15V. It's not something you could put in a jacket pocket. Its a real hefty block of plastic and lead that might be okay in a backpack.
Is that 6v 12AH ? If so it should last about the same as five or six sets of reasonable NiMh AAs. Why not get a nice 400AH battery & charge it up once a year :-)
As a caution Lead Acid batteries tend to be ideal/designed for high discharge rates whilst essentially remaining fully charged all the time (think of car batteries here). When used for what I imagine will be your long very slow discharge rate usage they can tend to develope a memory effect that makes them both harder to charge properly, and also their ability to supply large currents diminishes. One of those digital battery conditioner thingies that pulse charges and continually maintains battery condition might be ideal for a permanent bench setup - there again it will probably cost more than a small battery :-) The deeper you discharge the battery the shorter will be it's life, ideally you would charge it up when it reaches 80% charge but this would mean charging it almost as often as you would a set of AAs.
Rob. -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Free Edition. Version: 7.1.362 / Virus Database: 267.12.8/161 - Release Date: 03/11/2005
