Can you power your laptop computer with disposable batteries?
Yes, you're better off buying a spare battery. All you need to do is provide a stable DC power supply to the power adapter port of your notebook (typical voltages are around 19V give or take). Alkaline D cells aren't going to provide you much power but Voltage of notebook ---------------------------- Voltage of D cell will give you the number of D cells you need. So 19V / 1.5V = 12.667 So you'll need 13 D cell batteries in series and as your battery drains it's going to lose voltage quickly so it won't last very long. If you use NiMh batteries you'll need need 19V/1.2V so you'll need about 16 batteries. NiMH have non-linear drain but the probably won't last much longer either. You'll need about 32 NiMH batteries to be about the capacity of a typical notebook battery pack... Alkaline won't last anywhere near either of the two but the number you need depends on how you design your circuit. So in short, carrying D cell batteries and adapting a battery pack to it is NOT practical regardless of whether it's alkaline or NiMH cell. You can try alternative technologies but you'll be paying much more and getting much less than using a spare notebook battery pack. You'll also need additional circuitry to keep the power supply stable for your notebook. You could also do this with a car battery but you'll need additional circuitry or you can buy a 12V inverter but those aren't very efficient. Also imagine carrying a car battery on your camping trip... So tell your boss it's not practical for you to "Stay in touch".
Need Help to Power a Telescope and Laptop from a 12V Battery?
So I'm thinking about constructing a small observatory for my telescope but the largest problem I face is power. The observatory will be located away from any source of power so the easiest setup would be to use solar panels and batteries to give me the power I need but I have no idea how long a telescope and laptop could be powered. The telescope's power requirements are 1.5A and 12V (but it never draws more than 960mA). I don't know what the laptop requires but it's a pretty generic laptop and probably consumes as much power as any other (however much that may be). So, using a decent 12V deep cycle battery, how long would this setup last? I'm not interested in the solar panels at the moment, just the battery. Thanks!
How long would it last battery on power inverter?
Your actual load is 100W... With no losses the current is 100W/12V = 8.33A This means you need 8.33Ah capacity for each hour of running, with provisos as below. WIth a 7Ah battery that implies 8.33A/7Ah = 0.84 hours The nominal voltage of a 12V battery is 12.6V, but you will be lucky to have 12V at the inverter terminals. Battery ratings.. The battery will be rated at the 10 or even 20 hour rate, so that is a current of 0.7A or 0.35A for a 7Ah battery. The current you are drawing is 10 times that, in reality too much for this battery. The battery capacity is derated considerably, so the implied 100W running time of 50 minutes becomes maybe less than half an hour. In practice the losses due to the inverter must be added as part of the load. As this is a low load for an 800W inverter it would just be a stab in the dark to say what its losses are, unless you can measure the actual current drawn from the battery when running under that load. My feeling anything from a few watts to 150W losses. It could more than double the load. You could be down to 10 minutes if the battery doesn't get overheated. Batteries are also less capable in cold conditions. A 7Ah battery is more suitable for loads about 10W. Get the drift? You need a larger battery. The load is more consistent with an 80Ah size deep cycle battery. This would run more like expected, up to 9h, perhaps somewhat less due to inverter losses. If you want to run the Laptop only, it makes more sense to use an external battery pack that plugs in more directly. This will be more efficient at least. Most laptops run from an 18V battery. Look into the solutions for converting 12V to 18V (Laptop car adaptors), that will run on your battery as well. A solution that might be available, or soon will be, is a fuel cell for laptops. See the link. We are talking about something like 200ml of Methanol for 20h for a notebook. Sounds attractive.
Can I charge a 12V lead battery with a 20V laptop adapter?
Yes, you can. But before that, you need to reduce the voltage to 13.5v and the current drawn from it is 3.4A(may vary from charger to charger). the current also not more than 1.5 A. with these specifications you can design one circuit and you can charge the battery.If you want to charge directly from the adapter, don’t do that, the battery will get overcharged and it tends to battery damage.
12V adapter for a 14.8 battery, with Lipo Charger?
I have a Detrum D6 charger and I'm trying to charge a 14.8V, 1800 mah battery. And it says connection break(doesn't charge it). I'm guessing it doesn't charge the battery because the incoming voltage(12v) is less than the battery voltage(14.8). I couldn't find a 15v charger yet. I'm just trying to confirm my suspicion. Would a battery not charge with a balance charger if the incoming voltage is less than that of the battery? Or is there something wrong with my batt or charger?
With a lead acid 12v battery, will I short out a power inverter if I'm charging the battery and pulling power from the same -/+ contacts?
You can pull power from the battery while it is being charged, EXCEPT for these many glitches:If the batter is totally discharged, the charger will be spiking up to like 18 volts on the AC peaks, and that can kill a lot of devices. At the very least, you'll get a lot of ripple and hum.Some chargers will shut down or go to a very high charge rate or a very low charge rate if they see the battery voltage is lower than expected, due to the extra load.If you pull more current than the charger is supplying, you're actually net discharging the battery.
How many laptops can be charged through a 12V - 7AH battery?
Unless you are perfectly sure you will be able to gain knowledge of the battery's lowest possible and highest possible voltages and you would be able to either build or get sensors for this purpose you should convert this to 230V AC and not charge the battery directly as you can destroy and maybe explode the battery.As for your question most laptops have batteries working at 19V so 12V 7Ah will convert to 19V at 4.42ah so now what you need to do is get the battery capacities of the laptop batteries and you will be able to charge 4 1.1Ah laptop batteries 2 2.2Ah batteries or one 4.4Ah battery.
Can I use my 19.5V laptop charger to charge a dead 12V car battery?
If the laptop charger is the only power supply you have, and you absolutely have to charge a car battery, you can do it by putting a suitable resistor in series to limit the current to something less than the adapter’s maximum output. Let’s say your car battery is at 11 V and your laptop power supply outputs 19.5 V. Then you will need a resistance of at least 2.54 ohms to keep the current less than 3.34 A, because (19.5 V - 11 V)/(3.34 A) =2.54 ohms. But remember, that resistor is dissipating 28 watts, so it’d better be a big power resistor with proper cooling, or you will just burn it up.Be prepared to wait a long time, like maybe a full day, at such a low current.The other problem is that there is nothing to stop the charging once the battery is fully charged, say 14.4 V. But at such a low current, you probably won’t hurt the battery too much if you check in on it every few hours.Maybe you’d better call AAA instead. But if you’re stuck in the middle of the desert with nothing but a car with a dead battery, a laptop power supply, an electrical outlet that somehow works, and a pile of power resistors, this technique could save your life someday!(Remember, car batteries can be quite dangerous and should be treated with respect; they store a lot of energy and can release it very quickly if shorted, even when “dead.” The acid can cause severe chemical burns. And overcharging a lead-acid battery can release flammable hydrogen gas. Eye protection is always a good idea when working with large lead-acid batteries.)
I have a laptop charger that supplies 19v. Can I charge a 12v battery if I control the laptop charger voltage to 14.5 volts using a potentiometer?
Very unlikely. Are you talking about a car or motorcycle battery?A potentiometer is basically a variable resistor and so you aren't really controlling the output voltage of the laptop charger. In order to do that you need a voltage regulator.Your second problem is going to be the output current available from your laptop charger. Probably not going to be enough to charge your battery. Look at the output rating (Watts/amps) of your charger and compare that to the capacity of your battery. You're gong to need 10% off the battery rating in Ah in order to effectively charge it.Your third problem is going to be the way in which your laptop charger works. It probably just supplies it's rated voltage output constantly and leaves all the current limiting to the laptop. In order to charge a car battery, you have to give it a constant current for the first part of the charging cycle. Your discharged battery will try to draw as much current as your charger can supply. This will almost certainly be more than your laptop charger is rated at. Once the battery has reached its nominal voyage you need to switch over to constant voltage charging.So go out and invest in a proper battery charger for your 12 volt battery.