Saltwater battery from steel wire and copper foil powers LED

[hartiberlin]

Have a look at this easy to build saltwater cells.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfeBhrViZ7M

He is using several cells in series to power
one of these new light color changing LEDs.

Nice built !

He is using steel wire for bike gears and copper
foil as the electrodes and saltwater as the electrolyte.
Will probably give him around 0,5 to 0.8 Volts per cell.
As he uses it in straws these cells are pretty compact,
so you can build it easily as a series connection of several
cells.
Of course the electrodes will be consumed, but it might take
a while until this is done..

Regards, Stefan.

[hartiberlin]

This guy explains it very well in english language,
how these selfmade batteries work:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4PxYQYshn4k

The problem is, these generate almost the same voltage as
standard batteries, but not the current, so you can only use
low current needing loads, like LEDs, etc..

[Dingus Mungus]

Current is determined by metalic surface area... To call that a low current battery is to say the electrodes are too small. Make the surface areas greater and you'll make the current greater too. Good luck on your experiments Volta fans!

~Dingus Mungus

[NerzhDishual]

@Harti_berlin

Thanks for the links.

Very pedagogical.
I had a dream.
Joseph Newman was speaking like this guy on the video.
But he was less poetical.

Just kidding.

Best

[lltfdaniel1]

well since theres a way to increase the current , i wonder how long those batterys would last.