Posted on by Justin

More Batteries, More Light

more batteries, more power

I’m not sure we know much about electricity (yet), but we have now confirmed that 3 batteries make an LED considerably brighter. I think we should begin looking into resistors and other such things.

7 Replies to “More Batteries, More Light”

  1. i had a tiny LED light here than ran on 3 batteries too but can’t seem to find it. if i can i will bring it to the meeting. it was good to hear your interview on cjam today with tom too.

  2. In this picture, you are running the LED off of 9V (3x3V batteries in series). This will most likely damage the LED… not a good idea. When powering any LED, you should have a resistor as well (you can find calculators online that will tell you what value resistor you need, depending on the specs of your LED and your power source). The “throwie” thing that you are emulating is pretty much a one-time-use design and meant to be really simple, so it is sacrificing LED life for simplicity. With the 3V battery it is probably fine.. but I definitely wouldn’t power these off 9V like that and expect them to last. 10mm leds generally aren’t really bright anyways (as opposed to the super-bright 5mm leds).

    Also, if you are interested in having these run off solar power, take a look at the cheap-ass solar powered garden lights. You can pick them up for a few bucks and they’ll have a solar panel and a way of storing energy (rechargeable battery) as well as a photocell to detect when it is dark.

  3. Thanks for that info Mike… we have a lot to learn, the online calculator makes sense, we definitely don’t want to destroy all the LEDs

    Good call on the solar power garden lights!!! That’s actually pretty perfect.

  4. Oh man! The solar garden light components might be an awesome way to do this. I don’t think they are very expensive anymore. My mom might have a few to donate.

  7. Pingback: Learning Electricity | Broken City Lab

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