Miracle Batteries

12 Dec 2020

My first digital multimeter was a Micronta....here it is, fresh from my museum archives:

I remember being very impressed with its long battery life when I was using it decades ago, probably because it didn't use LEDs. But now I just turned it on and it powered right up, so I checked the batteries and they look pristine. The absolutely astounding thing is I believe these are the original Radio Shack Enercell Extra Life batteries bought when the meter was new! More than 3 decades ago! I did hang out at Radio Shack in the 70's and 80's but I definitely haven't bought batteries at Radio Shack for decades. I just measured the voltages at 1.54 V and 1.539 V.

Count me astonished, gobsmacked, flabergasted and totally blown away at how they can still be in this pristine condition. On the batteries it says they have a "miracle seal" - that is obviously not just hype. I have never seen any AA batteries sit on a shelf for a decade without dying and spewing their guts all over the battery compartment. I am going to have to see if these batteries are still in production - they are truly spectacular.

Top Comments

ralphjy over 5 years ago

Wow! That really is impressive. I remember being part of Radio Shack's "battery club". I guess I was only affording the cheaper batteries because I was always replacing them.

I wish all batteries would perform this well. There are so many forgotten places where batteries hide and unfortunately usually end up in a corroded mess. Of course, nowadays it's more frightening with the failure modes of Lithium batteries .
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neilk over 5 years ago

dougw those batteries are very impressive!

I've just had to spend a few hours replacing the contact strips and springs in the battery boxes of various LED Christmas lights. The (new at the time) batteries were accidentally left in last Christmas and have leaked badly!

Neil
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kmikemoo over 5 years ago

dougw I finally replaced the C cell in my Micronta meter - after around 35 years. The meter only used it for resistance readings but that's still very impressive. They just don't write 'em like that anymore.
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DAB over 5 years ago

Now I have to dig out my first meter I picked up in the 1960's.

DAB
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Andrew J over 5 years ago

That is impressive. I was sat by the computer a week or so ago and could hear this curious ticking sound. Using the power of cross-triangulation - i.e. moving my head around to pick up the direction of the noise - I tracked it down to some shelves and from there to a wireless mouse. Opening it up, the batteries had spewed their guts and at least one of them was venting, hence the ticking noise. That went outside quick-as-you-like!
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