Featured Articles
Announcing Pi
Technical Specifications
Raspberry Pi FAQs
Win a Pi
Raspberry Pi Wishlist
Actions
Forum Thread Details
  • Replies 18 replies
  • Subscribers 683 subscribers
  • Views 1824 views
  • Users 0 members are here
Related

interesting power supply for raspberry pi

benlikos

so i was browsing radio shack for a 3.7v lithium ion battery  because i had just made a  3.7v to 5v dc-dc usb adapter with three usb ports in it to power my raspberry pi well any way i was browsing and the idea came to me. i new potatoes cold produce around 1.2v

with some copper and zinc. and my adapter needs 3.7v so i cold get three and one 12th potatoes link them up and take some copper and zinc material and stick them in each end and i have a 3.7v potato battery. but the raspberry pi doesn't needs 1000 mAH and the potatoes only produce 3 mAH image/image

  • There is no such thing as a fraction of a cell. Your choice of electrodes is what determines the voltage. You can't make a portion of one.

     

    As for the current, I believe you can increase it by making more surface area between the electrodes and the potato. Or perhaps changing to lemons? The current can also be impeded by too much space between the electrodes. Too much potato I mean. So I suggest you experiment with cutting the potatoes into smaller bits, and running a few of them in parallel.

     

    And rather than trying to make 3 and 1/12th potatoes, why not stick with 4 potatoes and then you don't need extra current?

  • in reply to gallomimia

    Yes I was wondering about a lemon. The reaction with the juice might just give enough juice.

  • in reply to devinsheppard

    Reminds me of the time I showed my kids how to power a LED with lemons. :-)