Capacity of various Duracell AA cells?

I personally use aerocells, a brand name of lidl chain,german supermarket.They come for 3 euros a 8 cells, so I don't really mind if they last 1 year or 11 months 15 days in a quartz clock.

-- Tzortzakakis Dimitrios major in electrical engineering,freelance electrician

But limited to uselessness for most consumers. A single number won't tell you if a particular battery is better suited for years of life in a digital clock or more pictures in a digital camera. Batteries optimized for one scenario would be awful in the other.

They are different. ISTR the Maplin catalogue used to give the capacities some years ago (before they switched to selling boys toys, etc).

MBQ

William P.N. Smith wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com:

Since the early seventies, probably earlier, there were two kinds of battery that a consumer would see for either a dry cell or an alkaline: Long Life, and High Power. So if you use a single value for capacity per battery type, and it is printed honstly on the appropriately named battery, people will know that this figure applies if they use the battery appropriately.

There are two points that could be confusing:

1. Mixing up the battery types.
2. Demands that are some way between both types.

There's not much you can do about the first, when people fail to understand the difference, telling them more data won't help, but telling them less is disrespectful.

The second case is the tougher one, and there the single value won't be enough, but you can refer people to a makers graph of lifetime for average current drawn per life, one graph per battery type (Both graphs printed on cardboard packaging for both types). They can put both plots together and make their own choice. The point where the plotted lines cross is the set of conditions for which both batteries are equal to the task. This idea is simple enough to grasp by intuition, and also highly informative if you look at the values for capacity and drawn current.

snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@y43g2000cwc.googlegroups.com:

Nice summing up of what's happened to Maplin there. >:) It's a sad crime what's been done to that firm.

|Dave Fawthrop wrote: |>Roy Lewallen wrote: |>|You can be sure that if manufacturers were pressed to come up with a |>|single number for alkaline cell capacity | |>|The resulting numbers |>|would be totally useless. |>

|>Not IMI totally useless, just limited. | |But limited to uselessness for most consumers.

Who would not understand the Data sheets anyway.

|A single number won't |tell you if a particular battery is better suited for years of life in |a digital clock or more pictures in a digital camera. Batteries |optimized for one scenario would be awful in the other.

Already sussed that one. Alkalines for long life NiMh for power applications

I believe that some two years ago Practical Sailor magazine did an AA alkaline comparison test using hand held VHF transreceiver and Duracell Copper top came out best with Panasonic better than Eveready.

Absolutely. The zinc-air PP3's despite costing an arm and leg and theoretically offering a higher mAh than alkalines are useless for low current applications such as smoke alarms.

The message from Matt contains these words:

The local fire brigade in association with the local council gave away loads of smoke alarms with "10 year" lithium PP3s fitted. About three years later the batteries are dying. This wouldn't matter except that there's a pop-rivetted retainer over the battery so you "can't" replace it.

They don't yet have a long enough life. The Micron UHF types I use just about get through half a day (5 hours) on one PP3 alkaline. Anything less would be unacceptable.

Then there's the problem of recharging perhaps some 50 PP3s per day across the units.

In message , Lostgallifreyan writes

Same with Watford Electronics

As for RS - Has anybody actually managed to order something and found it in stock ?

e.g. 47uF /63v caps - 3 week back order, they don't know what they've sent out and what they haven't

They do have a mission statement, though

Yeah, but it's "You've got questions, we've got blank stares". 8*)

I've noted time between replacing batteries in a couple of appliances. Duracell were best but not by enough to justify the prices in British shops. Maplin were very poor. GP cells were close to Duracell at a fraction of the price. Appliances were Palm 3, and a sony CD/Radio alarm.

BTW, have other Brits noticed how the supermarkets tend to sell the most expensive Duracells? When Duracell Plus were the top of the range those were stocked, now they only stock the Ultra M3 range. What happened to consumer choice?

|BTW, have other Brits noticed how the supermarkets tend to sell the |most expensive Duracells? When Duracell Plus were the top of the range |those were stocked, now they only stock the Ultra M3 range. What |happened to consumer choice?

We go to Lidl, Where they have cheap own brand Alkalines

urers state the Ampere hour capacity on each

Sainsbury's regularly do a 50% extra free on standarad Duracells. 12 for about £4. That's cheaper than the market stalls.

john2

The impending RoHS deadline is causing componnet shortages (at least that's the excuse) as companies suddenly realise they don't have the correct stuff in stock and place panic orders.

MBQ

Large snip...

I'd call that a reason. :) I've found RS to be good generally. Certainly good enough to make the slow demise of Maplin bearable. I don't think Maplin ever did free delivery to my door, guaranteed next day, either. Or had such a good stock of data I get at will. But Maplin used to have really good small reference items in their catalogs, I still keep old ones for that reason.

Some parts at RS cost more, but the difference is usually less than the cost of trying to find cheaper. I still look though. RS don't mind either, they've often helped me with company info that lets me bypass them to buy direct, there aren't many companies that will gladly do this, and still be able to profit themselves on what they do sell.

Most such companies sell direct to anyone with a credit card.

CPS and Rapid are usually cheaper than RS for identical stuff.

In trade magazines Duracell advertises to retailers: selling expensive batteries is more turnover and more profit for you.

Thus, Duracell's key selling point is _high_ price. Not for the consumer, but for the retailer.

Thomas