Power on Bald Engineer

Energy Density of 9V battery vs. AA batteries

Wed, 23 Mar 2016 13:00:53 +0000

Previously I wrote up why the 9V battery sucks. As I thought more about that post, I realized, I never explained how much energy is in a 9 V battery versus say a couple of AA batteries. For this post, I am going to break down the energy stored in a 9 V battery, the small rectangular kind and compare it to what you get with 6 AA batteries. Yes, it takes up a little more space, but you might be surprised by the difference.

6 Simple Mistakes Electronics Beginners Make

Mon, 30 Jun 2014 14:00:47 +0000

Sometimes the hardest lessons are the ones you have to learn multiple times. When getting started with Electronics circuits, there’s a handful of things that can ruin a day (or experiment.) Here are 6 mistakes I made when I got started, and mistakes I see in the beginner classes I teach. In fairness #6 isn’t one I did starting out, because Fritzing wasn’t around. However, it took me a while to learn the value of providing a schematic, even a simple sketched out block diagram.

A new series on AddOhms, Electronics basics, starting with: Voltage, Current, and Power Explained.

Sat, 13 Jul 2013 00:53:31 +0000

Starting with this new AddOhms TutorialCast series, we are taking a look at Electronics Basics. The first topic is on the differences between Voltage, Current, and Power. The twist on this explanation is that we are not using the usual “electricity is like water” analogy engineers seem to love. Instead, we just use plain language to explain the difference between these concepts. From a production point of view, I am really having fun with these videos. Using some green card stock, imagination, and easy to use tools, I am able to achieve some pretty cool effects. Well, I think they are pretty cool. Check out this screen shot from Final Cut Pro X.

Fuelling Your Arduino - Thermal Look at Arduino Power

Fri, 25 May 2012 13:52:05 +0000

There are many options for powering an Arduino board. The designers did a great job of designing an auto-select circuit that makes it simple to power the boards. However, there are trade offs in how much power is available and how much power gets wasted. Australian Robotoics has a great breakdown of what an Arduino looks like under a thermal camera, when powered from USB and various external sources. I don’t agree with everything that is said in this article, but the pictures are very revealing (and cool to look at).