Best no-leak AA batteries?

[MoonlightSylv]

I recently bought an Omnibot (vintage collectors item robot) and I'd like to keep batteries in it, that's not a big problem for the main rechargeable battery however it also takes two AAs for the built in alarm clock and cassette player (it's from 1984) and because of that is has a slow-drain (or "parasitic drain") similar to a wall clock which makes corrosion a bigger problem.

 

So the ones that look the most promising are the Energizer Max Powerseal and the Energizer Ultimate Lithium batteries. And from what I know, lithium batteries don't leak, but maybe I'm wrong.

 

So which set of AA batteries would be least likely to corrode or leak in a low-drain scenario?

[ARikozuM]

I’ve had great luck with Panasonic and Sanyo Eneloops. 

[iamdarkyoshi]

Those lithium batteries are quite nice, but the ones I've had (got them at launch so to speak) start at like 2v instead of 1.5v

 

This may be something to watch out for. It might be fine though. It might not even be an issue anymore.

 

If the electrolyte is anything like rechargeable lithium batteries though, It will eat plastic and turn it into goo.

 

I'm not really sure if they have issues with leaking however.

[MoonlightSylv]

2 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

Those lithium batteries are quite nice, but the ones I've had (got them at launch so to speak) start at like 2v instead of 1.5v

 

This may be something to watch out for. It might be fine though. It might not even be an issue anymore.

 

If the electrolyte is anything like rechargeable lithium batteries though, It will eat plastic and turn it into goo.

 

I'm not really sure if they have issues with leaking however.

Both the Max and Lithium have no leak guarantees by energizer but I don't know which one would be better for a low-drain device. It uses about as much power as a wall clock.

[iamdarkyoshi]

1 minute ago, Sylvie05 said:

Both the Max and Lithium have no leak guarantees by energizer but I don't know which one would be better for a low-drain device. It uses about as much power as a wall clock.

I'd pick the lithium.

[MoonlightSylv]

2 minutes ago, iamdarkyoshi said:

I'd pick the lithium.

Thanks

[mariushm]

The cassette tape motor may spin too fast, due to the 2 AA batteries giving too high voltage (close to around 1.8v .. 2v per battery)

 

These non-rechargeable lithium batteries have no liquid inside so there's not much to spill or leak.

[MoonlightSylv]

3 minutes ago, mariushm said:

The cassette tape motor may spin too fast, due to the 2 AA batteries giving too high voltage (close to around 1.8v .. 2v per battery)

 

These non-rechargeable lithium batteries have no liquid inside so there's not much to spill or leak.

Could any damage be caused by more voltage or would it just make the cassette spin faster? Because as long as there's no damage I'm fine with a fast cassette player, I just want to make sure there's no corrosion.

[MoonlightSylv]

11 minutes ago, mariushm said:

The cassette tape motor may spin too fast, due to the 2 AA batteries giving too high voltage (close to around 1.8v .. 2v per battery)

 

These non-rechargeable lithium batteries have no liquid inside so there's not much to spill or leak.

According to amazon the voltage of these lithium batteries are around 1.5v to 1.6v

[mariushm]

@Sylvie05

 

1.5v alkaline batteries are 1.65v when fully charged, and give usable energy up to around 0.9v

Rechargeable Ni-Mh batteries are around 1.35v when fully charged, and go down to around 1v when discharged.

Lithium batteries can be up to 1.8v when fully charged, but they drop down to sane levels like 1.65v when you take out let's say 1-3% of their total charge ... so basically minutes after you insert them into something, the nominal voltage will go down to around 1.65v and then go down at much slower rate compared to alkaline batteries... they can still give some amount of energy down to around 0.8v

 

BatteryShowdown.com is a good site to see how batteries behave - i have contributed with batteries to that site, for testing.

 

See http://batteryshowdown.com/results-lo.html

Here's how the discharge is between battery chemistries :

 

200mA is close enough to a cassette player, walkman etc ... you can see the zinc ones (the cheap, often labeled heavy duty) discharge quite fast. Alkaline (red) are better and lithium are even better.

 

You can scroll down and click on "View graph" on batteries which are lithium based, and you'll see right at the left edge that the voltage is really high ... here's for example energizer ultimate lithium ... it's barely visible, but the red is above 1.65v for a few minutes

 

 

anyway, a bit off topic but the graphs are awesome... you can see how good the lithium batteries are at high drain (1A) - imagine for example a digital camera programmed to take snapshots every 5 minutes for example or when motion is detected, in the woods... when taking a shot, a camera pulls way more than 1A for a few seconds especially if the flash is on. Lithium batteries are great for such purpose