AMZ goes solar – Part 2!
Shown above is my $12 solar battery charger, which was previously mentioned on this blog, connected to a 12v rechargeable battery.
I salvaged the battery from a backup power supply from my office. These cheap backup power units go bad with alarming frequency and they are too cheap to repair. However, the battery usually has a lot of life left in it. I saved 3 or 4 of these batteries and now have cheap power that can be renewed at virtually no cost with my solar charger.
The battery is 12v rated for 7 amp-hours. This is more than enough to power a pedalboard for many hours.
I made a simple voltage regulator box to convert the 12vdc to 9v. That is a project for another time once I get it finished and have some pictures to show.
Check with your company IT department; they will probably give you a similar battery from their salvage pile.
What a coincidence… I show up at work this morning (Monday) and as soon as I get in the door, someone tells me the computer system is down. The IT person is not here, so being the resident electronics guy, I have to check it out… the router’s battery backup supply is dead. Completely fired.
IT came in and said they are going to toss it, so I took the power supply to my office to disassemble.
There are TWO 12v batteries in it! Score!
There are also some nice aluminum heat sinks and a couple of ferrites that I can use.
When I get it home, I’ll take a couple of pictures of it and post them.
I asked the IT guy at my firm, and he said that those batteries have to be recycled by law (at least n New York) so I am out of luck. :[
Hmmm… I would consider it recycling (or even better, re-using) if you used the old battery for powering your pedalboard or some electronic project. If it works it’s actually better than if its taken to be dismantled.
Yeah, it seems to me that using the battery in a pedalboard power supply would constitute recycling.
If the law required recycling, it would be printed on the side of the battery, and it is not.
the “law to recycle” for NY is a corporate bylaw or stance from that company not wanting employees to “get the idea” of taking things home. Of course reuse is the step before recycling. Most non-robot-run companies will let you take electro junk home if you are the IT guy. why else would the job be any fun?