Make:

This would be awesome for event videographers. We eat through 9V batteries like they were candy (all in the microphones).

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I think it is great.... Only thing is that the link suggest the PDF is dated from october 2003. That's pretty old. But still a great hack. I think it will set people on a new way of thinking about batteries. If people would have picked it up in 2003, by now we could enjoy much improvements on this idea I guess.

- Unomi -

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Great article, but where the in the world can one find the choke needed for the circuit? I'm having a terrible time finding a 470uh choke, much less the ferrite core used to make it. Can someone help me?

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Is anyone familiar with the new capacitor electrode technology, Reticle Carbon©?. (USPTO 6,350.520. This is a process for coaxing extremely large surface areas (and conductivity) from activated carbon.

Reticle's revolutionary high surface carbon technology offers significant advantage over currently available technologies. Therefore, for most applications, the company''s competition promises to come from other companies developing high surface carbon capacitive deionization related technology. Most of these are using Aerogel carbon, developed by Lawrence Livermore Labs. The current surface of aerogel is approximately 400 m2/g as compared with 2,000 m2/g for Reticle Carbon©©. The current quoted cost for aerogel carbon is approximately $150/kg as compared with production cost of $10/kg for Reticle Carbon©©.

Capacitors are direct power storage devices. At present, metal-carbon composites are being manufactured in the automotive industry as a means of leveling the power draw in future electric cars. Such materials combine aluminum sheets and activated carbon in various configurations. The best in class capacity demonstrated to date is rather inefficient, storing a mere 7-10 kilowatt hours per kilogram of material. Given the cost of such materials, supercapacitors based on those materials are simply out of the question from an economic perspective, and the internal combustion engine continues to reign until the supercapacitor problem is solved.

Reticle Carbon has in laboratory studies produced 7.5 kilowatt hours per kilogram of material in a 2 cubic inch capacitor (rather minuscule in size by Reticle''s standards). This was accomplished with a modest surface area grade of Reticle Carbon by Reticle standards (1200 square meters per gram). Reticle has manufactured much higher surface area carbon monoliths (2100 square meters per gram), and that higher surface area carbon has a higher power storage capacity. Because of the lightness in weight of Reticle Carbon, supercapacitors built from Reticle Carbon are considerably lighter than metal-carbon capacitors and therefore are ideally suited for mobile and transportation applications in which onboard weight is a prime consideration. This is not to be discounted. One of the primary markets for supercapacitors is the automotive market, a market that absolutely craves lightness in weight. Another is the airframe market, which craves lightness in weight even more.

We are presently working with overseas investors on desalination, and will soon be working with overseas electric and hybrid vehicle developers.

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