New Project Farm Battery Testing

[bxparks]

(12-20-2024 01:29 PM)AnnoyedOne Wrote:  

(12-19-2024 08:17 PM)mfleming Wrote:  Not entirely sure about the damage.

I cannot imagine how batteries could kill a device other that leaking corrosive chemicals over the insides. I assume that wasn't the case with the Eneloops.

We had a previous discussion about this in June 2024:
https://www.hpmuseum.org/forum/thread-21...#pid188859

When multiple NiMH batteries are in series, one dies to 0V, then the other good cells can drive the dead cell into reverse polarity. I've seen that happen myself. Then the next cell dies to 0V, and gets driven to reverse polarity, and so on. Until the last good cell dies to 0V. The final state of the batteries could be that the reverse polarity cells send negative voltage into the calculator. Maybe this damages the calculator if it doesn't have reverse polarity protection? This is just speculation at this point, no experimental data. [Edit: fix grammar typos]