Understanding Batteries
1. What Makes a Battery Tick?
Okay, so you're staring at a bunch of batteries and wondering if hooking them up in parallel will give you some kind of super-charged power boost. That's a great question! To really grasp what's going on, it helps to understand that batteries are all about voltage, current, and capacity. Think of voltage like the pressure in a water pipe, current as the flow rate, and capacity as the size of the water tank.
A single battery has a specific voltage — it's like its identity. For example, a regular AA battery is usually 1.5 volts. Current, measured in amps (A), describes how much electricity the battery can deliver at any given moment. And capacity, often measured in amp-hours (Ah) or milliamp-hours (mAh), tells you how long the battery can sustain a certain current draw before it's completely drained. This is the key, so hold onto that thought!
When we talk about "wattage," we're talking about power, which is simply voltage multiplied by current (Watts = Volts x Amps). So, to increase wattage from a battery system, you need to either increase the voltage, the current, or both. Now, here's where the parallel connection comes into play.
Think of it like this: imagine you have two small water tanks. Each tank holds a certain amount of water, and the water pressure is the same in both. If you connect the bottoms of the tanks together, you now have one big tank that holds twice as much water, but the water pressure hasn't changed. That's essentially what happens when you connect batteries in parallel.
