Could a paper battery power your car?

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Tue 14 Aug 2007 13:23
Could a paper battery power your car? - Nsar
I think had a prototype in the gutless Kangoo I rented on holiday once, nothing else could explain its dismal performance

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6945732.stm

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Tue 14 Aug 2007 13:34
Could a paper battery power your car? - Screwloose

Paper batterys aren't completely new - anyone remember the Exide Torque Starter?

I binned one last year that had been the loan battery on hundreds of cars [multi-fit terminals] - it was bought in 1984....
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Tue 14 Aug 2007 13:40
Could a paper battery power your car? - Number_Cruncher
>>anyone remember the Exide Torque Starter?

Yes, my father used one for similar "Thunderbird" duties, it was really powerful, and lasted for ages. Can you still get them?

Number_Cruncher
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Tue 14 Aug 2007 13:52
Could a paper battery power your car? - local yokel
Rubber bands are much cheaper - just follow the postie on his rounds.
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Tue 14 Aug 2007 14:00
Could a paper battery power your car? - Screwloose
NC

No; sadly they dropped them in the mid-nineties due to poor sales - just as the market for Optima-type premium batteries took off....

If the appalling failure rate of the first batch [c.1979] hadn't ruined their reputation; they'd have been another British winner - a whole-life car battery.

For breakdown use they were marvellous. Twice the cranking power - half the weight and would fit anything.

I remember being on a course at Chloride in the '70s; they drove six-inch nails through the battery - it didn't leak and still worked.
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Tue 14 Aug 2007 14:03
Could a paper battery power your car? - Saltrampen
More seriously, I often read stories about super batteries that have just been developed, then it is pointed out that the cost is so high that it is not feasible.
Like with many new technologies much of the ingeniuty lies with the scaling up of the manufacturing process to make the product cheap enough to have an impact...
RW DVD's for example...
If a cheap high capacity battery suddenly came on the market then it would be only a matter of years before the petrol/Diesel engines started to dissappear from show rooms...
then decades before the National grid and power stations could cope with the extra demand!
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