How To Make Two Daft Punk Outfits with Helmets

Step 5 Battery Timings

How long do the batteries last?

I couldn't find any real timings on how long batteries lasted with different lengths of EL WIre or a battery powered Arduino before I started. I was a little worred right up until the party that I'd be lit up like a Christmas tree for 15 minutes and then everything would go dark!

Our batteries ran for the following lengths of time:

1. One 9v battery running about 15 metres of Red Superbright EL Wire (2.5mm) on a KL10 Power Pack lasted about 2 hours.
2. One 9v battery running about 13 metres of Red Superbright EL Wire (2.5mm) on a KL10 Power Pack lasted about 2.5 hours.
3. Two AA batteries in a KH4B inverter ran 5 metres of Red Superbright EL Wire on the helmets for about 5 hours.
4. One 9v battery powered the Arduino, Max7221, and LED Array for about 4.5 hours running the program I attached to step 4.

Hope that helps, if you Daft Punk at Glastonbury this year be sure to say hello!
Derek

Comments

[kc0wys]

The runtimes don't really mean anything without knowing the battery chemistry. I assume you used alkalines...?

[04s2lao]

yeah they're alkalines - if you look in the photo with the arduino board and led array you can see the edge of the battery. Enough is visible to be able to say thats an very common uk brand (no names, no lawsuits!) that sell almost exclusively alkaline battery's. hope that helps!

[derektroywest]

Yeah that's right, all the battery timings were for alkalines. I wanted to use lithium but I couldn't actually find any in the time I had..