Have you ever found yourself in a situation where your batteries are dead and you need to use an electrical device? With this easy-to-make portable charger, this won't happen again. This charger can also be recharged so that you can use it endlessly.
Steps
Step 1. Remove the candy and paper from a box of Altoids (you can put the candies in a plastic bag so you can eat them later)
Step 2. Obtain a female USB port
You can find one on a USB extender.
Step 3. If you are using a USB extension cable, cut the cable as far as possible from the side where you plug in the cable you want to extend
Strip the wires and find the black wire (-) and the red wire (+). Make sure you keep them separate from the green and red wires that take care of the data transfer.
Step 4. If your wires are very short (less than 8 inches), you could lengthen them by soldering wires to them
Be careful not to put too much of it, as they may no longer fit in the box of Altoids. You just need to keep at least 20 cm of wires on the female USB socket.
Step 5. Install your AAA batteries in the battery holder
To install it, you do not need to charge them (you can buy rechargeable batteries very cheaply on eBay or similar auction sites. The unit used is the milliampere (mAh), which corresponds to to the current needed to completely drain the batteries in an hour. When charging, a 1000mAh battery will last at least twice as long as a 500mAh battery. You can buy battery holders at electronics stores, just make sure that it fits in the Altoids box, which is usually the smallest support you can find, see the photos in the Items needed section).
Step 6. Connect the cables from the battery holder to the USB cable
Remember: red on red and black on black. You better solder them. You could also wrap the wires on top of each other, but this method is not very reliable. Remember to cover exposed electrical wires with insulating material (such as PVC or electrician's tape) to prevent the positive and negative wires from touching each other.
Step 7. Make a square hole slightly larger than the USB port on one side of the Altoids box
If using a drill, be careful of sparks that can ignite flammable materials. Make sure you make the hole on one of the shorter sides, not on any of the sides above or below the text, only on the left or right.
Step 8. Place the battery holder connected to the USB port in the Altoids box
Install the on / off button (if your support has one) leaving the support on top so that when you open the box you can see the female USB port without it coming out of its opening, but in it. aligning so that it does not come out too much.
Step 9. Glue the USB port in place with hot glue
You can also put double-sided tape or hot glue on the backing to keep it from moving.
Step 10. You can close the box
You have now completed your charger. If the batteries are not charged, continue to the last step to charge them.
Step 11. Make a male to male USB cable if you don't already have one
Cut the ends of two USB cables, leaving as much wire as possible on the connector side. Strip the cable to expose the colored wires. You can remove the green and white wires. Strip the red and black wires. Connect the wires together (red to red and black to black) by soldering or twisting them (although this is not recommended). Cover the part where the wires connect with electrical tape by separating the two, that is, covering the two black wires and the two red wires separately. Once the red and black wires are separated, you can wrap the two wires in electrical tape to make only one wire.
Step 12. To charge the batteries, use your male - male cable, plug one side into the computer (or a USB adapter) and the other side into the charger port
The batteries should now take a few hours to charge.
Advice
You can find all the materials you need at very low prices on eBay or in an electronics store
Warnings
- Do not leave any device charging when you go out. You don't have to watch it like milk on the fire, but you should check it at least every two hours to be sure it isn't overheating.
- Do not leave it on charge for too long periods, for example overnight. 4 hours maximum.
- Do not keep or use it if it is very hot or very cold.
- If you are using a drill to make the hole in the Altoids box, watch out for sparks. If you see sparks, make sure there is no flammable material near you. Do not let the sparks touch you, your clothes or your hair. If you see very large sparks, watch them so they don't set something on fire. In this case, lower the speed of the drill.
- When charging the charger, be careful that the batteries do not get too hot. They can be hot, but if they get so hot that you can't touch them without getting burned, there's a problem. Dispose of the charger immediately if this happens.
- Do not put water on the charger, or expose it to fire, or to extremely hot or cold temperatures.
- The drill will leave a brown mark around the opening you made, produced by the heat from the sparks.
- A too powerful charger could heat the batteries and cause them to leak. As for the charger, consider: a computer USB port or a USB AC port with a voltage of 5 volts and a current of less than 1000 mA (1A), iPhone chargers, USB chargers of HTC and Kindle chargers. You can check your USB AC charger by looking at the writing on the back to be sure the current does not exceed 1000mA. It is recommended to use a 500mA charger. It is STRONGLY recommended to use a USB port from a computer.
- This technique may not charge iPods as well as other devices.
- Be aware that this involves risks, the authors of this article are not responsible for any damage you may cause to your devices.
