Liquid Batteries

by Ryan

My topic of my investigation is liquid and fruit batteries, I chose this topic because I did not know what to do for KIC and a friend of mine was not happy because he had no partner to help him. When I asked if I could help, he said sure. That is how I found this topic.

The question I tried to answer is, how do you make a liquid and fruit battery? I thought of this question because if you didn't have to pay money for battery to get something to work, it would be less expensive. That is how I thought of this question.

Batteries are a combination of 2 or more cells of electricity connected to produce electric energy. John F. Daniel made the first reliable battery. That was called the Daniel cell.

We first tried a fruit battery. We took an apple, a light bulb, and a light bulb holder and wires. Then we hooked wires to the apple, with the other part of the wire to the holder. Then we checked the light bulb to see if it would light. It didn't.

We tried to make a liquid battery. First we got a cup and put salt water in it. Then we hooked two wires to foil. We stuck the foil in the cup of salt water. Then the other part of the wires to the light bulb. For some reason the bulb did not light. Then we found out that we needed zinc and copper strips. We did not have any so we tried different

experiments. Our teacher, Mr. Pearce, found an electric siren. When you and someone else each touch a button with the finger on one hand, and touch the remaining hands together, the siren will go off. That is called a closed circuit.

Our new question is, is it possible to make a conductor? We gathered some facts. A conductor is any material that conducts heat or electricity. A good conductor has a high electrical or heat conductivily, such as a metal. A poor conductor, such as non-metal glass, has few free electrons.

We learned that you need zinc and copper strips to make a liquid and fruit battery. Also we learned how to make a conductor by using people. We learned that the two experiments that had to do with batteries did not work.

Other things students could try next year with my topic is to see if they could make their own liquid or fruit batteries. You rnighl want to see if you use zinc and copper if the light bulb would light. You could also find out if you could make a llashlight out of fruit and if had a powerful light. Those are just some suggestions.

Bibliography

Persons, Alexandra, 1995, Make it Work Electricity. New York, NY: Scholastic Inc.

2. Robinson, Pam. 1993. Electricity. New York, NY: Aladdin Books Ltd.

3. Shipton, Paul. 1992. Science With Batteries. London, England: Usborne.

4. Websters Concise Encyclopedia. Attica Cybernetics Ltd. Helicon Publishing Ltd. 1994.