Battery powered empeg

Ok, more whack-ass ideas from me stemming from a thread in For Sale:

Check this item on EBay. A super old school pull out radio that had batteries in it so it could keep working after you gank it.

So, what better to do with that spare 2.5" slot on the empeg, but retrofit a laptop battery in there. Maybe it could charge when the empeg was in the car or powered by AC. Then, it would kick in when the unit was unpowered. Hijack could have an entry for @battery (or however it does the differentiation between home and car).

But, I know nothing about current. Can a laptop battery power an empeg? And can a laptop battery accept charge from the car or ac adapter?

And we could make a cool holder for the battery. Like, a bracket with four holes for the hdd mount. Then, it'd need a wiring harness to patch into the empeg wiring system (which i know nothing about because i've never opened my empeg).

But, this thing would solve some people's desire for a portable empeg. Hm... too bad I couldn't hack this thing up and shoot it out to market. It'd be the money making scheme numbah 1!!

It looks to me as if that stereo you linked has a built in speaker, which would make it a good deal more useful than a battery powered empeg...

But some kind of dual-RCA-to-1/8"-jack converter for the outputs might be nice. Toss in some simple kind of amp (between the RCA's and 1/8" on the converter) that could run off the battery and, well, it's THA BUSINESS.

Don't see why you couldn't. You'll have to work out a way of charging it however. It's non trivial to charge newer batteries.

The Li-Ion batteries in my Dell are rated at 14.8V @ 3800mAh so you should be able to get a few hours out of each battery at least. It's nearly 4x the size of a laptop drive however so finding a battery small enough but also with a large enough capacity for it to be useful will be the hard part.

- Trevor

What you would need to handle the charging would be best suited for an IC such as this one. You could make up a small charging circuit around it and feed it to a hi cap Li-Ion battery pack (probably not a notebook pack though). Also, probably not for the non-electronically inclined.

What might work better than a notebook battery would be to series some PDA Li-Ion packs. I don't know what their nominal voltage is, but assuming it's 3.6 volts, you could series 4 of them and get 14.4 volts at ~1400 mah. I don't know what the average power consumption of the Empeg is, but you should be able to get at least 3 hours out of this setup, I would think.

Stu

Wow, I have to research this. Too bad my EE friends aren't around anymore. Hm..... Thanks for the info. Gotta get the creative juices flowing.

It looks to me as if that stereo you linked has a built in speaker, which would make it a good deal more useful than a battery powered empeg...

Yes, but dead handy if you want to use your Empeg with mini headphones on a train or plane: You only have to stick them on the line out and switch off the display.

Hmm. This idea interests me.

Wow, I have to research this. Too bad my EE friends aren't around anymore.

I'm sure there are plenty of EE types on the BBS that would help you if you decide to try to get this project going on your own. Let me know if you need any additional assitance with it. I'm not an EE either, but I play one on the computer.

Stu

You can get 12v 7A hour batteries at BG Micro for $15, get a cheap battery-less UPS on Ebay or somewhere for a charger. Use the UPS to charge them up take the battery out and wire it to your empeg and your ready to go for 7 hours. Problem is these batteries weigh 6 pounds.... A battery backpack my be in order

You can get 12v 7A hour batteries at BG Micro for $15, get a cheap battery-less UPS on Ebay or somewhere for a charger.

And all that's going to fit in the spare drive bay? Somehow I doubt it. Li-Ion is preferable, because of weight and energy density. But then you have to have special charging circuits for them. Still, it's probably the only workable solution in battery chemistry.

Stu

Right, and now we'll need the circuitry. Something to splice into the power input from the car or ac and convert it into a signal suitable for the battery. Then, we'll need circuitry to power the empeg from the battery. And, then, where will we fit it in the case? Seems like there is some room in there, but I still haven't opened mine yet.

So, it's an idea... And I'm too tired to persue it right now.

Well since I carry my empeg in a pelican case I think my best bet for battery powered empeg is a sealed lead-acid battery. For 11.99 you can get a 12 volt 4Ah battery from batteries.com. Im pretty sure these dont need any special charging circuit I could be wrong though.

Relatedly, I've just recently been pondering turning a pelican case into an empeg Jambox: empeg docking bay + either small car amp and speakers or computer speakers (with built-in amps) + mounted 12V power supply + some aux-in ports... maybe make the ethernet port accessible... add a cigarette lighter adapter and small FM broadcast unit for when you're roadtripping with friends... hrm... I think the trick is going to be managing to do all this in anything close to a small footprint...

--paulj

MkII in a 2002 Honda Insight
Austin, TX

This was our attempt. We weren't really trying to keep it tiny though, just managable.

Ive been wondering about taking a old boombox and adding a sled to the case, wiring the left and right output to the existing board and using one of those cordless drill batteries (or use a laptop battery...) for power.

You could add a switch that when the battery is not in the boombox then you could use the AC cord...

Now that would be neat.

Ooh, that's a neat idea. Why not make that a new thread in Projects. Haha, for us fruiftull minds, we need a Forum called "Hypothetical Projects".