At 18:51 4/3/2000, BRENT CHRISTENSEN wrote: >My impression has been that when running the charge gets "soaked up" >(excuse my use of layman's terms) by the battery that needs it (i.e. has >the lowest voltage). Is this not the case? Pretty close. Since the batteries are connected in parallel they will always have very nearly the same voltage, which in this case will be the charging voltage; but more current goes to the one with lower charge as its internal resistance (for charging, not discharging) is lower. > My limited experience with electrical issues has been that in most > cases electricity behaves just like water, and will follow the path of > least resistance, Like water it will follow all paths that do not have infinite resistance, but the amount is inversely proportional to the resistance. > as well as flowing into the "most empty bucket" Yes, if you stipulate that the emptiness of the bucket is represented by the EMF (electromotive force, i.e. voltage) exerted by the electrons trying to escape from the bucket. An emptier bucket has proportionately less voltage opposing current flow into it, and will accept proportionately more charging current. This is a very simple electrical equation if the bucket is a capacitor; if it's a battery the energy storage is by means of an electrochemical reaction and explaining it gets a lot more complicated. Note that once you remove the charging current, if you leave the batteries connected together the one with higher voltage will feed the other until they are equal -- that's why you don't parallel an old and a new battery, or a large and a small one, except for charging purposes. :) david David Beierl - Providence, RI http://pws.prserv.net/synergy/Vanagon/ '84 Westy "Dutiful Passage" '85 GL "Poor Relation" |
Please note - During the past 17 years of operation, several gigabytes of
Vanagon mail messages have been archived. Searching the entire collection
will take up to five minutes to complete. Please be patient!
Return to the archives @ gerry.vanagon.com
The vanagon mailing list archives are copyright (c) 1994-2011, and may not be reproduced without the express written permission of the list administrators. Posting messages to this mailing list grants a license to the mailing list administrators to reproduce the message in a compilation, either printed or electronic. All compilations will be not-for-profit, with any excess proceeds going to the Vanagon mailing list.
Any profits from list compilations go exclusively towards the management and operation of the Vanagon mailing list and vanagon mailing list web site.