[geeks] Burned by bad batteries

[Rjtoegel]

I agree.  I've noticed that almost all alkaline batteries leak a small amount
of fluid, sometimes a small amount that will barely coat the contacts but will
either corrode or form a nonconductive layer that will make the battery appear
dead or weak.  Scraping or rubbing off that coating seems to bring it back to
life.  Really weird.

Bob

On Mar 6, 2014, at 10:00, hike <mh1272 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Even Duracells will leak if left for long periods of time in devices.  I
> have experienced this with the regular style (tube shaped) for Duracell,
> Everyready, RayVac batteries.  I never leave batteries in devices that I
> canbt check periodically.
>
>
> On Thu, Mar 6, 2014 at 3:18 AM, <microcode at zoho.com> wrote:
>
>> We talked about counterfit batteries recently. During one of my
>> unsuccessful
>> attempts to find real Duracells here (although my wife finally found some
>> at
>> a great price in shop near her office) I was told several times that "GP
is
>> the best" by people working in shops that didn't have what I asked for. It
>> is customary here for the guy working in a store to swear with all his
>> might
>> that whatever you want is not available at all- never heard of it, not
>> brought into the country, illegal to import, junk anyway, blah blah blah.
>> Then they will try to sell you junk that is worse than you can possibly
>> imagine while showering praise on it and swearing it is the best you can
>> get. Basically, being honest and telling the truth does not show up on
>> their
>> radar.
>>
>> This was getting old, so in the next place when I asked for Duracells and
>> got the answer that "GP is the best" I was heading for the door. The
>> impatient, irritated SOB called after me and said "I don't understand why
>> you play 20 questions and then don't buy anything!" as if I'm obligated to
>> buy dangerous, defective junk from people with attitude problems. Have a
>> nice day, bastard!
>>
>> I know from the rest of the crap they put out under that name that GP is
>> not
>> only not the best, but is right up there vying for the very worst. I was
>> unfortunate enough to have been burned by some of their other junk in the
>> past. Some years ago I bought 2 expensive floor fans that died after 3
>> months of usage. I went back to the store that sold them and the GP rep
>> took
>> the fans and promised to swap them out for replacements. I kept hearing
the
>> fans were on the way over to my house but he never replaced the fans. In a
>> weak moment my wife bought a multipack of GP AAAs to use in some digital
>> clocks. I thought I was careful to not put them in anything important, but
>> I
>> remembered wrong.
>>
>> I left two GP AAAs in an old mint-condition Palm Pilot and today it was
>> proven that it was a bad idea. One of them leaked all over the battery
>> compartment and out the battery door. I was able to clean up the visible
>> mess altough I didn't open the unit itself. I washed off the battery door
>> in soapy water. I cleaned up the battery compartment with what passes for
a
>> q-tip over here and then swabbed the compartment out with a chemical that
>> has proven ok to use for cleaning up used electronic gear housings.
>>
>> There is some damage to the plastic on the case and the door but at least
>> it
>> shouldn't get worse now. I'm disappointed because the old Palm was
pristine
>> before this. I'm sure some of you can relate.
>>
>> I don't anticipate that people elsewhere except perhaps in China would
ever
>> be afflicted by this brand but since it is now being sold on eBay I
thought
>> it would be nice to let you know what I found out, so you don't try to
save
>> money the hard way!
>>
>> --
>> I was a programmer in the 1970s and I still am.
>>        _                             _
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