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Etymon
Advanced Member
United States
2393 Posts |
 Posted - 11 November 2009 : 05:17:03
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We've been cooking through the batteries for our baby swing, crib mobile, and a couple other devices. Some of those devices are power consumers, big time!
As a thought for anyone who uses items that are generally stationary yet powered solely by batteries ... why not go electric as well?
I soldered a jack into each of our devices. Then I plugged in a DC output transformer into each jack. This way our devices are still portable and can use batteries, yet, when electricity is available, we can save on battery life as well.
We've probably saved $50 USD in batteries these past 10 weeks with certain savings continuing.
I bought the transformers, jacks, soldering iron, solder, etc. on sale from a Radio Shack store that was going out of business. I guess I have about $12 towards hardware (transformer, jack, wire, and solder) into converting each device. That's a little less than the cost of two sets of batteries.
Just a note on what kind of power supply to purchase. I've had better success with the 1A power supplies. The 300 mA supply is not quite enough if you have a device with lights, sound, and motion. I used a 1300 mA for our 6 speed swing. And the transformer runs cool. My other devices are timed like the mobile in the crib. I still had to use a 1 A supply just to get them to come to speed. Otherwise, they hesitated.
Have fun!
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Batteries and babies
