Have you ever been stuck for AAA batteries? You know those skinny kid brothers of the AA 1.5 volt you use in your mp3 player? No? Well, this guy obviously has. But, unbelievably what he wasn’t stuck for was a 9V battery and a pair of sharp-nosed pliers. So, with a handful of dead AAAs and no battery store for miles, he hacks open the 9 volter and pulls out six skinnier still unmarked batteries, which he refers to as quadruple A (AAAA) batteries.
9 Volt Battery Hack! You’ll Be Surprised… – video powered by Metacafe
Now, I’d come across AAAA batteries before in laser pointers and such but unfortunately the 9V I hacked open myself didn’t contain these things at all, it was layered like a car battery instead. But, let’s assume that at least the brand of battery he shows in the video, an Energizer, is composed of six AAAAs. Then his hack should work to replace those worn down triple As in your device. But, think about it, what device uses AAAs that you really, really couldn’t do without so much on a trip that you’d hack open a 9V Energizer for. More to the point if you don’t carry AAA spares for said device what are the chances that you’d have a 9V in your glovebox anyway? I half suspected this was yet another spoof like our old friend the sweet potato mp3 player, which we featured on Sciencebase a couple of weeks ago, but Wikipedia also claims that some brands of 9V batteries are comprised of 6 qud As. But, hey, why bother hacking a 9V battery, when you could just use a couple of yams instead?