LED Project Design Guide - Batteries

Power Supply, Batteries:

A lot to cover, batteries can make a project more complex. Need more info and references.

https://oscarliang.com/lipo-battery-guide/

Voltage: Batteries are never a stable or consistent voltage. A single lithium cell can range from 3v to 4.2v  during its runtime. Most LEDs, even 5 volt pixels, can be powered from a single lithium, but below 3.2v battery voltage the blue LEDs will no longer light up.

Amperage: Batteries are rated in mAH, a higher value will produce a longer runtime. Batteries have limits on how much current they can provide to the circuit at any given time. If they are over drawn, the voltage can drop significantly and the battery can heat up. Check the batteries specification sheet for discharge curves.

Voltage Step-Up: A common solution to achieve a stable 5(or higher) voltage from batteries with a lower working voltage. These can get very complicated, and not all will work as intended or specified. There are many types of step ups, some work better than others for projects. Look online for other tutorials, but in general, many of the common/cheap Chinese step up modules will work, but expect to not be able to utilize their full output current rating. Anyone have links to good step up info?

Protection: Applies to all batteries, but lithium based ones especially. Protection can be features like: under voltage, over voltage, over discharge, over heat, short circuit detection. Typically the protection will turn off the current flow from the battery until the fault condition is removed. One of the most important things to watch for with lithiums is under voltage discharge. Summed up, if a lithium battery drops below a certain voltage, it will never be able to be fully charged again and should be replaced. There are some rare circumstances where they can't be used but almost all cases should use what are called 'protected lithium batteries'. Check online elsewhere for more info and details.

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