Ultra capacitors

[mistercrash]

Has anyone ever heard of EEStor? They apparently make these ultra capacitors that could replace lead acid or Li Ion or whatever batteries are used in 1:1 electric vehicles. The capacitors are environment friendly, they are 1/10th the weight of lead acid batteries and are significantly smaller. I wonder if this could be the next big thing to hit the RC world in the near future. Ultra capacitors instead of batteries.

it makes sense...a capacitor and a battery perform similar things (release energy). We just need to get to a point where the ability to get a material to make capacitor out of that could store that amount of energy needed and make it small enough could eliminate the need for batteries...I love technology...:-)

[BrianG]

There is quite a bit of difference between caps and batteries. Batteries release energy through a chemical process, and the cells have a fairly constant voltage. While caps simply discharge via the built-up energy between their plates. A cap might be at X voltage, but as soon as you put a load on them, the voltage drops more and more until discharged.

Now, caps can be used in conjunction with batteries for best results. A suitable array of caps can be used to supply the burst currents that is pulled when accelerating and take-off. The batteries would see a more constant current load. This would reduce the need for such high C rate batteries.

I guess if you want to equate a cap as a battery, think of caps like low mAh, very high C rate cells...

[mistercrash]

Presently, this technology seems to be developed for the auto industry but if it can supply the voltage and amperage to move a small car to up to 80 mph and give that car an autonomy of 280 kilometers, maybe it could be produced in smaller size for our toys, tools and what not in a near future. Brian I'll take your word on what you explained because you are way more informed than me on this, what you said makes sense even for an ignorant dude like me
I posted this just to share what seems to be a break through (well, they seem confident to have something very interesting) in how energy might be stored and delivered in a near future. Here's another article I read on the subject.

http://cleantech.com/news/3174/eesto...itor-milestone

Originally Posted by BrianG

There is quite a bit of difference between caps and batteries. Batteries release energy through a chemical process, and the cells have a fairly constant voltage. While caps simply discharge via the built-up energy between their plates. A cap might be at X voltage, but as soon as you put a load on them, the voltage drops more and more until discharged.

Now, caps can be used in conjunction with batteries for best results. A suitable array of caps can be used to supply the burst currents that is pulled when accelerating and take-off. The batteries would see a more constant current load. This would reduce the need for such high C rate batteries.

I guess if you want to equate a cap as a battery, think of caps like low mAh, very high C rate cells...

could there be a type of regulator that would control the power from a capacitor to produce less voltage and more amperage? In some of my recent science books I have on Quantum Physics we are producing more things that are much smaller in size including a guitar that is the size of an atom that can actually play audible notes. I am especially interested in scientists coming up with new forms of power, I have been reading about atom colliders and the key seems to be is to keep making things smaller