EEVblog #98 - Microsoft InstaLoad Battery Technology - Patent Busting Time?

Microsoft's new Instaload battery technology allows batteries to be inserted into a product either way around.
Is it one of those brilliant "why didn't anyone think of that before" moments, or just another patent on a really obvious idea?
Is it workable in practice?
Can YOU bust the patent by finding prior art before 2006?

DOWNLOAD the full InstaLoad Patent HERE

You can get Dave's T-Shirt here:

[TheFreezeChill]

6 years later, haven't seen a product using this.

[BritishGamingNetwork]

2015. and nobody uses it. so much for a pointless patent lol.

[michaelhawthorne]

If I was designing a product were battery polarity was critical I would either have a series Diode to prevent reverse current flowing or place a bridge rectifier across the terminals so the battery can be inserted either way and the supply would still be polarity correct.

[ElGatoLoco]

I think I can solve the problem of people being conditioned to look for the positive and negative terminal.  Just go ahead and put a positive and negative indicator on the instaload.  That way if they look, they can find the indicator even though it's irrelevant.

[EEVblog]

@cumesoftware Yes, but it costs more and drops significant voltage. That can affect the product battery life significantly.

[kralg]

After almost 12 years it is safe to say that it was a fail. In addition to the issues you detail this technology would have required much tighter tolerances on battery sizes which alone is enough to make it fail. So these are the reasons why nobody patented it (except Microsoft...).

[Gigaguenther]

many batteries i've seen have a cap on the positive side that covers that whole end of the battery, so it's conductive up to the rim of the plastic label - in other words, the positive terminal is just as wide as the negative one and that must surely cause trouble in this design

[EEVblog]

@SciStarborne
Third person to ask about the T-Shirt. It's in the info text for the video.

[EEVblog]

@EEVblog
Fark! Why does Youtube change d-e-s-c-r-i-p-t-i-o-n to "deion"?

[DavidSprings]

How about some kind of latching relay that connects the battery to the circuit properly based on its polarity? Opening the battery cover would release and reset the relay. No voltage drop to diodes, no chance of fire.

[EEVblog]

@ZouloumOSX 0.3V per diode is still very significant!

[XtianApi]

I built a electronic cigarette power supply, called a "mod" in the vaporizer world. I use it to attach my resistance coil device, which vaporizes e liquid, which is glycerol and nicotine. There are many moders out there who build their own. I decided to use two washers on each side, with recessed center contacts, I also did it in a childs toy, which had a broken terminal. I never heard of this tech until today. When I did it, I also thought it wouldn't catch on for the reason you stated.

[nebulawars]

the nipper could push a switch to tell the direction of the battery. no need for two leads on either ends. no short out.

[JimTheZombieHunter]

I suppose it works great for single cell products anyway, but geez .. if they can't follow the battery insertion pictogram, are they still to be expected to read the other warning labels?

One of the "why wasn't this done before?" forehead slappers that I've run across is (auto) oil filters with a kind of grippy treatment (suspiciously looks like acrylic pickup bedliner) so they can easily be spun and removed by hand.

[thCstudio]

this would be good for loading batteries into belt packs of mikes. It would shorten the time it takes to load 20 or so G3's from 10-20min to about maybe 5min and not having to worry about replacing batteries in the dark; in one of the wings or back stage is another+. Although the older G1's use a 9V battery. so I wonder how it works for a 9V battery? + it costs about $60~100 in batteries to do 4 shows and 3 full rehearsals so how much extra would they all end up costing?

[syncmastern]

I did some thing like this in a collage project but i just used a regular battery holder and standard bridge rectifier.

[ZouloumOSX]

@EEVblog What about germanium diodes? its just a 0.3v drop

[andrewgc]

how are you suppose to have two batteries in series? like a torch

[EEVblog]

@TrueBlueAustralian
Read the video description.

[redtails]

well i can certainly see why you'd design this sort of thing.. though i'd probably not put it on the product. If I were the product designer, I'd just print the plus and minus on the case, and people will still insert it the way they're used to.. but the big difference is that if people mistakenly put it the wrong way around, they won't call technical support, nor will they break their product.

that's a win-win situation where people don't lose their decades of conditioning, while still decreasing product failure. And honestly, a product will need a polyfuse anyway, so you might as well use it to protect against battery short circuit