Filed under: Humor, iPod Family, Video, How-tos, Tips and tricks, Odds and ends
Charge an iPod with an onion
I think we somehow missed this at TUAW, but I have no idea how. Just in time for everyone to head home for the holidays (and forget their iPod chargers), here's a quick fix solution to get that battery back up and you back listening to The Cars' Greatest Hits. Household Hacker put this together, and unfortunately they say on the same page that you should not attempt this at home if you're not an expert, but all of you TUAW-reading iPod owners out there are experts, right? If you do try this, don't hurt yourselves or your iPods.
How does it work? Beats us-- the electrolytes in the Gatorade might be breaking down the individual cells of the onion, and releasing excess energy as electricity of some kind, but obviously that's just a guess based on my many years of watching Bill Nye, Beakman's World, and more recently, Mythbusters (pop science for the win!).
There is one major problem with this plan, however, and that is that as of right now, onions do not properly install updated firmware for any iPods of any generation. Hopefully, Apple will fix this oversight in the next Software Update.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
fitzhume said 10:15PM on 11-14-2007
I docked my iPod into a watermelon thinking the extra size would charge it faster, but now my iPod is full of watermelon seeds and won't boot up!
Thanks a lot TUAW. >:(
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scb said 10:21PM on 11-14-2007
I think what's happening here is that the USB plug is being consumed to power the iPod. The plug looks like it has gold contacts on the inside and maybe stainless steel contacts on the outside. The onion is probably acidic enough to overcome the corrosion barrier on the stainless steel and the iron just corrodes, generating electrons that are consumed by oxygen reduction on the gold. But first those electrons go through the iPod. Cool idea.
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Aaron Gyes said 10:22PM on 11-14-2007
Pretty sure this is fake. Why on earth would an electrolytic solution help? And just stuffing a USB with the positive and negative contacts a couple mm apart shouldn't make a circuit even if this pretend chemistry did work.
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geochick said 10:38PM on 11-14-2007
Ha pretty funny... ! I liked the serious tone of the guy in the video.
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Art said 10:40PM on 11-14-2007
Uhm, please note the odd "notebook" sitting underneath the iPod, and the cable perfectly curled 2 times ( or at least it seems ) underneath the iPod.
There is no electricity coming from that onion, the cable underneath the iPod is connected to power.
Move along, nothing to see here.
-Art
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tycho said 10:40PM on 11-14-2007
Definitely fake - have you seen the other entries on their website? "Power any TV with a AAA battery"? Well I guess it's their 15 minutes of fame at least.
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Hubby said 10:46PM on 11-14-2007
An onion, an iPod and a can of Red Bull - Will it blend?
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Spencer said 11:25PM on 11-14-2007
Um, this is possible, most everyone has seen the old 'potato power' experiment where a potato generates electricity for a light.
Organisms actually create ion gradients which gives the cell a charge. In humans the ions Sodium (Na) and Potassium (K) are pumped through an antiport to create the gradient. Plant cells have a similar process.
If one were to look at he process of a galvanic cell (lets say liquid state batteries) one would notice that the membrane of a cell acts as a the semi permiable membrane. The electrolytes (ions in solution) will saturate the cells, greatly icreasing the number of ions in the cells, and thus storing more of a charge in them.
I don't know much about electronics, so the way a USB port works is beyond me. But that's cell biology and a bit of chemistry from my notes.
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Danny Zumwalt said 11:46PM on 11-14-2007
This is not fake guys. We used to do this kind of thing in middle school science class (not with iPods of course). if you don't believe it but don't want to juice up your only iPod USB cable, just stick a couple of probes hooked up to a voltmeter in your electrolyted-up onion. :)
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Marcus Farnsworth said 11:46PM on 11-14-2007
Spencer is on the right track. The main source of potassium in here is monopotassium phosphate (KH2PO4), a soluble salt and an ingredient in Gatorade. Of course, if we were only using the KH2PO4 in Gatorade, it would be the drink powering the iPod, right?
Obviously, we're talking about the onion charging it. Onions coincidentally contain a lot of potassium metaphosphate (KPO3), which, when combined with all the water soaked up from the Gatorade, is used to produce even more KH2PO4!
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Aaron Gyes said 11:49PM on 11-14-2007
Try plugging a USB cable into your potato experiment. It won't work. You usually need the terminals a few inches apart
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Dean Baird said 12:16AM on 11-15-2007
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. These guys are preying on your recollections of potato batteries. No dice. No dissimilar metals in the USB terminals. A simple battery requires two metals with different electronegativities to work. You can use a lot of things for the electrolytes: potatoes, bananas, onions, oranges, lemons... Like Art mentioned, check the non-accidental coiling of the USB cord. Hmmm, how odd that we can't see part of the cord. Well, I mean cord*s*.
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Znapel said 12:22AM on 11-15-2007
Brawndo's got what plants crave...
Yeah, it's got electrolytes...
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Gidgidonihah said 12:46AM on 11-15-2007
No, see if you want to upgrade the firmware, you have to use an apple to do it, not an onion. Preferably Granny Smith.
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blufire said 12:54AM on 11-15-2007
If you look at the rest of the videos on the site, they're all completely bogus. So even if you're unsure of this one, rest assured that it's bogus because the rest are.
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Jose said 1:36PM on 11-19-2007
Is it a 5G iPod running the new Operating System? Or should I sleep more than 8 hrs a day?
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martin said 4:22AM on 11-15-2007
vegetables and fruit can generate electricity, but this is a joke.
to make it work u can't just plug in the cable, u have to separate the + and -
and, u need electrodes made of two different metals, like coper and zinc.
see http://bizarrelabs.com/lemon.htm
(or google lemon electricity copper zinc)
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John Bailey (BDog) said 8:34AM on 11-15-2007
Casino Vs. Japan, yea baby!
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krye said 10:17AM on 11-15-2007
Bogus. Even if there was a charge from the onion, you'd create a dead short by plugging the USB cable into it.
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anthony said 10:49AM on 11-15-2007
OK, so when did Apple release new firmware for the 5.5 gen iPod?! I WANT IT!
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