Lemon battery is one of the common projects that are undertaken in most science books. However, it is not easy to successfully create the lemon battery. Thus, the aim of this paper is to create a lemon battery that uses four lemons, LED, zinc screws, copper coins, alligator clips and connectors. Normal batteries usually consist of two different metals that are suspended in acidic solution. Thus, in the case of the lemon battery, the copper and zinc will act has the metals while the citric acid in the lemon will be the acidic base.
The voltage that is associated with the lemon is usually small and is not able to energize bulbs or run a motor. However, the voltage that is produced can produce a dim glow when used with a LED (Pilger 12). Creating the lemon battery The lemon is cut and the copper coins are inserted on one side of lemon. On the other side of the lemon, a screw is screwed into the lemon. The screw and the coin should not touch each other. As shown below (Fig 1):
The zinc screw and the copper coin are called the electrodes, which form the terminals of the single cell while the electrolyte is the lemon juice. The zinc and copper form the “+” positive and “-” negative terminals of the lemon battery. The electric current is the movement of the atomic particles that are called electrons through good conductors of electricity from the “-” electrode to the “+” electrode of the lemon battery. In most case, a single lemon can produce 0. 906 volts (Pilger 13).
In the case of this project, four lemons are used and are able to produce about 3. 5 volts. The four lemons are connected with wires that go from “+” to “-” on each of the lemon battery. The LED has positive and negative terminals that have to be connected in the same case has the terminals of the lemon (Pilger 13). The figure below shows the connection of four lemon batteries with the LED. (This is a sketch of the four lemons forming a battery. The alligator clips are used to connect the connectors to the terminals of the coins, screws and LED).
The screws are the negative terminals “-” in which is the origin of the electrons and moves through the LED (glows) and back to the positive terminal “+” coin. Hence, forming a complete electronic circuit. The quality of the battery lemon can be improved through the improvement of the terminals. In most cases, the coins are usually not pure copper and can be replaced by common house wires, which will improve its quality.
Reference Pilger, M. A. (2005). Science Experiments Index for Young People, 4th Ed. New York: Libraries Unlimited Publishers.