Batteries store electric power and allow many devices to run. Batteries work through a chemical reaction that makes electrons move. Learn how to make your own battery by using basic household materials such as lemons, old pennies, and nails. Watch your battery make a light bulb glow!

From one of the most popular project channels on YouTube comes a how-to book on building things that go boom. Grant Thompson, "The King of Random," has created one of the most popular project channels on YouTube, featuring awesome videos such as How to Make a Laser Assisted Blowgun and Assassin’s Micro Crossbow. He currently has almost 10 million subscribers, posts 5 times a week, and averages over 40 million views a month. Partnering with Grant is Ted Slampyak, the artist behind the #1 New York Times bestseller 100 Deadly Skills. 52 Random Weekend Projects: For Budding Inventors and Backyard Builders is a guide that enables ordinary folks to build an impressive arsenal of projects. These crafts combine some of Grant’s most popular projects—Matchbox Rockets, Pocket Slingshot Super Shooters, Proto-Putty, Ninja Balls, Mini Matchstick Guns, The Clothespin Pocket Pistol—with many new ones, providing clear instructions on how to build them step-by-step. Broken down into Beginner, Intermediate, and Advanced sections, 52 Random Weekend Projects is loaded with truly amazing projects, including: - Mousetrap Handgun - Mini Solar Scorcher - Air Vortex Canon - Air Mounted Skewer Shooter - Paracord Bullwhip - Bottle Cap Party Whistle - Ninja Stress Balls - Tablecloth Parachute - Skyblaster Slingshot And many more!

"Gather a few supplies and follow the simple steps to power a light with this fun science experiment!"--

What are the main parts of a battery?All batteries contain one or more cells, but people often use the terms battery and cell interchangeably.A cell is just the working chemical unit inside a battery; one battery can contain any number of cells. A cell has three main parts: a positive electrode (terminal), a negative electrode, and a liquid or solid separating them called the electrolyte. When a battery is connected to an electric circuit, a chemical reaction takes place in the electrolyte causing ions (in this case, atoms with a positive electrical charge) to flow through it one way, with electrons (particles with a negative charge) flowing through the outer circuit in the other direction. This movement of electric charge makes an electric current flow through the cell and through the circuit it is connected to. That's the theory anyway. Now let's look at it in practice. How does a battery really work?Where does the power in a battery actually come from? Let's take a closer look!Here's my battery hooked up to a flashlight bulb to make a simple circuit. I'veunwrapped a paperclip to make a piece of connecting wire and I'm holdingthat between the bottom of the battery and the side of the bulb. If you lookclosely, you can see the bulb is shining. That's because electrons are marching through it!Anode and cathode?Now here's what's going on inside. The battery's positive terminal (shown just above my left thumb in the photo and colored red in the artwork below) is connected to a positive electrode that's mostly hidden inside the battery. We call this the cathode. The outer case and the bottom of the battery make up the negative terminal, or negative electrode, which is also called the anodeand colored green in the artwork. The paperclip wire is represented in the art by the blue line.Let's quickly clear up one point of confusion. At school, you may have learned that the cathode is the negative electrode and the anode thepositive electrode? However, that applies only to electrolysis (passing electricity through a chemical to split it up). Batteries are like electrolysis going backwards (they split up chemicals to makeelectricity) so the terms anode and cathode are switched around. Okay?To avoid confusion, I suggest it's best not to use the terms anode and cathode at all. It's better to say positive terminal and negative terminaland then it's always clear what you mean, whether you're talking about batteries or electrolysis.Chemical reactionsNow back to our battery. The positive and negative electrodes are separated by the chemical electrolyte. It can be a liquid, but in an ordinary battery it is more likely to be a dry powder.When you connect the battery to a lamp and switch on, chemical reactions start happening. One of the reactions generates positive ions (shown here as big yellow blobs) and electrons (smaller brown blobs) at the negative electrode. The positive ions flow through the electrolyte to the positive electrode (from the green line to the red one). Meanwhile, the electrons (smaller brown blobs) flow around the outside circuit (blue line) to the positive electrode and make the lamp light up on the way.The electrons and ions flow because of the chemical reactions happening inside the battery—usually two or three of them going on simultaneously. The exact reactions depend on the materials from which the electrodes and electrolyte are made, and we won't go into them here. (If you want to know what they are, Google the type of the battery you're interested in followed bythe words "anode cathode reactions". For example, Google "zinc carbon battery anode cathode reactions".) Whatever chemical reactions take place,the general principle of electrons going around the outer circuit and ions flowing in the opposite direction through the electrolyte happens in all batteries. As the battery generates power, the chemicals inside it are gradually converted into different chemicals.

The ultimate collection of DIY activities to do with your kids to teach STEM basics and beyond, from a wildly popular online dad. With more than 3 million fans, TheDadLab has become an online sensation, with weekly videos of fun and easy science experiments that parents can do with their kids. These simple projects use materials found around the house, making it easier than ever for busy moms and dads to not only spend more quality time with their children but also get them interested in science and technology. In this mind-blowing book, Sergei Urban takes the challenge off-screen with fifty step-by-step projects, including some that he has never shared online before. Each activity will go beyond the videos, featuring detailed explanations to simplify scientific concepts for parents and help answer the hows and whys of their curious children. Learn how to: explore new fun ways to paint; make slime with only two ingredients; defy gravity with a ping-pong ball; produce your own electricity, and more! With TheDadLab, parents everywhere will have an easy solution to the dreaded "I'm bored" complaint right at their fingertips!

Gloria Gaither and Shirley Dobson team to help families create a bank of happy memories, a shared heritage that will bind families together over the years. The book contains a wealth of ideas for holidays, special occasions, vacations, and impromptu activities.

This book teaches readers how to put a working system together by showing them the equipment available to them, and what it can do. Readers will learn how to create video products using the computer as an editing tool, and how to refine sound and combine graphics with video. Information on web distribution is included. With the advent of the new digital camcorders developed by Panasonic and Sony in the new DV format, professional quality video is available in consumer-level equipment. At the same time, digital editing is now available for the PC using video capture cards in the $500-$1,000 price range, and digital editing software in the $800-$1,200 range, such as Adobe Premiere. This combination enables users such as the sophisticated amateur video maker, the wedding or business presentation video maker, and people working in multimedia for educational, training, or other presentation purposes, to edit their own work and turn out competent professional-quality video.

Artwork that moves and glows and turns on and off. Make one for yourself and one to give as a gift. The possibilities are endless when you're making artwork with circuits. Learn about what a circuit is by creating your own. Each project contains a list of easy-to-find supplies and step-by-step instructions.

Examines impact of National Bureau of Standards testing practices on efforts by Pioneers, Inc. to market AD-X2, an additive claimed to extend electrical battery life.