Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
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Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.
Posted because I didn't see Zorba post one today. Feel free to delete if that's an issue.
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Notes -
Do charging systems have a limit in how much they can charge certain devices?
I have a weak charger and I left it charging a phone over night and it is still only at 66%. I vaguely remember seeing some solar panels that claimed the same thing -- they could only charge a device to X percent full.
I figured it would just take a long time but eventually get full, but is there some equivalent to "water pressure" where it takes more work to get that last 10% in?
A phone drawing max power uses more than a low power charger can provide, so perhaps your phone was drawing almost exactly as much as the charger. Another possibility is that if the battery in the phone is old, it might never get to full charge. But in general I'd expect to get to 100% eventually on most phones even with a minimum power charger. The technical details of battery charging are really complicated and vary by battery chemistry, but unless you're building a project with bare li-ion cells, the rechargeable batteries in things like your phone are paired with a charge controller whose job it is to do the right thing given a steady 5 volts from the USB port.
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This is basically correct. Same reason that quick charge batteries in phones can charge the 1st 60% in like 15 minutes but the remaining 40% take hours. To charge the battery, you need a voltage difference between the charge source and the battery, and that difference gets smaller the more the battery gets charged.
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