A battery at the University of Oxford has been incessantly ringing two bells for 175 years—but no one knows exactly why it’s lasted so long.
The “world’s most durable battery” has been continuously functioning since 1840 – and no one knows why this mysterious battery, commonly referred to as the Oxford Electric Bell, has lasted s long.
It all begins at the London-based instrument-manufacturing firm Watkins and Hill, where the battery was manufactured with dry piles – one of the first forms of electric batteries developed by Giuseppe Zamboni in the early 19th century.
In the mid-1800s, a physics professor got his hands on the mysterious device and its bells have been incessantly ringing every since.
This from Smithsonian:
In the mid-1800s, Robert Walker, a physics professor at the University of Oxford, acquired an interesting device. It was a battery designed to propel a hanging metal ball quickly back and forth, between two small bells. Today, 175 years after it was manufactured, the Oxford Electric Bell, as it is often referred to, is still ringing – in fact, it is said to have rung over 10 billion times.
No one knows why the battery has lasted for such a long time, but we’re not about to find out. Scientists believe that if the device is opened to conduct experiments, it could be destroyed. For now, we’ll just have to marvel at the mysteries of science.
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