DH putting an old battery in something - it’s given me the rage!

[AFingerofFudge]

We have a big fairly modern looking clock in our kitchen. A couple of days ago it stopped and so DH put a new battery in it.
Last night it stopped working again and so this morning I spent about 20 minutes looking through old orders at the shop I got it from and going through emails to look for when I bought to see if it had a guarantee as it was expensive. I couldn’t find any record so I asked DH if he had bought it and could he look and he replied saying it just needed a battery change. I said but he had done that and that’s when I discovered he has a stash of old batteries that the rest of the family put in the battery recycling as he says he can’t believe they can be totally out of power and he had put one of these old batteries in!
For some reason it has really given me the rage, mostly because he stood his ground and said it was a completely reasonable thing to do. I told him he could have at least told me when I had thanked him but he just stood there gawping at me.
So tell me- AIBU for being pissed off?

It’s not a fundamentally unreasonable thing to do.

I can see where the rage came from though, if I thought it was a new battery and had gone that fast and spent time looking for the receipt I’d be irritated too. But it’s at the combination of circumstances rather than because reusing batteries it’s a fundamentally unreasonable thing to do.

It's not a terrible idea. Batteries can not hold enough power for some things but work fine for lower power items

It just happened to be that this one was pretty dead

Did he know you were spending hours digging around for the receipt? It sounds like he told you the first moment it was relevant

Batteries for our thermostat go into a wall clock when they’re ‘done’, they continue to work for weeks in the clock, it does depend on the power needed by the item.

That would pmo too, why put an old battery in so that you need to replace the battery again in a few days when it inevitably dies completely? Just do the job properly 😬😬

It gave you the rage? I can see his side to be fair. But your reaction is a bit strong for what is an essentially small everyday matter. Is there a back story? I can’t imagine this giving me the rage, but I guess we are all different.

I move batteries around too- usually from fairy lights into clocks as they have enough power for those but not the lights.
batteries are expensive and I don’t like waste

He's BU to try and suck an extra 10p worth of power out of a dead battery without letting you know. Mean as fuck.

I sometimes do this - some stuff needs lots of power so the batteries are too low for them but work in sonething else for a few weeks. It's just wasteful to get rid of perfectly usable stuff (the environment...).
I'd not do it secretly or have a quiet stash of half-used batteries, that's just wierd!

He should have told you. A battery tester is also a worthwhile investment. I got a cheap battery box from amazon that also had a tester.

But new batteries are wasted on things like clocks and remote controls if you have ones that are too weak to power higher demand items.

My granny used to reuse the ones from her radio in her clock.

We use the ones from the cat flaps in similar ways. Saves wasted resources and money.

This would piss me off too, OP, so I get the rage 😁

It's just the inefficiency of it.

Other people are right though and dead batteries do still often have power in them.

My dad used to have a device that checked the remaining power in batteries. It was one of my favourite childhood past times, checking the remaining battery power of dead batteries. Get him one for Christmas 😉

Plenty of people do this I have a box full of random batteries taken out of various things

you don’t need a penis to change a battery you could of done it yourself bin the first place

Yep that would piss me off too. I cannot be doing with dicking around doing shit like that. Once they are dead they are binned.

My husband has a battery tester and insists on checking every used battery ! It's dead, get over it for God's sake.

He’s right but he should’ve told you. Things like clocks can run for several weeks on batteries that wouldn’t have enough power for other things so he’s actually being quite sensible.

How do people like you cope when something actually stressful happen? How this raised any feeling I have no idea, never mind one of “rage”

You sound dramatic, unreasonable, and unable to control your emotions

its a Battery, in some shop bought clock, that you’ll chuck out in a few years

Agree with previous poster. Its a massive overreaction.

He wasn’t unreasonable, it’s not a bad idea, but he should have told you, or at least apologised when you wasted so much time. Presumably there was other things you could have been doing that would have been a better use of your time, which is why you are annoyed, rather than that as an isolated incident

Sometimes a "dead battery" can power a clock for months... its saving waste and environmentally conscious

Thanks for the replies- there is definitely a mix of opinions.
For the people who are concerned about my “over reaction” by getting the rage- I’m a long term Mumsnetter and having the rage at something is often used for very trivial situations (correct me if I’m wrong, it’s what I understood!)

They're not always, though. You can take "dead" batteries out of lights and use them to power clocks or remotes for weeks.

I was just reading through thinking that I probably wouldn't have noticed the clock had stopped. Put batteries on list, remember 6 months later...

It wouldn't register on my stress level. Still, we're clearly all different.

What's the point of putting a dying battery in a clock? You need to rely on a clock, not expect it to start fucking up in "weeks".

Absolutely. What powers granddaughter's Barbie piano keyboard for a couple of months, powers the TV remote for years.

I got used to raiding the toys nearly 30 years ago when son was born 🤣

Do you rely on a battery operated clock in 2025?

YADNBU! My dh also has a battery tester and keeps any battery with a flicker of life in it. We have a stack just sitting dustily on a shelf somewhere. Yesterday I went into the tool box and found about another 50!

Absolutely RAGE inducing, you are not alone OP.