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Why are people not using say a small one million volt step up transformers? the current demand would be so low in that system, I would stay away from low voltage systems and aim for larger pressure voltages.

Current = number (density) of ions transported, voltage = how fast they move, you want the most number of ions for the least frictional loss = heat, when you move something faster, guess what happens?

RW: great concept; you could use the silicone to attach instead of zip ties?
As for the materials, you need to check out the plates. I went to Walmart with the idea of everything from SS rulers to wire to cookware and discovered one thing in common with everything there: a magnet will readily stick to it. I suppose that's why it's so cheap; it has a lot of iron or nickel in it and/or is merely SS plated. I'm not entirely certain about using the ferrous material mixes in acid, but I recall some guys saying that the switchplates from Lowe's were not as good as Depot's. A magnet sticks to the Lowe's plates, but not to Depot's.

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BTW some method should be found of physically attaching it to the bottom of the container, or otherwise restraining it, otherwise it will tend to float/thrust it's way to the top of the electrolyte.

I'd say your straps going to the bolts thru the casing would do that...or put a rock on it. :)

Nickel mix SS should actually work very well. You need less volts to push the electrons out of the metal so you can have 8 or 9 plates instead of 6 or 7.

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Originally Posted by quadancer@bellsouth.net (Post 108303)

I went to Walmart with the idea of everything from SS rulers to wire to cookware and discovered one thing in common with everything there: a magnet will readily stick to it.

Heat treated SS is magnetic. In the annealed state it is non-magnetic.

Stainless steels are a very broad group of metals. The name was adopted as a generic term for steel alloys with a minimum of 10.5% chromium. The chromium gives the steel its 'stainless' properties - essentially corrosion resistance. On the surface of the metal, a very thin chromium-rich oxide layer is formed which is inert - i.e. it prevents the steel from rusting. The advantage of stainless steels over plated steels is that, if scratched or damaged, the steel will 'self-repair' as a new oxide layer is formed. In plated steels, scratches in the plate will often lead to corrosion of the steel underneath.

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Originally Posted by flapdoodle (Post 108309)

Heat treated SS is magnetic. In the annealed state it is non-magnetic.

Magnetic permeability is the ability of a material to carry magnetism, indicated by the degree to which it is attracted to a magnet. All stainless steels, with the exception of the austenitic group, are strongly attracted to a magnet.

All austenitic grades have very low magnetic permeabilities and hence show almost no response to a magnet when in the annealed condition; the situation is, however, far less clear when these steels have been cold worked by wire drawing, rolling or even centreless grinding, shot blasting or heavy polishing. After substantial cold working Grade 304 may exhibit quite strong response to a magnet, whereas Grades 310 and 316 will in most instances still be almost totally non-responsive.

The change in magnetic response is due to atomic lattice straining and formation of martensite. In general, the higher the nickel to chromium ratio the more stable is the austenitic structure and the less magnetic response that will be induced by cold work. Magnetic response can therefore be used as a method for sorting grades of stainless steel, but considerable caution needs to be exercised.

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Originally Posted by RoadWarrior (Post 107108)

Hi folks,

One of the things that bothers me about electrolysis cell efficiency in general is that you're dependant on the speed that the gas bubbles rise. It appears to me that the cell resistance rises as it waits for the bubbles to get the heck out of the way, making unnecessary heat... Agitation can be beneficial in helping bubbles to detach. Some commercial electro etching and plating setups have pumps to circulate the electrolyte, a nice idea, but makes things a little more complex.

So I spend a bit of time thinking about stuff like this, and a serendipitous solution presented itself the other day in the "everything for a dollar" store. I was looking for SS artifacts to press into service as plates, and noticed electric range/stove "reflectors" available for a buck a piece...These are shaped like a shallow bowl with a hole in the bottom.

So, imagine a stack of these "upside down" with the hole at the top, the bubbles will rise up the center where the hole is. Now here's the clever bit, because of the convex surface an aerodynamic effect will come into play similar to the Coanda effect, the electolyte will move up the center pumped by the bubbles, then will be drawn over the top plate making a lower pressure area over the curve, and inducing more flow in the center, which will be pulled through the plates. This should "self exite" quite strongly and create a toroidal (donut shaped) flow motion. Encouraging a little axial rotation would be good too, since then you would get a bubble vortex forming in the center, the heavier electrolyte thrown outward. This should also combat foaming problems that might happen in high output cells. The container ideally should have an inch or so clearance all round and maybe a baffle at the bottom, a rounded hump/shallow cone, and rounded corners to encourage the flow.

I am thinking that ziptie construction would work, with 3 zipties around each reflector, left loose enough so they can be pressed together with zipties around the whole assembly. The axial rotation could be set up by angling the spacing zipties a little. I'm thinking the "ends" of the ties should be brought out at the bottom, to allow smoothest flow at the top end.

Conceptually I see this as making a great amount of gas relative to plate area and current consumption and believe it may damp thermal runaway much more than in other designs. It may also be possible to run more plates, as near to the lower voltage limit as possible... you could tweak the voltage down until it was just forming bubbles slowly, and I suspect that as soon as those bubbles got moving, the whole thing would speed up and ramp gas production to remarkable levels.

Heat actually provides some of the energy in the process, so running hot isn't all bad, in fact the hotter they get the less power you need for given gas production. However, since you are typically not controlling power, you get into a thermal runaway problem. If this design limits heat production in the cell, then coupling it to waste engine heat will boost efficiency further.

BTW some method should be found of physically attaching it to the bottom of the container, or otherwise restraining it, otherwise it will tend to float/thrust it's way to the top of the electrolyte. Probably need to allow a reasonable depth of electrolyte over the top of this for it to work well.

This could be made a lot bigger, there's the smaller reflectors I was thinking of trying it with, then there's a larger size, and if you really want to go nuts, you could take a holesaw to the bottoms of SS mixing or salad bowls and make a huge beast.

I guess now I'm on the lookout for a good container to build it into...

Road Warrior

I know the guys over at HHO INFO would like to see your concept.