washers

[crb]

Bob, Have you considered making your own washers?
My next experiment will be trying to cut them out on my milling/
lathe.  4" sounds like about the right size.

Randy, do you have your round plates laying flat or on end?
crb

[randy]

Hey, 4" are fine but finding a container for them is a mission, my cell sits at about 45 deg in truck, that way the gas escapes quickly.

[Weapon_R]

Randy you stated that the cell runs cool. How much water is contained in the cell and how often do you top up?
Have you tried neutral plates with your cell?

[randy]

the cell is mounted low behind the front bumper, there's a reservoir mounted inside the front bumper, then there's a large bubbler mounted behind the grille, holds just shy of a gallon of electrolyte. I've tried neutrals on the original build MK1, I used -n+n-n+n etc. configuration, got inconsistent results??, but I only want to use k-aid for electrolyte.

[Bob]

so your "Neutral Plate washer cell" used 8 washers in that config eh? any idea of the output it
put out ?
...
I am wondering how well a 6 washer cell like that would work with the configuration of... -nnnn+
because it would be really easy to build, all you'd need is vinyl hose to cover the threaded rod
and insulating spacers between the plates for gap....and then just "POWER" the 2 end plates.
if the output would be the same as the "Randy cell" it would be far easier to make than the other kind
... but that's the problem... almost any other configuration lacks the LPM output of the "Randy Cell"
...perhaps that is just because of the lack of Cell-Tuning being done on the other configurations
 I know it is in my case...<BLUSH> I haven't even tried to operate the "Wall switch plate cover cell"
with ONE less plate yet... and I Know in my gutts that that may well be all it takes to make it a good producing cell.... just can't get back to it ! LOL
....
Bob...

[randy]

no, I used 11 washers, that's what the etc. was for,lol, tried the -nnnn+nnnn- didn't do squat, but that was with k-aid, might work well with koh.

[Bob]

Ahhh ok well information on BAD PRODUCTION is valuable too !  what not to do is IMPORTANT so we don't waste our time ! HAHAHAHAHHA
...
11 washers ... and it did lousy
....
A real good earmark for Neutral plate cells I know is High quality Stainless steel... if the washers are at ALL magnetic they probably arn't good enough for neutral plate use...
that may well have been the problem
...
I remember reading somewhere about a fell'as experiments in cell design he went with Dry cells every time, but found that only non magnetic stainless steel was suitable for neutral plates.... where just about ANY stainless steel can be used for parallel plate hookup...
... another thing I learned from him was using normal female "Blade type" connectors on tabs he made in the plate, worked great, even fed with #10 gauge wire because of all the connections that exhist in the cell... he had a fairly long cell with what must have been at least 15 plates in it, all wired in parallel, each plate had a tab cut into it and he just pluged the wire into the plate...
he was quite pleased with the output.
....
 he could wire the cell that way because it was a "DRY cell" and although his plates were "Special made for him" it wouldn't be beyond anyone to simply cut some slots in the plates and off set every other plate to give plenty of clearance.
...all the plates could be exact copies of each other, including the holes,just have them slightly off center, then when you flip the plates they would stack up nicely
...he talked about 4.5LPM at 50amps running KOH and a PWM....
and that's not too darn bad at all for 4.5LPM
sure 3 "Randy cells" will beat it easily at 6LPM at 60amps....but being that close to a 10:1 Ratio with a DRY CELL... made me sit up and take notice on how he did it
...he did it with a Parallel plate Dry cell.... and that's not too bad...
I think he said his gap was 1/16" gasket (shower pan gasket I think)...but he did say he could crank down on the bolts and shrink the gap a long way...
I kind'a got the impression it was tighten it till it quit leaking ! LOL

Bob...

[Weapon_R]

Bob the type of cell you described is axactly the cell I plan on building for experientaton.
This allows a number of configurations to be tested with just one cell. One can experiment
with and without neutral cells.

[Bob]

Yes indeed !
 However you best plan on real good quality Stainless steel if you want to experiment with Neutral plates as well...
 here is a simple drawing of a plate for a dry cell.
although the 1/4" holes can be enlarged so you can use steel bolts instead of nilon and cover the shafts with vinyl tubing, you get the idea.
the tab can be put on any corner or even any edge although the plate thickness needs to be kept fairly thin to accommodate the electrical tabs/plugs.... and a tiny hole in the tab itself (1/16") will help to keep the electrical connections in place and secure .
this particular plate can be rotated 90 deg. to the right and stood on end which would be better for plate area being kept wet as compared to laying down.
...
Bob....

[Bob]

Although the plates are just one part of a Dry cell they are very important.
bolting the cell together can be done in various ways a single large bolt in the center can do the trick
but that method does have a tenancy to leak. Personally I prefer the ring of bolts method.
....
the end plates , usually made of PVC or heavy clear plastic is the place where the gas and electrolyte
enter and exit from....
Oddly enough problems have occurred with leaks because of the "Gas/Electrolyte" Holes are too small and pressure builds up inside forcing leaks to occur. so hole SIZE is an important issue.
....
another method is to have 2 holes for gas/electrolyte, this extra hole is usually the same size or a bit smaller and is placed on the bottom opposite corner of the plate. the theory is for better electrolyte circulation, and I think it has a great deal of Merritt. However, when you introduce "Bubbles" into a gas line you restrict the gas flow a great deal... so a larger hole on the top as well as a larger line to the recirculation tank is needed.
 I have seen holes as large as 1/2" on the gas return side of Dry cells, this is probably OVER KILL
but "to much" is better than "NOT ENOUGH" in this case. But if the line is too large the "Pumping action" of the cell will stop.... and circulation of the electrolyte will almost stop... this in itself isn't all that bad except that heat will build up in the cell, so circulation is needed.
...
This drawing of a Dry cell plate has 2 holes in it for the Gas/Electrolyte and is turned on its side as compared to the last drawing.
 there are Pro's and Cons to this method the Pro, being better circulation, the con being Current leakage, but sense the holes are in oppisit corners the leakage should be minimal...
f.y.i. Current leakage is converted directly into heat and contributes nothing to production
...the "Randy Cell" suffers from this problem as it does get quite hot when ran for a long time at high amps... personally I don't think Current leakage is that big of an issue...
but there are those that disagree with that statement and try their best to eliminate "current leakage" completely.
...
Bob...

[Weapon_R]

Bob my design is similar. Plates have two holes top and bottom. One for electrolyte and other for exit.
Plates have tabs like the ones you have illustrated above. They are also reversible.
Bob I wasn't aware the randy cell produced heat. Can you confirm this randy.

[randy]

oh yeah, they get hot, but I never tried them with an amp limiter, YET. I've got some new 2" 1/4" hole washers, I'm going to build using the new configuration, adjust with the amp limiter and see if it still builds heat, when I have the time. The 4" cell I've got now doesn't get hot at all, it did before the amp limiter was added.

[Bob]

Yes they get Hot .... I have several MELTED Pop off caps to prove it !
... I used to run my "Randy cells" for 1hr and 30min at a time  feeding them 20amps ...
I had to watch it because some times they would draw more than 20 amps so I had to dilute the mix quite often, which ment the next trip started out at about 15 amps and ended at 20 amps...
they consistently gave me 2LPM at 20 amps however and that should not be understated, heat or no.
its hard to get that good of a amp to LPM output with ANY CELL
... we found early on that a large resivor of electrolyte helped dissipate the heat a great deal
actually My 1 gal cell container in my truck now (with a old style "Randy cell" in it) has yet to over heat on me... by that I mean boil away the Koolaid to have nothing left or melt the Pop-off cap
however the container does get Hot to the touch as does everything under the hood in this summer heat!
...
 having 2 cells in that container running 40+ amps is probably what Cooked the KOH I was using at the time.... it turned dark brown and looked like expresso coffee !  
I've not had any problems in that regard sense I switched to Lemonaid Koolaid
...
Any time you pump wattage into a cell you are going to create HEAT.... its a GIVEN... you can't get around it... how you handle that heat is the tricky part... you can have a recirculation tank that cures the heat problem or even a radiator to cool it down... or cooling fins on the lines and containers...
  there is no such thing as NO heat... some cells dissipate the heat better than others is all
but the heat is still there.... it has to be if Work is being done, and splitting apart water is "Work"
...
Please understand what I'm saying... I'm not saying Randy is lying and that his new cell will boil the electrolyte...far from it... I have No doubt that the cell Randy has made will run at a very LOW temperature.... constantly... if he says it does !   I don't doubt him one bit <grin>
 But rest assured that that cell will generate allot of heat, because of the configuration of the cell the heat it does make is being dissipated faster than its being made.
...that's the key here... dissipating the heat FASTER than the heat is being made in the cell...that results in a cool running cell.
 I can guarantee you that I can make a container to House my "Randy Cell" out there in my truck that will dissipate the heat faster than the heat is made and have a cool running cell ...IF I WANT IT....
but I figure a little water vapor isn't going to hurt a thing, and in fact will help gas mileage.
Actually I remember Randy saying ages ago that his cells were running cool, or barely warm to the touch after a long run....which proves my point, its the container in a wet cell that will do the heat handling.... not the cell design itself...
...
LOL...Randy had More PVC pipe on his truck a few years ago than could be found in most hardware stores ! HAHAHHAHA but it WORKED and worked well.....
( till the fuse-able link let go ! or lack there of...<GRIN>)



Bob......

[Bob]

How much heat ?
well allot ! 
 P=I*E
Power in watts= Amps times Volts
 so in this case 13vdc * 20amps= 260watts
have you ever touched a 100watt light bulb that's been on a long time ? and that's only 100watts!
so 260 watts is quite a bit of heat, but with care you can dissipate that much heat fairly easy
...its when you get into 80 amps and above that heat becomes a major problem
13vdc * 80 amps= 1040 watts.... a electric heater on low setting!
this kind of heat takes special steps to control and should not be over looked !
...
Bob...