Water battery

[nightlife]

Freezer, have you tried to run any parallel as well as in a series? Did you also note that there wasn't a difference in the amount of water used? I found I got the same results using just a little bit of water apposed to greater amounts.

[jeanna]

Do you know how long a galvanic action will last? Or if it looses power over time? I am also wondering if they can be put in parallel as well as in series if they would create more amperage?

Yes they can be put in parallel as well as series.
No, I don't know how long it will last because each set of chemicals would work differently. It has always been dissapointing. The salmon was an alkaline battery because I used sodium carbonate as the "salt" (electrolyte) in the water. I did a study of different kinds of acid batteries a few years ago. lemon juice and copper and zinc etc. They were only good for about 6 hours.

In general what happens is that one of the electrodes (or probes if you want) will get plated with the other. I think a chemist could predict which one would be plated on the other.  But there is another kind of reaction. It takes the electrolyte and puts IT onto the probes.
Either way it slows down after a while and eventually stops.

Then the deal would be that if you pumped electricity back the other way from how it was going, you would redissolve the plating off the electrode and back into the solution. And you would have recharged your battery.

My mother used to polish her silver by soaking the tarnished silver in a bath of water + baking soda along with a big piece of aluminum foil. The foil would get black and the silver would shine. It never occurred to any of us to see what electricity potential came from it!

I also have a story about boats and galvanic action.

Steel hulled boats will get rusty from oxidation in the water. Warm salt water is the worst. They would spring a leak and sink. So, Someone had the bright idea to use galvanized zinc screws to hold the hulls together. Zinc electrons would fill in the "electron space" lost to the oxidation in the rust. It worked pretty well for a while, but after a while the electrons from the zinc would have become lost in the reaction and the zinc screws would be too small to fill the holes and the boat would sink.
I don't know if that is a true story or not. My high school chemistry teacher told it. I guess I learned the principle, even if it wasn't a true story.

Keep on building things and trying things. It's all good! and fun besides.

jeanna

[jeanna]

I wonder what would happen if you used palladium? 

Nice and bright.
And where would you ever get palladium?

jeanna

[nightlife]

jeanna, thank you.

What about epson salt? Have you tried that before?

[hansvonlieven]

I wonder what would happen if you used palladium? 

Nice and bright.
And where would you ever get palladium?

jeanna

The six platinum group metals are ruthenium, rhodium, palladium, osmium, iridium, and platinum. They have similar physical and chemical properties. Platinum, rhodium and palladium are used extensively in the jewelery trade as final coats for base metal castings and such. most electro-platers that do jewelery will use these metals if you ask for it.

These coatings are not very expensive, just a little more than gold plate, which is cheap. Because the action in these applications is confined to the surface, electroplated base metal  will give exactly the same results as solid metal.

Hans von Lieven