Getting amps from small selfmade DIY Zinc Air cells, amazing !

[samawati]

How would this technology be used in space where there is no air?

[gmeast]

Before the user Anders wrote in Swedish:

I väntan på den stora pressardagen görs ett förtest med endast en liten testbit av strömnät och Silverkolpulver manuellt muskel-pressat med tesked över 1 cm2 yta, Nedsänkt i en liten rostfri bytta med Zink i botten och Luftkatoden ovanför mäts den lilla ström som ev kommer från så liten yta. Med alla (ca 5) gram Silver som lösts upp i Silvergeneratorn och förhoppningsvis/troligtvis adsorberats i kolpulvret är det inte helt orimliga värdet 50 mA kontinuerligt (nominellt) tänkbart, kanske tom 100 mA !
Detta innebär i så fall för den färdiga prototypcellen på ca 200 cm2 att minimum 10 A kommer ur den lilla lunchlådan (cellkärlet) med samtidigt 1 V, vilket blir 10 W effekt, ungefär vad en baklampa drar..! I bästa fall 20 A, och 20 W..!
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Maybe someone can help with a better translation ?
Many thanks in advance.

Hi all,

This Zinc-Air Battery, or better, Zinc-Air Fuel Cell is exciting technology and it is not new.  Ten years ago several European concerns and if my recall is good some Isreali innovators were proposing large scale infrastructure to integrate this into a practical way to power electric automobiles.  The power density is about the same as gasoline regarding volumetric efficiency (size and such).

In a nut shell and according to a great Wiki reference:

In one type of zinc-air fuel cell, zinc fuel is replenished and zinc oxide waste is removed ... continuously by pushing zinc electrolyte paste or pellets into an anode chamber. Waste zinc oxide is pumped into a waste tank inside the fuel tank and fresh zinc paste or pellets are taken from the fuel tank. The zinc oxide waste is pumped out at a refueling station and sent to a recycling plant.

But, the most practical approach that I had seen was to have a zinc-air fuel cell that 'unplugs' from the car's undercarriage and is replaced by a fresh 'plug-in' and away you go.  The spent fuel cell is hauled off (with others) to be 'recharged' at a power plant during off-peak hours or by solar, wind, hydro.  Certain of the zinc-air fuel cells have been designed such that only electricity is needed to reverse the electrochemical process that turned the Zinc from zinc metal to zinc oxide.  The recharging process in essence 're-plates' the zinc metal back onto the anodes and very little. if any, toxic by-products or waste is generated.

I've been waiting for this technology to mature for about a decade.  I lost all references to this in a computer crash an never rebuilt my database.  If someone can provide some links to the latter above ... great!

Greg

[FatChance!!!]

How would this technology be used in space where there is no air?

Compressed Air Tubes....as when scuba diving.

[derwood]

Hi I have been doing some research on this topic after i saw the vid on A. I was amazed at the current this type a battery could deliver. The basic principle of this type of fuel cell is quite simple, unfortunately the air electrode is the key to a large amount of current. without this it is just an interesting science project. Surface area is the key to the elctrode also it must be very conductive. I am going to start fabricating an electrode as soon as I can find the proper materials. The filter material should be fairly easy to obtain. I feel that it is very important because if you are going to take the time to build these electrodes, lack of filtering would destroy them. The only hard to get material is the teflon binder. I am confident that other binders can be used but from what I have found is that a porous binder must be used. My goal is to build a cell capable of powering an
EV.           

http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/6291090/description.html
I have Found some very detailed info on how to make this electrode. This should answer all of your questions.

[derwood]

Here is another approach that may show promise.
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6444609.html

more A!
http://www.aist.go.jp/aist_e/latest_research/2009/20090727/20090727.html