Crystal Power CeLL by John Hutchison

[Koen1]

Personally I think glass isn't very usefull in Cell materials,
unless you're thinking of actually heating it to melting point
and making a vitreous material, then it might be used in the mix...

And in my opinion Calcite is not a very good material for making Cells,
or at least not as far as I have been able to establish experimentally.
I have tried to mix in conductive and semiconductive powders with
calcite/gypsum type mixes in attempts to increase whatever output
they might yield, and in attempts to add dopant for increased polarisation
of the bulk material, but none of those experiments produced anything
above simple gypsum drying polarisation (the potential of which was extremely
low and disappeared when the stuff dried completely, except for one cell where
it seemed to continue but that was later found to have extensive corrosion
on the metal particles which proved the additional potential was galvanic).

But of course this is only intended as constructive info and you should by all means
do the experiments you have planned involving Calcite. You might just strike a
material composition that does produce higher and lasting potentials.

Low cost materials to experiment with you say? Well, it does sort of depend on
what style of Cell you're going for...
If you're going for a Hutchison-style Cell, the materials stated by John are pretty
clear and not very expensive at all: crushed pyrites, crushed galena, if you have it
crushed germanium (from Ge diodes for example), and Rochelle Salt as a binder.
If you're going for a more Reid-style Cell, the exact materials are vague but it certainly
is a sort of ceramic-like material which solidifies permanently. So if you're going for that,
you may want to look at fairly simple ceramic materials. I have used and still do use
things like Kaolin in Cell experiments, for example. (That's a type of white clay used in
pocelain for example)
Things like pyrites, galena, tourmaline, etc can often be bought at or via local mineral/
rock/crystal shops, or ordered online. Tourmaline can be expensive depending on what
colour you want (the green variety is much more sensitive to deep infrared than the black
variety for example, but also more rare and more expensive, usually), but "fools gold" pyrites
are relatively cheap and so is galena. Things like quartz (powder or sand), mica, kaolin,
plaster of paris, etc, can usually be bought at (or ordered at) a local ceramic crafts/potters supply shop,
or at arts&crafts shops, and are often not very expensive.
Several art supply shops in the region here also sell all kinds of powders intended as pigments
for painters to use in their homemade paint, and among these powders are potentially usefull things
like powdered copper, aluminium, silver, gold, iron, carbon, and various oxides.
Rochelle Salt and many other materials can be bought from lab supply shops but they can sometimes
be expensive. You can make it yourself too, from "Cream of Tartar", by a fairly simple chemical reaction
as some here have posted in the past. For that you will need some simple chemicals that can often be
bought at local supply shops. Quite a few materials can be made at home using such simple household
chemicals, if you know what you're doing. And the needed chemicals like caustic soda, hydrochloric acid,
etc, can most often be bought locally and cheaply.
And of course you can collect rocks of (or with patches of) the less common mineral types to get
materials. I'd go for the ones with patches of shiny, glittery, and preferably iridescent minerals on them.
And those with some metallic glitter or glare to them. But hey, that's me

[triffid]

Thanks,Koen 1 for the good advice.I learned how to use a propane  torch in one of the jobs I had before
and wanted to suggest it to people here,But was not sure because I knew a lady who burned down her house with one.But it would certainly melt some things together.Triffid

[Koen1]

Lol Yes kids, watch out with propane torches!

But yeah, you're right, certain materials can be 'sintered' into compounds.
Depends on how clean you want things of course, as obviously the combustion
vapours from the propane will contain lots and lots of carbon dioxides and quite
probably several carbohydrate residus, and these may well pollute whatever
material you're trying to sinter.
And of course a quick blast with the propane torch can help get your
metal container up to higher temperatures faster.

[Koen1]

Okay, here's a little update:

The Hutchison-style Cell has now one again solidified, this time with
a proper 2kV applied to it over the course of several hours while the
Cell material hardened. The Cell shows a static voltage of 1.3 Volts,
if not connected to anything; not surprising, that's what we tend to get
from Cu-Al bimettallic layers.
I connected a 1kOhm resistor between the electrodes. At first it showed
zero output.
Just this morning I measured it, ad I repeated that measurement just 5 minutes
ago, and I am not measuring a DC of 300milliVolt rising up to 340milliVolt,
at an amperage of 0,1 milliAmp, across the resistor.
We seem to have output!
Alright, it is terribly low output, but it still is output.
Finally my first Hutchison-style Cell that actually does more than just sit there
being a dud.

Now for boosting the output. Hutchison gives no clues as to how output could be
increased, unfortunately. I think I shall attempt to increase the output by just
adding more Galena and Pyrite to the Cell material. Think I shall try adding
another cubic cm of both.
Suggestions are welcome.

So, conclusion: a Hutchison-style Cell made from an aluminium tube slightly
larger than a can of RedBull, with a copper rod as central electrode, almost
entirely filled with Rochelle Salt and with approximately 1 to 1,5 cubic centimetre
of crushed Galena and approximately an equal amount of crushed Pyrite (both
ranging from fine powder to pieces of maximum size 0,1 mm diameter),
and a pinch of pure Germanium (powder), melted, mixed, and 2 to 2,5 kiloVolts
applied to the electrodes, did result in what appears to be a weak form of a
working Hutchison-style Crystal Cell.
Perhaps it should be noted that the output mentioned recently on Hutchisons
personal blog was equally low, in the range of the couple of hundred millivolts
but a slightly higher amperage... So perhaps I actually am getting close to the
Cells Hutchison makes after all.

So the next step is to increase the amperage.  If that doesn't work, I'm not
sure... Think I may give the Hutchison-style a rest again and get back
to my more ceramic-like Cell experiments. At least I got some amps from those.


On a sidenote, I took some crushed Tourmaline and mixed it in with a few drops
of molten Rochelle Salt + Galena + Pyrites and had that solidify between two
layers of conductor, one of copper and one of aluminium (in the hopes of getting
some slight polarsation due to the different metals). Sticks to the aluminium just great,
produces 0,45V potential difference between the layers, which did seem to go up
a little to 0,47V when it was warmed, but never went higher. The stuff did not bond
to the copper well at all, and after a few tests the material disattached itself from the copper.
This was just to see if R.salt could be used as binder for a Tourmaline-based heat-conversion chip.
I used purpleish/pinkish Tourmaline for that, as the colour of Tourmaline dictates the wavelenth
of infrared it is sensitive to. "Deep infrared" is closest to actual thermal radiation, while "shallow
infrared" is closest to red light. Greenish Tourmaline is said to be one of the most sensitive kinds
for deep IR, then purple, then all others. Most common type is black and the least sensitive to
deep IR. Or so they say. Of course the colour depends on the amount and type of transition metals
in the Tourmaline crystal structure. Just for your information.
Perhaps actually making Tourmaline from scratch would be the best way to produce chips of usefull
composition...
Obviously this would be a heat transducer chip and not at all a Crystal Energy Cell. But interesting
nevertheless.

[ian middleton]

G'day all,

@Koen:  Way to go dude    How stable is the 0.1mA output ?  Also was your polarizing voltage placed across electrode to can?
Your test voltages match up with mine  . It's good to have confirmation of these things.

As for boosting the current output, well thats the 64 million dollar question    One reading JH does not show us is the voltage on his little battery under load ie when it is running the fan. Anyway Koen, please give us updates on your JH cell, it may be useful as a benchmark.

@All
In the last few days I've ramped up cell production and like Koen have tried to simulate a JH cell as far as we know them.
I do not have any Germanium or galena so I've had to improvise.

In place of the germamium I made some gallium coated silcon carbide powder. Most interesting stuff.
The first cell off the production line ( kitchen bench) was made with plaster of paris as the main bonding material.
I called this one the PP cell. ( no urine involved  )  The mix solidified ok but then became very brittle and the electrode fell out. Sound familiar ?
Before it fell apart it had a voltage of 1.1V.
I made another and swapped a couple of ingredients, left out the sand and inserted some silicon carbide powder.
This one held together very well and after 1 hour 45mins on the datalogger had a voltage of 0.48V.
At the moment this cell (PP+SiC) has a 10kohm resistor across it.    0.1V@ 1uA.  Not a mind blowing amount but it is constant.

Also I've started to polarize the cells electrostatically. That is, no current flows through the cell when polarizing.
I have noticed that all cells since do not go through a reverse polarization phase.
The next cell was an experiment with ratios and the reintroduction of borax.
The GaSic cell was 80% rochelle salt, the other 20% made up of tourmaline, GaSiC ( gallium coated silicon carbide), pyrites and borax.
To aid electrode stability I wound the wire around a 5mm drill bit so the corkscreww design now anchors more firmly in the mix.
This cell sits at 0.44V.  A higher voltage can be achieved with the use of sodium silicate.

The Borax 2 cell was made on the 2nd Sept.  This one was made in an Al cigar tube and the main binder was white builders cement.
I went this way because after 5 months the Portland cement cell was still putting out 0.5V @ 5 uA.
Although this cell contains sodium silicate and can be considered in it's galvanic stage, it looks very promising.  3 days on the datalogger and it hasn't budged from 1.26V.

Now back to the low current problem. I had the thought that perhaps the oxide layer on the Al tubes was somehow impeding the current flow.
So to test this I inserted a thin stainless steel sleeve into some of the cells. First thing of note, not surprisingly, the cell voltages dropped to around 0.45V. However this modification did not seem to increase the available current.  Anyway as we all have seen the voltage on most cells
will recover to it's original value when the load is removed, some sooner than others.  The multilayered cell, built last week, shows remarkable powers of recovery even after 3 or more bouts of 12 hour short circuits. In fact each time the voltage comes back slightly higher. 0.941V after the first sc  to 0.951V after the third. temperature was monitored and was not an issue.

There comes a point in the cells output where the current drawn is equalized by it's recovery current. 

Anyway thats me blurb for the day .  I'll post the full formulas for any of the above cells if requested.
Oh and by the way, if you do polarize your cells electrostatically make sure you discharge the cell before you pick it up.  Zap!
Sometimes I think my stupidity is boundless 


Ok back to fight.

Ian