Copper Zinc Tap Water Fuel Cell

[wattsup]

@b_rads

Nice going with your small voltages.

A while back I made an animation of what I call a Voltage Grabber Circuit that only needs a small voltage input to accumulate it into large pulses.

I put it in my OU FTP site located here;
http://purco.qc.ca/ftp/Wattsups%27%20stuff/voltage-grabber-circuit-VGC/
Just click on the gif file and it will open up.

This is only to give you some ideas on how to harvest that energy that seems frivolous when you first look at it but which is in fact a tremendous amount of energy if it can be harvested in mill-second intervals.

I am not saying you should do it like in the animation, but think many smalls, to mids to high uF capacitors. You can start off with three or four 5vdc capacitors, that load individually, then you put into series to discharge into a a larger set of caps individually, one by one, then the larger are put in series to discharge into another larger set of caps.

It does not have to be electronic. Think maybe a small wind fan that turns with little wind and can turn a connected set of contacts to which you connect capacitors. The contacts are arranged something like an old player piano that have all those reeds being plucked by a turning drum with protrusions placed at the right position and interval. Such a system could control the opening and closing of capacitors. There are low cost micro contacts that require almost null force to activate and they have N/O, N/C and Common terminals to give you some connecting flexibility.

So let's say this is working with wind and you are producing constant energy output. Then you put a small dc motor instead of the fan and see if you can loop the action and have it work without the aid of the wind. Just a small battery to start it up.

There are many ways to go about this and I only wanted to give you some ideas on how to maybe move forward.

wattsup

[b_rads]

@wattsup
I went to your link and looked at the GIF; it took a little while before the lights turned on.  I need to digest this some more, but thinking out loud â€" the copper/zinc water battery is sort of like a turtle,  keeps running at pretty much the same speed until it dies of old age.  The track I am currently on came about when I connected 4AA batteries to the water batteries for a few seconds and almost instantly the water battery jumped way up in amperage and lit the LED nicely for over 6 hours.  When I say a few seconds â€" I mean no more than 15 seconds.  Now, taking liberties with what you have presented to me â€" could excess energy from the water battery be stored and dumped back into the water battery to extend the life.

Back to weird recharging results â€" I replicated the test and the results were different.  I will wait until the water battery is nearly dead before repeating this test again.  I have tried to summarize the test a little better as shown below.
Brad S

[b_rads]

While these new cells constructed this past weekend proved to be disappointing â€" an important observation was made.  As for the disappointment â€" I can only conclude that the threaded rod is not as good a source for zinc as conduit.  The observation worth noting is as follows:
Green Cell â€" Control cell â€" 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, and tap water.
   Output 0.94v
White Cell â€" 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, activated carbon, and tap water.
   Output 1.00v
Yellow Cell - 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, activated carbon, and Alum.
   Output 1.14v
Conclusion â€" Voltage increased .2v by adding activated carbon and Alum electrolyte.
Brad S

[dasimpson]

what was the ampage range of each cell and would a shorter zinc rod change that when i messed with earth battery i noticed the further in i moved the zinc nail the more the ampage changed

While these new cells constructed this past weekend proved to be disappointing â€" an important observation was made.  As for the disappointment â€" I can only conclude that the threaded rod is not as good a source for zinc as conduit.  The observation worth noting is as follows:
Green Cell â€" Control cell â€" 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, and tap water.
   Output 0.94v
White Cell â€" 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, activated carbon, and tap water.
   Output 1.00v
Yellow Cell - 20” copper pipe, 5/16” threaded rod, activated carbon, and Alum.
   Output 1.14v
Conclusion â€" Voltage increased .2v by adding activated carbon and Alum electrolyte.
Brad S

[b_rads]

what was the ampage range of each cell and would a shorter zinc rod change that when i messed with earth battery i noticed the further in i moved the zinc nail the more the ampage changed

I know this is going to sound goofy to anyone who reads this reply.  I purposefully try to keep the amperage low on these cells to extend to life of the battery.  Currently, my cells run 3 months and better before they die.  An LED can be lit with a fraction of a milliamp as long as it has enough voltage.   I am trying to get as much voltage in as small of a space as possible.  Also of note is the Alum electrolyte.  With this electrolyte, the amperage stays low â€" however, it provides a neat recharging effect not seen with plain tap water.  I have cells that appeared to be dead and after recharging, continued to run for weeks afterward.  They can then be recharged again.
Brad S