cheap do it yourself DIY solar cells from alufoil

[hartiberlin]

Hi triffid

please post the process as exact as you can.

Is it all in these patents or are these different papers ?


The main problem is how to get a large PN-surface-layer which is
exactly sensitiv for sunlight.

What must the bandgap be in ElectronVolt to be sensitive
for sunlight ?

The easiest thing would be to come up with a kind of "ink"
that you just put on alufoil and which will harden to your alufoil and
also acts as the second electrode.

So maybe a mix from Titandioxid and graphite and a special
color ink like Fluorescin will do it ?

The problem is, that all commercial cells have these
ITO conductive Indium-Tin-oxid layers, which make
these cells expensive and hard to replicate at home.

So we have to find a way to not use these ITO coated glasses...

One way of doing it could be, to put the alufoil with a PN-layer-coating
into transparent conductive saltwater and let the sun shine through it.
Then you could use a graphite rod inside the saltwater to act as the other
electrode.
Okay, this cell would be bulkier due to the use of the saltwater,
but anyway, if you could this way get rid of the ITO coated glas,
why not...

There must be a simple solution to this question !
We just have to find it.

Maybe one could also just electroplate the alufoil
with Titandioxid or use High Voltage DC to put the
Titandioxid into the alufoil.

There must be just build a bandgap-layer between the
alufoil and the "bondage" layer, which is sensitive to the sunlight
in the right electronvolt range.
That is all we have to find.

As bounding graphite particles directly onto alufoil
that already gives a bandgap voltage of about 0.7 Volts,
but it is not sensitive to sunlight and is more likely a galvanic cell
with the air moisture
which consumes the alufoil.

Regards, Stefan.

[hartiberlin]

Here are the links to the 2 patents user triffid
mentioned:


http://v3.espacenet.com/espacenetDocument.pdf?KC=A&date=19990727&flavour=trueFull&NR=5928438A&locale=en_EP&CC=US&FT=D

http://v3.espacenet.com/espacenetDocument.pdf?KC=A&date=19980310&flavour=trueFull&NR=5726065A&locale=en_EP&CC=US&FT=D


You have to give in the graphical code to download the full PDF file this way.

But these methods are far too complicated...

An easy method to use silver coating for the pickup electrode is to use
collaidal silver.

If you make a collaidal silver for almost 1 hour from a hot destilled water baker
and afterwards put some stuff into this water,
the silver particles will kling to all stuff
and you get a silver layer.

This could be used to make silver contacts on a solarcell.

This happened to me one time, when I made too long the
collaidal silver  in the water baker and all the silver particals
coated onto the inner walls of the glas baker...

Pretty energy efficient method to coat anything with a silver layer...

Regards, Stefan.

[triffid]

Unfortunately I could not match the patents 5928438 and 5726065 to the info I already had.The reason being (?) I need the number to the japanese patent for the japanese website.Not the us patent site.I did relocate the link to the japanese patent website.I also need to stop trying to do stuff from memory.There is another layer in those directions I gave that you put on  and let dry /then bake for 3 to 5 minutes.The final layer consists of nickel metal ink that you let dry in a screen pattern(no baking).The final layer acts
as the neg electrode.So to recap :
5)final layer(nickel metal ink in screen pattern)dry/no baking/neg electrode
4)layer /dry/bake
3)layer/dry/bake
2)layer/dry/bake
1)aluminum foil/pos electrode.
So layers 2,3,4 I do not know what they are.Baking times and temps are the same for all layers that need baking.I am so close to  solving this that I can taste it.Triffid

[triffid]

The patent for making solar cells from the screen printing method is US patent #5,538,903.There is link in another thread to a pdf article that r8rchris  so generously supplied that tell how to construct these cells using aluminum foil and a different order of layers than if you just start with glass.You can do a search for all the posts by r8rchris(he is a newbe) .
Triffid

[nievesoliveras]

Hi1

The pdf file patent is here:
http://www.pat2pdf.org/patents/pat5538903.pdf

Jesus