Linnard?s hydrogen on demand system without electricity !

[ResinRat2]

Aaaah... Now I see why your battery was heating up... That setup is very similar to mine but you have both tungsten rods wired for production and then added a battery to the apparatus.

If you look closely you have short circuited the battery by directly attaching it in that way... current flows from the battery, up the zinc rod and then directly back into the battery again. All without passing through the electrolyte.
That voltage you gave me is still working well... No precipitate of any kind and the zinc is once again furry  No buildup on the regen electrode either... will keep a close eye on this.

Good job at seeing my simple mistake. Very, very nice.

See, it is simple things like this that I easily miss that cause many failures. That is also why I keep the notebook and try to put as many details as I can into it. It is my permanent record of things I have tried in the past. See, once again it has paid off for me.

Adjusting your voltage may be a bit of trial and error. I hope the number I gave you will be the same for your setup as it was for my old one. That was the one that ran almost twenty days. If the voltage is too low then your zinc will form as a zincate on the zinc rod, kind of a blobbish grey "soft" type of coating. That is the best way I can describe it. It will kill your reaction. If the voltage is too high then the tungsten from your tungsten regeneration electrode will plate on the zinc electrode, or the zinc will plate on your tungsten hydrogen producing electrode. Watch for both carefully.

This is very exciting for me to see. You may laugh, but that is the way I am. Simple things please simple minds I guess, LOL!

[Tacmatricx]

Hi Dave,

One more question, I am supplying the cell with the 0.840V in the middle of the range but the voltage I am seeing at the cell is much higher.

If I put my meter probes across the cell with the power supply attached it reads over 1V but if I disconnect the power supply and test that, It reads 0.840V...

Which voltage am I to keep in that range? the supply voltage or the overall cell voltage?

Thanks,

Chris

[ResinRat2]

I measured my voltage by placing the probes across the electrodes when the power supply (fuel cell) was attached. That reading should be the target of 0.83-0.85 volts to match what I was doing with my small reactor experiment. So I guess in your case that would be the overall voltage as you defined it.

Hope that helps.

Thanks again,

Dave (RR2)

[Tacmatricx]

Hi Dave,

Balancing that voltage with the power supply I am using is proving to be a royal pain. My fuel cells haven't arrived as yet so i'll need to get a decent temporary power supply together.

The previous cell ate itself as the tungsten electrode had a plating over it and the zinc was almost to nothing. Voltage was over 0.9V for too long.

Working on it.

Chris

[ResinRat2]

Chris,

I guess that is where the fuel cell has a bit of an advantage. It only supplies the voltage that is needed and doesn't "press" it forward. It would have helped in this case. I apologize if my advice was misunderstood and caused the plating.

You can buff the zinc off the tungsten by using a metal buffing wheel or a grinding wheel. The tungsten won't be damaged by it at all.

I have seen what you described, and it happened to me a few times before I finally understood what to look for and how to avoid it. There is a bit of a balance here. Too little, or not enough voltage hurts you either way. That is why I found the fuel cell's load following capability very useful for this application. 0.83-0.85 volts should do it.