Running HHO generator on separate battery

[astrocady]

This does make sense, if your cells were designed to run on the lower voltage. Drawback in one more BIG thing to find a place to install. But, it wouldn't be hard to build a simple circuit that would connect the HHO battery to the vehicle electrical system if the HHO voltage dropped below 11 volts, then disconnect once the voltage rose to a a preset level -- kind of a back-up charge for long trips.

[BioFarmer93]

Roland- OK, I see- Thank you for the clarification.

This is an idea I have been teasing myself with for a long time, based on the supposed lesser cost of grid electricity in the wee hours. I guess I should have realized that someone probably was already doing it…

When I activate my system on the truck and that 150A Zena kicks in, my rpm’s drop by about 50 or so. I realize that the two alt. setup is about the least efficient way you can go for HHO, and it does bother me. I have been seriously considering pulling off the stock Ford 100A alt. and putting the Zena in its place to have that extra capacity for the system and regain a little efficiency in the process. The stock alt. can sit on a shelf until a need arises for it.

This would bring me back to the point of the "standard efficiency model", I guess we could call it. I really like the "on demand" aspect of HHO created from the vehicles electrical system without worrying about batteries running low. I really like the "high efficiency model" created by charging from the grid at night and not taxing the engine's output with the alt's increased load.

So, here is the point where I'm going to need a little electrical advice, because I think I’m going to do a little re-arranging to my system. (Are you reading this Phil?) It just so happens that I have about 130-140 6V 5cell (1.2V per cell nominal) 85A.h. flooded NiCd batteries (about 80lbs. per batt.) sitting here waiting on a task… The cells have connecter bars from terminal to terminal that can be easily reconfigured. Here is the idea- arrange say, 20 individual cells in a parallel-series manner (10+10) to make a 850Ah 2.4V battery. This system should (ideally) have the ability to be switchable from battery to vehicle electric on the fly, also to be charged from the grid or from the alt. These large flooded NiCd’s like to be charged at 1.7C and around 15-16A, so I would need a circuit to make about 4.1V and 16A from 110VAC. As for charging on the fly, I think I might need some way isolate (or not) a simple buck DC-DC converter so the battery bank didn’t try to clamp the alt’s output at 2 ½ or 3 volts.

Ideas? Opinions? Sneering denials of my sanity or intelligence?

[IM2L844]

Bio, your system would be much more efficient if you were to reconfigure your reactors into conventional series type units and wire them in parallel.

For example, if I remember your arrangement correctly, if you removed a few plates from each reactor and made them into 15 plate, 14cells in 2 stacks of 7cells each, that would give you the equivalent of 56 cells in 8 stacks which should produce somewhere near 6 LPM with 80 amps and an MMW above 5

[BioFarmer93]

@ IM2L844- OK then, as I understand it, a "cell" can consist of just a pos & neg, or a pos and some number of neutrals and a neg. I know the difference between series and parallel, but I'm a little fuzzy on what a "stack" is... A complete or standalone electrolyzer maybe? I had considered building my units the way you guys do, but I still have a mental block about neutral plates that I can't seem to get over... As in "How the hell can un-powered plates make any gas, and how can they in any way be more efficient than a [-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-+-] unit running at 2 volts and 80A?
Not trying to be cantankerous here, but I'm afraid my ignorance is showing.. In all my reading and studying, I don't recall ever seeing this addressed, and always assumed it was because 99.9% of folks doing this stuff had to work from the vehicles existing electrical system and found it necessary to split voltage across their electrolyzer to keep the temp down...
Can you do a little sketch for me like the one I did a few lines up to show me what you mean by "-into 15 plate, 14 cells in 2 stacks of 7cells each, that would give you the equivalent of 56 cells in 8 stacks" I apologize, I am one of those people that has difficulty conceptualizing physical arrangements until I can draw a picture of it, probably why I ended up in my particular line of work..

[IM2L844]

It took me a long time to get my head wrapped around this. When I first started fooling with this stuff, I couldn't find any clear explanations of the how's and why's this was the way it worked either, but first things first.

An electrochemical cell consists of the positive surface of one plate, the negative surface of another plate and the electrolyte between the two surfaces.

A stack is a number of cells arranged in series with a connection to a positive external terminal at one end of the stack and a connection to a negative external terminal at the opposite end of the stack.

In this picture there is a typical reactor with 12 cells in 2 stacks of 6 cells each:

The green represents the gaskets and electrolyte between the plates.

Once a current enters a stack, it can't escape. It must pass through all the cells in the stack.

BTW, I am suggesting you arrange the plates and electrical connections in your reactors similar to the picture, but with another plate/cell on each side.

[BioFarmer93]

@ IM2L844- Thank You! A concise explanation accompanied by a specific graphic dissolved months of fuzzy thinking in less than a minute- I could ask for no better.

@Koya- Ben, thank you, but save your postage for materials my friend. Don't forget that I have 84 plates to play around with here, and the system is coming down in the next couple of weeks anyway. I am going to media blast all of the plates, re-do my bubbler's (I picked up 12 of the 2" Oatey pipe end plugs) re-seal all my nylon elbows to their respective locations with the plastic threaded pipe specific sealer I have found, and replace all of the leaky zip-tie hose clamp sillyness with honest-to-goodness properly sized pinch style Corbin-Clamps from NAPA- They had to special order them for me, and as it stands now, there are only two boxes of ten left in Fla! When I reassemble, I am going to put two of them back the original way, and two of them the way you guys are doing it with the neutral plates.

[IM2L844]

OK, Bio. On to the second half of your question. Since once the amperage enters a series-coupled cell stack it has nowhere else to go and must pass through every cell in the series until it leaves through the external terminal, each cell it passes through produces the same amount of HHO proportional to the amperage. Assuming a 13.8 volt power source, at standard temperature and presure (77 F & 1 atmosphere), each 1 amps entering and passing through a 100% efficient series-coupled cell stack, with 1 to 7 cells, would produce exactly the following (note that each cell it passes through produces another 11.4 milliliters without increasing the energy cost):

Legend:
+|+ = Anode
-|+ = Neutral or Bipolar plate
-|- = Cathode

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|- = 11.4 milliliters for 13.8 watts

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|- = 22.8 milliliters for 13.8 watts

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|+(cell 3)-|- = 34.2 milliliters for 13.8 watts

-----------------------------------------------------------------
You have 20 of these:
1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|+(cell 3)-|+(cell 4)-|- = 45.6 milliliters for 13.8 watts
-----------------------------------------------------------------

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|+(cell 3)-|+(cell 4)-|+(cell 5)-|- = 57.0 milliliters for 13.8 watts

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|+(cell 3)-|+(cell 4)-|+(cell 5)-|+(cell 6)-|- = 68.4 milliliters for 13.8 watts

1 amps = +|+(cell 1)-|+(cell 2)-|+(cell 3)-|+(cell 4)-|+(cell 5)-|+(cell 6)-|+(cell 7)-|- = 79.8 milliliters for 13.8 watts

In effect, because of the way you have it wired, you have 20 reactors with 4 cells each. In my opinion all that wire is introducing unnecessary resistance between the cells, but not only that. Because of the way you have it configured, you have 3 extra unnecessary plates in each series. This may have some advantage in helping dissipate heat, but other than that, I don't see any advantage as far as energy efficiency goes.

[IM2L844]

Now, to get back to the original topic of this thread; I have been experimenting with this concept for a couple of years. The main problem is with any significant amp draw, the voltage drops and consequently so does the amp draw. I suspect this could be overcome with a large enough battery bank. My experience has been that my 2 deep cycle batteries with a total capacity of 280 amp hours start out providing 12.5 volts and as soon as the surface charge gets knocked off (almost instantly) the potential drops to 12.3 volts and will stay there for several hours with small amp draws (less than 10 amps). In my estimation a system would need to be designed to operate on between 12.0 and 12.3 volts (6 cells per stack) and in order to maintain a 20-25 amp draw for for any significant length of time you should have a battery bank with about a 600 amp hour capacity. This would add about 4 batteries and 200 pounds to the average system and Phil's highly efficient constant current Hulk PWM would be a "must have" if he ever get's the damn thing finished.

[H2OPWR]

Now, to get back to the original topic of this thread; I have been experimenting with this concept for a couple of years. The main problem is with any significant amp draw, the voltage drops and consequently so does the amp draw. I suspect this could be overcome with a large enough battery bank. My experience has been that my 2 deep cycle batteries with a total capacity of 280 amp hours start out providing 12.5 volts and as soon as the surface charge gets knocked off (almost instantly) the potential drops to 12.3 volts and will stay there for several hours with small amp draws (less than 10 amps). In my estimation a system would need to be designed to operate on between 12.0 and 12.3 volts (6 cells per stack) and in order to maintain a 20-25 amp draw for for any significant length of time you should have a battery bank with about a 600 amp hour capacity. This would add about 4 batteries and 200 pounds to the average system and Phil's highly efficient constant current Hulk PWM would be a "must have" if he ever get's the damn thing finished.

I used 2 very good 6 volt golf cart batteries in series for a couple of years (Can't remember amp hours) for testing. I found that with them They started at 12.8 volts and quickly dropped to 12.5 volts then would stay there for several hours as long as the cell was under about 40 amps. When it started dropping from 12.5 volts it would drop quickly. You were just done then. I would bet that golf cart batteries would work for most folks in all but the longest of trips. In a normal days commute anything over a couple of hours would be unusual. They are a little on the pricey side though. If I remember correctly they were around $200.00 each but are made to be used in that way and will outlast most other batteries by quite a bit.

Larry

[IM2L844]

T-105 6v batteries are the most common industry standard for golf cart batteries and they are very good. Much, much better than what I've been using. They have a much higher "Reserve Capacity" and that is the important number to remember. It tells you how many minutes the battery can maintain a particular amperage (usually 25 amps). You would think amp hours and reserve capacity would be directly proportional, but they're not. They are calculated differently. I think a new, fully charged T-105 will put out 25 amps for close to 8 hours. My cheapies won't come close to that.

There are better out there. It all depends on how much money you want to spend on this hobby, I guess. If you had money, the room and the suspension to handle it, you could go for a good 12 volt fork-lift battery.