Anything that increases the surface area is worth doing. You can effectively nearly double the surface area of the plates by cross hatching with sand paper. This lowers the resistance of the cell and so all things being equal will increase the current flow and hence gas output.Originally Posted by jwhhopower1978
sorry littel of topic.. but, is sandning etc worth the effort ?
Sandblasting is easy job but I dont have access..
Fine papper on Air grinders?
I did that last time whit very fine papper (1200k)
but I destroyed my plates before I could test for best mmw
(did a typical newbie mistake)
There is some debate as to coarse or fine sandpaper. Both work, and personally I tend to opt for a finer sandpaper. You don't need deep gouges in the surface of the plates as this effectively reduces the distance between plates. On a microscopic scale, even fine sand paper creates enormous valleys and peaks. The other thing is that the peaks do help bubbles of gas to leave the plates as they form, as the bubbles effectively have less grip on the plates.
I have never said anything about removing the chromium? Why would you want to do that, it is the chromium that affords the protection as it oxidises? Where have I said that cleansing or conditioning can cause irreverisible damage?Originally posted by Stevo
I'm most certainly not getting these processes confused, but rather trying understand how either cleansing or conditioning can cause the ss to be damaged to the point to where it is "irreversible". I understand ss to be self-healing in a sense. Are you trying to say that somehow there is a way to remove all of the chromium in the ss via conditioning?
btw-
About 3/4 of the way down this page Bob Boyce explains conditioning as a process where low amperage is used just after the cleansing stage where instead NaOH is used at 20% and high amps in order to remove "surface chromium".
In fact you said this, not me!
Cleansing the plates initially is just to remove any oils and surface contaminants that exist as a result of the manufacturing process - basically washing them. The next step is conditioning the plates to leach out any reactive metals near the surface... I thought I'd made all this clear.Originally posted by Stevo
Seems that regardless of which method was used even these methods would cause serious and irreversible corrosion of the ss.
I have never found Boyce credible as his science is often dubious to say the least, but people are free to say what they want, just as people are free to believe what and who they want.
At the end of the day everyone on these forums would be wise to exhibit some scepticism and not simply take anyones word for anything. Following up with your own research and experimentation is the only real way to get to the truth. Too many people simply jump on the latest bandwagon and follow like sheep, without having a clue as to whether there are any real facts involved. Too often it is the blind leading the blind. And the uneducated and gullible will be only too happy to promote nonsense, just as what is happening in the Fast Freddy saga.
As an individual only you can decide on what makes sense and what doesn't, what is science fact and what is science fiction and what is truth or bullcrap, but a little effort may be required - simply tossing a coin is not the way to go!
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