New To HHO. Got Questions About Plate Material and Electrolytes

[myoldyourgold]

CONDUCTIVITY OF METALS SORTED BY RESISTIVITY

http://www.eddy-current.com/condres.htm

[H2OPWR]

I have used just about everything and here is my 2 cents worth. Hitempmetals sells Nickel 200. You can buy just about any size you want. Buy 35 guage or so and media blast it. First use 80 grit or so and do a good blast. It is easy to warp the metal but with care you can keep it flat. Then switch to a very fine media. Maybe 320 grit or so. It is difficult to use because it is like blasting baby powder but important as the surface area greatly increases. I can help with advice as to how to make it work if you are interested. You can get away with much less metal if you use nicklel because heat will not cause hexcrom like ss leaches, The overall cost of meterials will not be that much more because you can feed Nickel with more amps than you can feed SS. The device can be smaller and still get the same volume of gas.

Simply if you want to do good tests go big or go home!

Larry

[charliebrumfield]

how much are we talking cost wise? ever where i've called to ask about the nickel 200 plates has quoted me astronomical prices.

[H2OPWR]

I read through this thread. You priced really thick stuff. Yes Nickel is more expensive. I will admit I used 316L Stainless for my last build because I used plates. At that time I beleive raw material Nickel over stainless was 6 times the price. The last Nickel I bought cost me about $30.00 per pound. I made 20 8X8 plates and if my emory is working the raw material cost was about $20.00 per plate or so. I am not sure what your goal for LPM is but you can push the Nickel much harder than the stainless so the size can be smaller. You might look up Shane Jackson in the members list as well. I know he had some Nickel plates for sale at a really good price. He bought a larger quantity than I did so he got a better price. Shane doesn't hang around here any more but if you e-mail him I am sure he would answer. If he does not answer you then let me know. I can get in touch with him.

On another topic I read that you want to use Titanium as the cathode and another metal as the Anode like Nickel. I would be careful with that one. I have never personally used Titanium but know several that have. It has only one redeaming quality. It does not leach hexcrom. Other than that it is your worst choice. I would avoid using dis-similar metals in a cell. Just like not using a dielectric union to connect copper to steel pipe. Or how the stubblefield coil works. The softer metal always gives up its electron and corrodes. I think the Stainless or Nickel might have a real problem being used along with Titanium. I could be completely wrong but if you did use Nickel and Titanium in the same cell and ruined the Nickel you would not be a happy camper.

Good luck with your project. I look forward to seeing how you can make HHO work by programing your ECU to accept it. It is something I always wanted to see someone do.

Larry

[Brent]

Keep in mind pure Nickle (Alloy 200) is about twice the cost of Titanium. And the sizes needed are not that big so finding surplus drop pieces isn't that hard. Ti drops can be sold retail for far more money then to recyclers. There also more industrial uses for Ti then pure nickle.

But that won't stop me from experimenting with nickle down the road either. HHO is one avenue of technology that needs a lot of experimenters constantly trying new ideas.

[charliebrumfield]

thanks for the input guys. and brent you hit it spot on. the more folks plugging away at cell designs the better off we will be in the long run.

h20pwr i really like the idea of using nickel for all the plates but even if i just bought enough nickel for the anodes at 20 bones a plate that puts my cost at $360 there's no way i could plunk down another $360 for the cathodes as well. and good call about the dissimilar metals. it really easy to forget that we are all essentially creating an electro plating tank. however i won't be using a metal for the anode. so i wonder if it would have the same effect? i'm going to order some grafoil and see if i can get that to work. if not it's cheep enough that it won't break the bank.

[H2OPWR]

thanks for the input guys. and brent you hit it spot on. the more folks plugging away at cell designs the better off we will be in the long run.

h20pwr i really like the idea of using nickel for all the plates but even if i just bought enough nickel for the anodes at 20 bones a plate that puts my cost at $360 there's no way i could plunk down another $360 for the cathodes as well. and good call about the dissimilar metals. it really easy to forget that we are all essentially creating an electro plating tank. however i won't be using a metal for the anode. so i wonder if it would have the same effect? i'm going to order some grafoil and see if i can get that to work. if not it's cheep enough that it won't break the bank.

I followed a thread on another forum a couple of years ago on Graphite plates. The thread had one guy pushing Graphite as the plate material and several others following his lead. The guy touting graphite was origionally on this site but left to start his Graphite plate thread on another site. He called the people here Stainless Sheeples and laughed at them all for refusing Graphite. To make a long story short all his followers ended up mad at him because the Graphite turned the water black and performed poorly. The followers were mad because he claimed to have been running his cell for years but there was never any video proof. The thread abruptly ended with the guy saying the Graphite supplier must have sold them all the wrong product. There were never any additional posts after that.

I am not saying it wont work. In fact if it is cheap enough I would love to see someone try it. I am just recounting the only time I have even read about it being used.

Here is everything I have tried and my results.

Lead plates. Worked well for a VERY short time then the lead from the anode eroded and shorted out the entire cell. A complete failure.

Brass, Seemed to work OK but turned black quickly and was not as effecient as Stainless.

Stainless Steel 316L, The all around workhorse. Can leach hexcrom if overdriven but if you do not overdrive the plates works well.

Nano Particle coated Stainless, Outstanding production. The best performing material I have ever used but you don't even want to know how much it costs. Also after a long tome the coating came off. Maybe because I over worked it. Just TOO EXPENSIVE to try again.

Nickel 200, My first choice if I were making a reasonable sized cell. Overall better performance than stainless with no bad side effects. It is just very expensive.

I have always wanted to try a copper cathode and a nickel anode but have neeb afraid of the dissimilar metal issue. I know as an anode the copper will be destroyed very quickly as it corrodes and plates on the anode.



Another thing you will have to think about. If you are using a bipolar or neutral plate set up you don't have seperate anodes and cathodes except on your power plates. All the neutral plates are bipolar. One side will be an anode while the other side will be a cathode. You would have to somehow bond the two together while still letting them conduct electricity. That will be quite the trick.

If you are making a unipolar style cell then you can make it work.

Larry

[charliebrumfield]

i've read that post. as a matter of fact that is what pointed me in the direction of grafoil. grafooil is not the same stuff they used to make their reactors. grafoil is used to make gaskets that have to stand up to corrosive environments. so i think it should hold up to the electrolyte. now it still may fall apart once you run current thought it, but since i only payed 3 dollars a plate for them i figured it's going to be worth a shot.

[H2OPWR]

i've read that post. as a matter of fact that is what pointed me in the direction of grafoil. grafooil is not the same stuff they used to make their reactors. grafoil is used to make gaskets that have to stand up to corrosive environments. so i think it should hold up to the electrolyte. now it still may fall apart once you run current thought it, but since i only payed 3 dollars a plate for them i figured it's going to be worth a shot.

You still have one big problem to solve before you start your build. I did look at the links you posted that show how you want to build your cell.

You are building a standard Tero Ranta style dry cell. You will be using neutral plates in your design. Your neutral plate which are commonly referred to as bipolar plates are not either an anode or a cathode. Each neutral plate is in fact both. One side will be an anode and the other side will be a cathode. You will end up with a Grafoil plate that is positive on one side and negative on the other side. Then the next plate will be Titanium. It will also be positive on one side and negative on the other. In effect both materials will be both anodes and cathodes. The anode side of the Titanium will quickly corrode and stop producing. That is why the people using Titanium use the MMO coating to protect the Titanium.

Larry

[charliebrumfield]

the links i posted were in response to someone asking about how to build a dry cell. i'm not actually building a bipolar or tero ranta style dry cell i'm building a unipolar dry cell. bio farmer convinced me to do that in the first couple of posts.