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Author Topic: Working Air Battery  (Read 221271 times)

lasersaber

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #45 on: June 17, 2010, 03:38:32 PM »
@capthook
 
Thanks for sharing your thoughts.  None of the points you mentioned really matter for the applications I have in mind.  Here are some things to consider.
 
1 - Not everyone in this world has access to the grid.
2 - The Magnesium ribbon I am using can be bought easily for $3.50 a roll.  It may be even less in bulk from other sources.
3 - I think this same design could be built using aluminum and other metals.
4 - The carbon rod could also be a hollow tube design that would use at least 75% less carbon.
5 - They may very well last much longer than you are predicting.
 
I have two tests projects running at my house now that I will leave running until they stop.  This will give us some idea on how long they will last.  I have a motor running off a very small air battery and the flashlight connected to two large air batteries seen in my last YouTube video.  I will run them with out wetting them down and under constant load and see how long until they stop.
 
I have a dream of getting these perfected and making something like the Oxford Electric Bell: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_Electric_Bell  I think having an electric motor that runs for years on end with no up keep would be very cool.  I think I may have already have this worked out but the only way to know is more long term testing.

capthook

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #46 on: June 17, 2010, 06:20:55 PM »
1 - Not everyone in this world has access to the grid.
2 - The Magnesium ribbon I am using can be bought easily for $3.50 a roll.  It may be even less in bulk from other sources.
3 - I think this same design could be built using aluminum and other metals.
4 - The carbon rod could also be a hollow tube design that would use at least 75% less carbon.

I hope you folks don't think I'm saying there is no value to what is being discussed/examined here.
The idea of creating electricity from 'simple' items and in a 'simple' way is great.
Just wanted to give some numbers/math/costs etc. for all to see/use for a better evaluation.

To your points:

1 - Those without grid access tend to be in extremely poor areas so $/watt becomes even more important.
Solar/sun is available everywhere and the current benchmark of $1/watt from First Solar is hard to beat.
To cut the cost of the current airbattery by 1/2 is still $17/1.5W = $11/watt.
3 - Aluminum will probably see a reduction in output but result in production at a much lower $/watt.
4 - Excellent!  To expand on that idea, a 2nd layer of anodic material (aluminum) could be added to the interior of the tube, increasing output per cubic meter by 2x.  And the reduced graphite content would greatly reduce costs.  However, such a design would require speciality fabrication at increased initial tooling costs.

And for portable applications, watt/kg needs to be maximized.

From a chart (attached) in one of conradelektro's links (A for those links conradelektro), it shows graphite as the best cathode material and magnesium as the best anode materials.
The power you are producing is good @ ~ 2 amps and is undoubtly a direct result of using these materials.
However, the trade-off between output/size/weight/cost may favor materials like stainless steel and aluminium.

I really like your idea #4 - modifying the carbon rods.
The possibility of a 75% reduction weight/cost while increasing output by 2x.

capthook

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #47 on: June 17, 2010, 06:34:35 PM »
@capthook
 Thanks for sharing your thoughts.  None of the points you mentioned really matter for the applications I have in mind.

Ahem...
1) $/watt is of primary importance and matters to *all* applications
2) wh/kg is of primary importance for *portable* applications

 ;)

lasersaber

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #48 on: June 17, 2010, 07:05:44 PM »
Quote
Ahem...
1) $/watt is of primary importance and matters to *all* applications
2) wh/kg is of primary importance for *portable* applications

If you are looking for someone to argue with you will find that I am much more interested in building things than discussing in theory whether or not they will work.

jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #49 on: June 17, 2010, 10:19:09 PM »
Well, well, well,
I spent most of the morning researching magnesium stone (magnesite and bruxite) and sourcing magnesium so it could be used as a fuel cell. I do not know how to do that, but it seemed the right material.
I finished all I could do, then came here, and I am so glad you put those links up.

How do we find magnesium plates?
@pete,
Did you give us the details of the broken carbon rod thing?
It looks small and tidy, but I want details like how much of each material, please?

@conrad,
I will study that post more. I did not realize that cell has done so well.
All mine immediately ate through the electrodes which were Aluminum.
(of course they were making H2 gas with the aluminum)

@lasersaber,
Thanks for all your sharing.
It really helps.

The 5 inch broken carbon (welding) rod and 1.6gr mag ribbon battery I made a week ago started up after I opened the tape to allow some moisture in to the cloth, and it has been running a joule thief (for 14 hours) since yesterday.

thank you,

jeanna

PeteIdl4

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #50 on: June 18, 2010, 02:14:09 AM »
[quote A=jeanna link=topic=9276.msg245540#msg245540 date=1276805949]
@pete,
Did you give us the details of the broken carbon rod thing?
It looks small and tidy, but I want details like how much of each material, please?
[/quote]

Hi Jeanna,
I Didn't take precise measurements, but I have a really good estimate:
The carbon rod is roughly 2 inches long with a 1/2 inch diameter.

I used 11 turns of mag ribbon, so Pi times diameter equals 1.57 inches times 11 equals a total of 17.27 inches of mag ribbon, lets just say 18 to be safe.

I used a regular paper towel that i soaked in the solution i had mentioned before, the mixture I used is about 4 cups of water 1 tbl spoon of salt and about another tbl spoon of baking soda.

I think that's about it I drilled a small hole at the top of the rod and i just stuck a breadboard jumper cable in there for the anode connection. Coincidentally this is almost exactly the same size of a AA battery :). I hope this helps let me know if you have any more questions. Keep up the good work I'm a big fan of yours, lasersaber, lidmotor, and pirate's i really enjoy all of your videos and information everyone has shared.(sorry nerd moment ;D)

-Pete


jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #51 on: June 18, 2010, 04:06:52 AM »
Excellent!

I will give it a try.

I happen to have only broken welding rods and this looks good.

18 inches without the salt on a 5 inch carbon rod gave me barely enough for a red jtc, so I will do it again with the 2 salts to replicate and see. It will be a quick confirmation, which is always a good thing.  :D
Then I will make one with mg sulphate also.
We will get this down.

I got a 1" copper pipe today. The hardware store doesn't even carry 1 1/2 or 2" copper pipe anymore!
But it is bigger than the other one so it will show how much difference size of copper makes.

thank you,

jeanna

conradelektro

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #52 on: June 18, 2010, 09:01:59 PM »
More experiments with paper kitchen towel soaked in salt water

My personal reference cell is still the "copper - tile cement - aluminium cell" as posted here:
http://www.overunity.com/index.php?topic=972.825
Re: Crystal Power CeLL by John Hutchison
« Reply #833 on: May 31, 2010, 11:22:17 PM »

The size of the metal sheets is 120 x 120 mm; the metals so far are copper, mild steel and aluminium with little holes.


copper - salt water paper - aluminium --> 0.5 Volt and 1 mA

mild steel - salt water paper - aluminium --> 0.2 Volt and 0.5 mA

copper - tile cement - aluminium --> 1.02 to 1.17 Volt and 0.15 mA (seems to work with air humidity)

Remarks:

- the salt water paper is drying out over night; somehow one has to keep the salt water from evaporating; may be it would be better to submerge the metal plates in a saltwater container (not very practical, but good enough in a big stationary battery with many plates)

- applying pressure on the stack to squeeze the salt water paper helps (as the builders of Stubblefield coils observed)


Of course, one wants graphite and magnesium, which should give up to 1.8 Volt in between in salt water. And acids or many other chemicals work much better than simple table salt. But I am exploring easy to get materials and practical setups; sturdy, easy to build, easy to handle, readily available materials possibly for free like aluminium soda cans, steel from abandoned cars and ordinary salt or possibly sea water.


I posted a few more details about the tile cement:
http://www.overunity.com/index.php?topic=972.840
Re: Crystal Power CeLL by John Hutchison
« Reply #853 on: June 18, 2010 at 10:44:34 AM »


@ Lasersaber:

In this thread, do we discuss graphite - magnesium batteries only, or also other materials?


Greetings, Conrad

jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #53 on: June 18, 2010, 11:15:45 PM »
Hi everyone.
It is time for a little entertainment.
I made a "AA" battery from C and Mg yesterday as Pete showed.

In the first shot it is newly made. You can see the magnesium pretty clearly.
In the second one the 2 leds which are in series are still on after about 24 hours.
I learned the other day that in this jtc if I add a 47uF cap across the leads the light flicker is so fast it is beyond seeing, whereas the 1F memory cap stores more and then lights the light brighter, but only some of the time, depending on the mA output of the battery.
So,
2 1/2 inches length carbon rod (1/4-3/8"? diameter)
0.7 gr Mg ribbon
I also had to tie the Mg tight with a string to get it into close enough contact with the carbon rod.
2N2222 transistor, 470 ohm base r, 84T secondaary jtc
47uF cap across the leads.


#1= newly made
#2= after 24 hours running

jeanna

oops, I forgot to say I soaked the paper towel in epsom salts.
I know it works as a salt, and I am hoping it will outlast table salt and help keep the magnesium on the ribbon  ;)

jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #54 on: June 18, 2010, 11:29:25 PM »
Hi Pete
Your voltmeter is showing a reading of .57 volts. How are you able to run 3 LED's on this small amount of voltage?
Bill
I meant to answer this yesterday. Sorry for the delay.
When you are using a joule thief and you read across the leads, you will always have a reading of the battery output MINUS the use of the transistor.
so, it is safe to add back around 0.7v
Therefore Lasersaber's reading of 0.57v + 0.7v =1.34v .

jeanna

PeteIdl4

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #55 on: June 19, 2010, 12:40:55 AM »
@jeanna,

Great job and thanks for your pics. Just one question, when you say it's been runing for 24 hours is that without adding more water for that whole period of time? If so that's really good as mine seems to only last for about 4 hours on one drop of water, although i haven't tried adding a cap to see if that will help i guess i'll try that next. Thanks for sharing your results.

-Pete

jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #56 on: June 19, 2010, 01:05:18 AM »
Oh yes, add the cap.
It stopped last night, but when I held the ribbon tight against the cloth it went back on, and that is the reason for the string. (It is yellow string. I think you can see it in the pic.)
So, I think it went out not because it was dry, but it wasn't touching the wet cloth.
But it had a fast flicker, and the cap made that appear to stop.

Try the cap.
I think you will have to try some different cap sizes.
Too big and it stops the light or makes a slooowww pulse; too small and the flicker stays the same.

This is a sweet little AA .
A q:
Are those 3 leds in parallel?

jeanna

PeteIdl4

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #57 on: June 19, 2010, 01:36:49 AM »
@Jeanna,

Thanks for the info I will definitely try adding some caps. As for your question, yes they are in parallel I took these lights from a small flashlight I bought and I just left the circuit they came in intact and added a JTC to it. I have a few more pictures to share the first one is showing the milli-amp reading off the little cell it drops from about 40 and holds steady at about 31. The second is showing 12 LEDs lit with the same cell all in parallel. Once again thanks for the info.

-Pete

jeanna

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #58 on: June 19, 2010, 03:41:32 AM »
Nice!

I did not drill the little hole in the carbon. I just wrapped  some bare copper wire around it about 6 times. Maybe I should try the little hole on one.
I got my 5 rolls of magnesium wire and it is now easy to try a bunch of things!

31mA is awesome from such a small battery.

jeanna

Mk1

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Re: Working Air Battery
« Reply #59 on: June 19, 2010, 03:58:04 AM »
@all

All i think soda cans can be used , and cut to fit most any pipe or carbon rod you have , magnesium dose give high voltages but because it is the most anodic element anything we use to connect to it will break the wire , why do car rust galvanic mismatch of metals some water(electrolyte) bam free energy if it only powered the car , humm .

@jeanna

Nice work , on this and the Ns , i have comments on that more on the other tread ...


 @conrad

Cement dries in 30 days and take about 3 month to exit the rest of the moisture , dose it still work beyond that ?