Electrochemistry Frazzled

[kane333]

Hey everyone. It's been one of those days, nothing seems to have gone right. I hate Mondays :roll:

My first attempt at the Sulfuric Cell today. Watched Steve's video 3 times just to make sure I wasn't forgetting anything. Pyrex flat dish with lid. Check. Glass Stir Rod. Check. Sulfuric Acid (Liquid Lightning). Check. Flat Tupperware dish with lid for rinsing. Check. Brand new 12v Battery Charger....couldn't find it for the life of me. I spent more than half an hour searching everywhere. Even went on Amazon to check my account, to make sure they shipped it. I finally found it. Now I'm happy again. For the moment.

I set the Pyrex dish up, and start pouring the Liquid Lightning. Ack! This stuff isn't clear. It's dark as black coffee. Looks like I've been deplating all day. Hope this stuff works...

So I set a GP Ring on the mesh and lower it down into the bath for a test run. Turn on the Battery Charger. Nothing happens. Start playing with the buttons. 2A, nothing. 8A, still nothing. 12A. Not a bubble forms. Did I get a bad battery charger? I disconnect the leads and click them together. No Spark. Now I'm thinking I got a bad battery charger. I break out the DMM to test it, no reading. Still thinking it's a bad charger, I read the manual. It's got one of those safety devices that won't allow amperage to flow unless it's hooked up to a battery! No matter what I tried, I couldn't get the thing to work. :x

Last resort. Does anyone know how to disable the safety device on one of these? It's a Schumacher Speed Charge I got through Amazon. If not, I'll be heading to Radio Shack tomorrow for a variable power supply. Only problem with those is you have to make your own leads.

So here I sit tonight, staring at 5lbs of GP pins, and 3lbs of GP Jewelry.

Hope you all had a better day than I did.

 

[butcher]

Try this get a 12volt lamp for your head light on your car, see if the battery charger will light it up, if that works on your battery charger, try putting it in series with your cell, another option use your car battery for the cell, charging the battery with your charger.

To test your new battery charger, measure the voltage on your car battery, should be around 12.6 to 13 volts, now hook up your new battery charger, you should now see the voltage of your battery raise to around 14 to 14.5 volts while charging from the charger.

 

[Woodworker1997]

I would be inclined not to use a car battery directly without some kind of current limiter.

Derek

 

[Geo]

i agree about the battery. theres nothing to limit the amps. i used the battery out of my truck with my first cell because i couldnt find a manual battery charger locally and i was getting antsy. it over heated the cell within the first minute of use. i wound up with alot of base metal in my gold powder and being a newb, i thought all the powder was gold. :roll: it was a shock to say the least when half the weight disappeared when i refined it.

 

[kane333]

So I got a power supply from Radio Shack and its working fine. Only thing, it doesn't have a meter so. I am only doing small amounts at a time. Problem is, there's a lot of foam coming off the lead anode. And it doesn't seem to be dissipating. Will this foaminess ever subside? It's probably because of the Liquid Lightning.

Also, I'm sure the rinse water collects small amounts of the powder. How does the rinse water get treated?

 

[element47.5]

At the risk of opining without seeing your setup, it sounds to me like the original power supply you had was/is a switching power supply, which will work, but as you said, one of the characteristics is that it has to see SOME kind of load before it start and then work. If it is very light in weight, it is probably a switcher. Most "non-switcher" (aka "linear") supplies (old-style battery chargers) will be built around a beefy transformer, so they will weigh. Yours will work under the right conditions. If that supply is your preferred one, you are going to have to bridge the terminals of the supply with a resistor. One easy way to do this is to prepare a resistor with flexible leads on both ends and with alligator clips on the ends of those wires. You could place this near your cell but it would possibly corrode, thus it would be better to place it near the power supply. Either way *should* work.

The value of said resistor? You have 12 volts and let's say you'd like 1/4 amp to flow to get the supply started. E = IR. Volts = Amps * Ohms. Thus, 12 = 1/4 * ohms. That's a 48 ohm resistor, a 50 ohm is close enough. Power rating? I [squared] * Ohms. Thus 1/4 * 1/4 * Ohms or 1/16th of 50 or about 3 watts. At Radio Shack, get a 10 watt 50 ohm resistor, or 75 ohm, or 100 ohm. Such a resistor (capable of dissipating that amount of power) will likely take the form of a 3/8" x 3/8" * 2" ceramic deal.

 

[gold4mike]

Problem is, there's a lot of foam coming off the lead anode. And it doesn't seem to be dissipating.

You should be using the lead as the cathode, not the anode.