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I do not want to confuse those who have
very limited knowledge of basic electronics, so I will not go into deep
explanations of the Electron Theory. Instead, I will simply state that
"Amperage is the flow, or movement, of electrons on a conductor - such as
a copper wire or stainless steel plate". The electrons get pushed or pulled out of their orbit
around their atom - by a force. In our case, that is with HHO or
Electrolysis of water, It is the voltage that supplies the force.
Voltage is electrical pressure. Your
automobile creates it while you drive, and stores it in a battery.
Everything in your automobile that operates on voltage, gets its power
from the battery. The battery even supplies power to the alternator;
even though the alternator is what puts voltage in the battery.
What I need you to understand is that
the
alternator creates the voltage as it turns. The voltage causes electrons
to move down a wire and into the battery. The electrons run all of your
electrical parts. The more electrons you use, the harder your alternator
has to work to keep the battery charged. The harder the alternator
works, the harder it is for the engine to turn it. The movement of these
electrons is called current. We measure it with an ammeter.
The unit of
measure is in amperes or Amps for short.
I hope you are with me at this point,
because I need you to understand that increasing the amperage of a
hydrogen generator, can affect the fuel economy of an automobile. It can
raise it or lower it.
A hydrogen generator, better known as an
HHO generator, or cell, uses voltage and amperage to force water to give
up its molecules of hydrogen and oxygen gases. The amount of gas depends
mostly on two things; how well the water passes the amperage, and how
much amperage travels across the electrodes surface area.
The electrons do not pass through the metal
plates; they travel around the outer surface. They take the path of
least resistance. So it is very important to evenly space the
electrode plates equal distance apart; perfectly parallel to one another. If not,
current density will not be equally distributed across the plate
surface. If that were to happen, heat would build up at close crossings.
We do not want that to happen.
The electrodes in the hydrogen generator
are called Plates. The plates are normally made of type 316L stainless steel
(because of the durable characteristics of the metal).
The hydrogen and oxygen molecules form on the plate surfaces. So, the
more surface area, the amperage potential we have.
It has been determined that 1 square inch
of plate surface can efficiently electrolyze 0.54 amperes. It is also
know that 1 ampere can produce 0.0003689 Cubic Feet/Minute of HHO gas (Faraday). You see, the hydrogen needs
one square inch and the oxygen needs one square inch. Faraday is
describing a cell (two plates separated by water). The plates are generally spaced 1/16 or 1/8 inch
apart. So actually we need one square inch of sandwiched surface area
(one square inch from each side of the water).
Look at it as if you have a one inch square sandwich; hydrogen is made
on one side and oxygen on the other. It will be much easier to understand. Here is why. Our HHO
generator is going to need a lot of plates; in pairs. Each pair needs to
have the same amount of surface area (sandwiched). The total of all of
that surface area is going to be a big factor in how much amperage the
cell can operate with efficiently, and the amperage is going to
determine how much hydrogen and oxygen gas we make. That is the
theory.
It has also been determined that
electrolysis of water is most efficient at 1.24 volts (Faraday says
1.24v, Brown says 1.48v, and Boyce says 2.0v). I
just recently discovered that NaOH minimum voltage is 1.69 and KOH
minimum voltage is 1.67. As it turns out, the electrolyte solution
affects the voltage drop. Faraday's 1.24 volts was based on sulfuric
acid. Keep in mind, the
voltage is the electrical pressure. So, if we keep the voltage, between
our sandwiched plates, at or close to 1.24, we will not have any problem
with heat, as long as we can keep the amperage per square inch of each
sandwiched cell, at no more than 0.54 amps, That is the formula. That is the trick. Through
trial and error, I have concluded that Faraday's 1.24 volts is
difficult when using 12 to 15 volt power sources, because of the
amount of electrolyte needed to lower the resistance of the water. We
need a balance of sandwiched square inches of plate surface, 0.54 amps
per square inch, and closer to 2.0 volts, more or less, as Bob Boyce says.
Around 2 volts will provide long operating times.
Let's look at our operating voltage; our
charging system and battery. The voltage varies, depending on
automobiles, but it usually is between 12.5 volts and 14.5 volts. A single
sandwiched cell needs let's say 2 volts. We do not have a 2 volt power
supply, we have a 12 to 14.5 volt power supply (more or less). So instead
of using electronics to achieve our goal, we will simply chain multiple
cells together, with positive from the battery on one end, and negative
from the battery on the far end, with additional plates between them
forming cell water areas. Each cell will cause a voltage reduction
(drop). The voltage drops need to add up to be close to 2 volts (measured across
any two adjacent plates).
So divide the operating voltage by 2 and you will get the number of
cells (water areas) needed. Now round off the number to the nearest whole number. In
the following example, "n" represents electrode plates, and the space
between the "n's" represent water areas (cells). The "n" is
what we call a neutral plate (that is another subject).
Examples:
-
12 / 2 = 6
7 plates would provide 6 water areas, 2 volts each (that is close).
The cell configuration would look like this +_ n_ n_ n_ n_ n_ - (count
the 6 spaces)
-
12.5 / 1.24 = 10.08 11
plates
would provide 1.25 volts 10 plates would be 1.39 volts.
10 cells would look like this + n n n n n n n n n -
-
Don't let this confuse you. I built a
configurator that will do this for you.
What we know so far is that enough
plate surface area is needed to produce the amount of HHO we need, at no
more than 0.54 amps per square inch, at or near 2 volts per cell. That
is it. that is the balance we need.
You can make 1 liter of gas, using less
surface area, simply by increasing the amperage.
But the result will cause excess heat. Nearly every Hydrogen Generator
on the market is designed this way......to produce excess heat. They use
higher amperage than their surface area can handle.
Now that we have a good plate configuration
based on the operating voltage of our automobile, how do we get the amperage
we need. We start with the spacing between the plates. The closer the
plates are, the less resistance there is in the water between them.
Water has very high resistance to electrical current. We have to add electrolytes to it to
make it pass electricity better. The more electrolyte we add, the
lower the resistance gets. When the resistance gets low enough, current
(amps) starts moving through the water. The lower the resistance gets, the more
amperage we get through the water. If you build a cell with half inch
spaces or gaps between each plate, you will need to use twice as much
electrolyte as you would if the spacing was a 1/4 inch. Still better,
1/16 inch gaps would provide even less resistance. But do not go less
than 1/16 inch. If you do, you will not leave enough space for the gases
to travel through. Gases will keep the plate surface clear of water. We
need the water on the plates at all times. Keep in mind, as the electrical pressure
increases (that is the voltage or the amperage) so increases the HHO
output.
There are a lot of Hydrogen Generators on
the market. Some of them proclaim good output; some proclaim good
efficiency; some proclaim how cool they operate. They all have one thing
in common, they make Hydrogen and Oxygen gas, one way or another. I hope
now you have a better understanding of what makes these generators work.
You can use the Cell Plate Configurator I built, to check the
efficiencies of their cells.
One last thing, remember the alternator I mentioned in the
beginning? The harder it works, the harder it is for the engine to turn
it. Amperage is the reason. So if you are using that alternator to
supply the amperage, your Hydrogen Generator is going to make the engine work
harder. If you want better fuel economy, you will need to limit the
extra load that your Cell causes. You will have to find that happy medium.
For instance, when you run your air conditioner, it affects your fuel
mileage some what. But the air conditioner does not put energy back into
the engine; in our case, the Hydrogen Cell does. So limit your HHO
production to the efficiencies of your alternators resistance to the
engine. If you are not seeing any fuel efficiency improvements, then you
need to look into changing the Air/Fuel ratio that is controlled by your
engines Computer. That is another subject. |
