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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 a stainless steel plate". The electrons get pushed or pulled out of their orbit
from around their atom - by a force. In our case it is the Voltage that supplies the force
(with HHO or
Electrolysis of water).
Voltage is electrical pressure. Your
automobile creates it and stores it in a battery - while you drive.
Everything in your automobile that operates on voltage, gets its power
from the battery. The battery 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 is turned by the engine. The voltage causes electrons
to move down a wire and into the battery. The electrons run all of your
electrical equipment. 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 HHO 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,
electron current will not be equally distributed across the plate
surface. If that were to happen, electrons would pile up at close
crossing areas, and heat would build up.
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 a plate has, the more amperage it can distribute; thus
the more HHO it can produce.
Faraday determined that 1 square inch
of plate surface can efficiently distribute 0.54 amperes. He tells
us that 1 ampere, distributed across two adjacent plates, can produce 0.0003689 Cubic Feet/Minute of HHO gas.
That translates into 10.44 Milliliters Per Minute (MLPM). You see, the hydrogen
side needs
one square inch and the oxygen side needs one square inch. Faraday is
describing a water cell (two plates separated by water). The plates are generally spaced 1/16
to 1/8 inch
apart, sometimes more. So actually we need one square inch of surface area
on each side of the water.
Hydrogen is made
on one side and oxygen on the opposite side. Our HHO
generator is going to need a lot of plates - in pairs. Each needs to
have the same amount of surface area. Each pair makes up what we call a
Cell; a water compartment. The total number of Cells is going to be a big factor in how much
hydrogen and oxygen gas we make, and the size of the plate surface is
going to determine how much amperage we can distribute efficiently. 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 to 3 volts). I
discovered that each electrolyte has a different minimum voltage. NaOH minimum voltage is 1.69 and KOH
minimum voltage is 1.67. As it turns out, the electrolyte solution
affects the voltage between multiple plates. Faraday's 1.24 volts was based on
using battery
acid. Keep in mind, the voltage is the electrical pressure.
Through trial and error, I have concluded that we
need closer to 2.0 volts, more or less; as Bob Boyce says.
Around 2 volts will provide long continuous operating times. So, if we
keep the voltage, between our plates, at or close to 2 volts, we will not have problems
with heat, as long as we distribute the amperage at no more than 0.54 amps
per square inch of a plates surface. That is the key for efficiency.
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
water cell needs let's say 2 volts to power it. We do not have a 2 volt power
supply, we have a 12 to 14.5 volt power supply. So instead
of using expensive electronics to make our voltage, we will simply
configure multiple
cells together in Series. That is, we will place additional
electrode plates between the positive and negative
electrode plates. Each plate we add will make another water area for the
electrical current to cross. Each water area will cause a voltage drop
(reduction). The voltage drops need to be close to 2 volts each (measured across
any two adjacent plates).
So divide the operating voltage by 2 volts and you will get the number of
cells (water areas) needed for efficient voltage. Round off the number to the nearest whole number.
If you count the plates, there will be one more plate than the number of
water compartments.
In
the following examples, "n" represents electrode plates
that have been added between the positive and negative electrode plates.
The space
between them represents the water areas they form (cells). The "n" is
what we call a Neutral plate (that is another subject). We are
going to divide the operating voltage of the vehicle by the number of
water compartments in our Serial Configuration. That will give us our
voltage drop per water cell.
Examples:
-
12v divided by 6 water compartments =
2v
7 plates would make 6 water compartments, 2 volts each
The cell configuration would look like this +_ n_ n_ n_ n_ n_ - (count
the 6 spaces)
-
12.5v divided by 10 water
compartments = 1.25v 11
plates
would make 10 water compartments, 1.25 volts each.
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 calculate this for you.
What we know so far is that enough
electrode plates are needed to drop the voltage and produce the amount of HHO we need, at no
more than 0.54 amps per square inch of plate surface area, at or near 2 volts per
water compartment (cell). That
is it. that is the balance we need for efficiency.
You can make 1 liter of
HHO, using fewer electrodes and less
surface area, simply by increasing the amperage.
But the result will cause excess heat. Excessive heat will shorten your
cells Operating Time, and will cause amperage to eat away at your
electrode plates. Nearly every Hydrogen Generator
on the market is designed this way......to produce excess heat. The
builders don't know any better. They copy each others products and use
higher amperage than their surface area can handle efficiently. They use
fewer plates than needed for efficiency. And they sell you on the Liters
Per Minute their products can produce - when they should be selling you
on how long their products can Operate without overheating.
Now that we have a good plate configuration
based on the operating voltage of our automobile, how do we get the amperage
we need. It starts with the spacing between the plates. The closer the
plates are, the less resistance there is between them in the water.
Water has a very high resistance to electrical current wanting to pass
though it or across it. We must add electrolytes to it in order to
make it pass electrons better. The more electrolyte we add, the
lower the resistance gets between the negative and positive plates. When the resistance gets low enough,
electrons start moving through the water. The lower the resistance gets, the more
amperage we get traveling 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 HHO
bubbles
to travel through. The bubbles 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 turning 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 Emissions Computer. That is another subject. |
