Hydrogen Generator!

[dfoxengr]

lol i get tons of stuff from there. i wouldnt worry about it "blowing up" but it could cause a fire. i would suggest making a very good outter container to contain blasts if possible. it is very unlikely that a flame will come back out through the intake valves anyways. especially on a stock cammed motor...

[SVOboy]

Can anyone put up some good electrolysis theory background stuff for those of us who have only done one chemistry course? Thanks in advance.

[Flatland2D]

Last night I produced hydrogen substantially faster than I had ever done before. The secret was boiling the water. I've heard this theory discussed before but I haven't seen anyone implement in their hydrogen generator. I couldn't believe my eyes when I put the electrodes in. The surface of the water/salt mixture was convex from the large amount of bubbles rising to the surface. The electrolyte was continually being mixed by the convection caused by the bubbles.

The idea behind boiling the water is to give the water molecules an energy boost so it takes less electricity to supply the remainding energy to break the molecule apart.

The cathode (the electrode producing the H2) was eroding much faster than the anode. Maybe it is only necessary to have one electrode with high corrosion resistence and the other is less important. I had not seen my electrodes erode so fast before.

I tried a two cell generator in series to keep the current the same but divide the voltage across each cell. Unfortunately my idea about voltage being independent of H2 production was wrong. There are many more bubbles at full voltage than at half voltage. I will probably rig up a better test device to confirm this. I'm still using drinking glasses and coat hangers for electrodes. Even though two cells at half voltage are producing less bubbles per cell, they still might be producing more bubbles together than one cell at full voltage. I would consider up to four cells in my generator. There might be a current/voltage trade-off.

I still haven't gone up to sulfuric acid as an electrode, which is supposed to be much better than salt. Electrode erosion will probably happen much faster, but I will try to make it to the metal supplies store soon to by the highest grade steel I can find and samples of other corrosion resistent metals.

So now I've been thinking about how to heat up my generator in the car. I am thinking about using a water jacket like in the picture I made below. It consists of one container inside another with engine coolant (green) heating up the inner container.

<img src="http://www.morlinos.com/delsol/waterjacket.GIF">

My only reservation about this is that I don't want to mess with the coolant system too much. Any mistakes on my part could permanently damage my engine. The coolant hoses are too wide to simply put a T fitting on. I would want to avoid drilling and tapping my radiator. I could always use an electric heater, but they consume lots of energy, especially to get up to boiling point. I wouldn't want to strain the alternator too much. There's too much heat under the hood to let it all go to waste. Anyone have some ideas on how I might heat this thing up? I've heard someone give the idea of wrapping small diameter copper tubing about an exhaust header which might work, but might also require a pump. The heated fluid might pump itself, like how a heat pump works. I don't know.

Any ideas? Comments?

[SVOboy]

I dun see why rerouting the coolant is such a big deal. In my experience with WVO the main thing is rerouting the coolant so that is goes all the way to the back of the car and hangs around in the second tank to heat up the oil. I've never seen anyone have a problem with something like that or talk about that having a potential for problems.

[Flatland2D]

Sounds good. Let me go outside and see if there's anywhere I can easily tap off the coolant.

[SVOboy]

It should be basically anywhere on the old flexy lines. I dunno how you'll do it with all the coolant running through or some or what? Might consider some vavles and blah blah blah for testing and easy isolation and blah, mehbe, I dunno.

[Matt Timion]

First of all, I have a question, and then I have an idea as to how you can reroute your coolant.

Why not just produce the hydrogen at home and somehow get it into a kerosine tank? you can then replace electrodes when you need to. it is also much easier to boil water on a gas stove, and much cheaper too.

Okay, back to an idea.

At the bottom of the radiator and at the bottom of the engine block there should be a coolant drain. It's usually a small threaded bolt that when you unscrew it all of the coolant comes out.

Why not get a hose with a threaded end and just attach it to the drain? Obviously this idea needs some work, but it would be very easy to tap into that hole. No drilling needed.

[Flatland2D]

I think it would be difficult to store the amount of hydrogen required because it would have to be pressurized to get it small enough to carry in a car. I believe the hydrogen storage tanks used on fuel cell cars are pressurized to 5000 psi. Electrolysis will only pressurize the produced gasses to a small fraction of that. It is a promising idea though and it is the way fuel cell cars are working already. The only problem is that you can't buy hydrogen at gas stations yet. At home you could at least be producing 24 hours a day with almost no current limitations, but storage at high pressure is a problem for an amateur.

Just connecting to the drain cock would not allow a return path for the coolant to flow through. It would have to be cycled back to the radiator somehow.
EDIT: Just realized you said there is a drain at the bottom of the engine block, too. That would be enough to provide a pathway through the device.

I got that part figured out now. Upon inspection, I saw there is a 1/4" hose that tee's off of the main coolant hose and takes it to the throttle body. After a little research, disconnecting the coolant to the throttle body is a widely done modification. It is only used to keep the throttle body from freezing in extremely cold climates and has the adverse effect of heating the incoming air once the engine gets warm. I don't think I'll have the freezing problem down here in Texas, but even people in freezing climates said the mod hasn't caused any problems. I plan to carry coolant to my generator by either putting it inline with the coolant going to the throttle body, or disconnecting the coolant to the throttle body and using is exclusively for my generator.

[Matt Timion]

I always thought that warm air was GOOD for gas mileage. wouldn't a coolant hose connected to the TB effectively heat the incoming air, thus helping increase mileage?

i've heard so much about warm air versus cold air, that I really don't know any more which is best for gas mileage.

[SVOboy]

I think the warm air is better as it gives you less air actually around, and the hybrid people is where that idea is coming from and they test things really meticulously, but the CAI people are all just performance people who don't really care that much (from my experience). However, I am thinking the coolant to the intake is meant to thin out the gas, especially in cold weather, so that it sprays finer through the injectors.