[NewCandle] Rolled Al hydrolysis

[Nick Reiter]

Hi Keith,

Sounds great - we shall see what bubbles up!

OK, on Friday, I did some playing around with aluminum
in about a 1M KOH solution.  I have a 1000ml beaker
that I lined the inside of with stainless steel
screen, to make a relatively normal electrolysis
electrode.  I then used a variety of aluminum rods,
foil twistees, flat bars, etc in the center as a
counter-electrode.  I wanted to see if there was a
potential between the dissolving aluminum and the
stainless outer electrode, given about 500ml of KOH
solution filling the beaker.

There was typically about a (-) 750 to 800 millivolts
potential open circuit between the inner sizzling Al
and the outer stainless screen.  Shorting this through
a milliampmeter gave some surprisingly high currents,
from 200mA up to nearly an amp, depending on the
aluminum electrode.  Now here was a curiosity, though
I presume an explainable one.  When I would short the
clip leads between inner and outer electrodes, the
erosion and bubbling at the center aluminum rod would
be suppressed or diminish.  Presumably if one biases
the inner positive with respect to the stainless...
you would suppress bubbling even more, and ta da da da
make our old friend the anode glow.

I reckon then that one could tap H2 at the same time
as your aluminum alkaline battery is sacrificing
itself.  No doubt plenty o' patents exist for it...
still it was a fun lunch hour!

N


--- Keith Nagel <NewCandleAdmin at ipdiscover.com> wrote:

> OK, I've done something just now.
> 
> I started with a 25 ft roll of White Rose brand Al
> foil.
> Donning a pair of rubber gloves, I removed the
> cardboard
> roll and cut the roll in half with a pair of shears.
> I saved one half, and dropped the other in an HDPE
> container, after cleaning with acetone and distilled
> water.
> I filled the container and sealed it.
> 
> We'll see what develops over the next few days.
> 
> I expect the Al to corrode, Al ions displacing H
> from the
> water and leaving an excess of OH. That OH will end
> up
> on the body of the Al, in the form of mixed
> hydroxides/oxides.
> 
> I think the foliated structure enhances this for
> perhaps the same
> reasons that corrosion occurs more rapidly at a
> crack in the
> paint than a plain metal surface equally exposed to
> the elements. 
> 
> While browsing the "roll" section of the local
> grocery, I
> came across parchment paper and wax paper. Either
> ought
> to be good enough to use as a dielectric as you
> suggested.
> I'm not such a snob as you think, Jones (grin). They
> say
> that anyone can make a bridge, but it takes an
> engineer
> to make one that _just barely_ stands up. 
> 
> I have heard strange stories about corrosion of Al,
> from miners
> who use it to displace precious metals from heap
> leachings.
> Perhaps these experiments can help shed some light?
> 
> K.
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: newcandle-bounces at ipdiscover.com
> [mailto:newcandle-bounces at ipdiscover.com]On Behalf
> Of Nick Reiter
> Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2007 12:28 PM
> To: New energy for the new world.
> Subject: [NewCandle] Rolled Al hydrolysis
> 
> 
> Ahoy, Keith,
> 
> Was curious if you had tried the roll-o-foil in the
> distilled water cylinder yet?
> 
> I started another one going.  After about a 48 hour
> catalyzing period or dwell time, I start to get
> hydrolysis, and at about T+70 hours, I was cruising
> at
> around 10 to 15 ml/m of (apparently) H2.
> 
> The real test is coming together in the form of a
> tidy
> little experiment.  Four vessels, with distilled H2O
> in two and an alkaline "amalgam" forming solute
> (like
> dilute KOH or NaOH) in two.  100 square feet of Al
> foil added to each one, except in one case each for
> distilled H2O and alkaline solution we have loose
> crinkled strips or shreds, the other two are tightly
> stacked or rolled layers, to produce some regions
> where presumably a Casimir type cavity would
> prevail. 
> Which hydrolizes faster and more effectively?
> 
> I'm still trying to wrap my head around what the
> predicted influence would be on a chemical reaction
> occuring in a vacuum mode constrained space....
> 
> NR
> 
> 
>  
>
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