fixaze Project Page 3

The nefarious device installed...hopefully stealing $ from the pockets of the oil companies on a daily basis.

Front of the car is to the right. Radiator can be seen at upper right corner. Fresh air openings to the right. 12V current from yellow wires to left. Gas from the two cells goes into the front backflow jar and then to the rear bubbler (green caps). A hose then goes to a carb port above the butterfly valve. There is an air intake in the lid of the front cell. Notice the heat shield protecting the jars from the radiator heat.

On a 45F day after cruising for a while I was seeing around 78F cell temps and 6.5 amps current used. Houston....we have gas.

The bubbler used up about 1/2 it's water in 45 miles...I installed a splash shield, but will probably have to use a larger bubbler.

After approximately 900 miles of use...this is the collection of crud (iron oxide?) in the jars.

The jar on the left has an air bleed coming in the top...so it tends to lose electrolyte faster than the other...they connect to a Y and then go to the bubbler. Also the deposit in the jar on the left with the air coming through is lighter in color and has less crud.

The black markings are the fill lines...showing how much electrolyte has been lost...they had been refiled to the lines before though.

This run was done using NaOH...or at least Crystal Drano from an old can...it had alum particles in it...which were removed...but no guarantee that it was pure NaOH otherwise.

Amps used had dropped from over 6 to around 5 at say 100F...this is probably more due to the loss of electrolyte rather than to the crud collection.

Need to understand that this "layer" of whatever is AFTER the jars have settled for awhile...during actual operation you wouldn't see a layer.

Larger bubbler installed.  Extra one not needed since one cell has an intake vent in it to allow air to enter during operation....and after shut down when cooling can cause bubbler water to backflow into cell(s).

A test of using 1/4 of bubbler filled with 91% isopropyl alcohol in bubbler resulted in the level in the bubbler going down fairly fast by 1/4.  This bubbler has an HDPE splash shield right up under the outlet to help avoid liquid water going into intake.

Could be that adding a "thickener" of some kind to the bubbler water might allow it to still function as a backfire arrestor AND reduce fluid loss to some extent?   I'm thinking cornstarch as the substance least likely to do harm...maybe a light oil like MMOil would work and add a little lube to the engine?

.....

After shutting the cells down and checking them later I've found a lot (1/2 full?) of the iron oxide gel in them...so looks like the 304 ss won't do so well.  Will go ahead and check the condition of the plates...replace the NaOH...add a vent to the other cell and retest them for mpg, temps, and gas output.

I have a THEORY that using 316 ss wire mesh might be the way to go with these 6V across the plate cells.  The idea being that the small radius of the wires will help to defeat the overheating and efficiency loss found using flat plates.  If 316 ss mesh was used the mesh should last pretty well.  No need to drill ss sheet either....bolts would be forced thru the mesh openings.

McMaster probably has a suitable ss mesh...at a price.

Shows the plates after removal from the jars. White poly plastic pieces are baffles to help prevent loss of electrolyte.

Finally got around to measuring the plates thickness with a dial caliper. Can only find...at the most...maybe .001" to .002" difference between the outside (+) and the inside (-) plates as far as thickness near the edge....and most wear is likely near the edges anyway.

A nice closeup of the nasty old plates.