Electrolysis Basics Project Page 1

OK so you want to do electrolysis ...no problem!

-What's that? Oh ...You want to dive in "Head First" and from the common materials that you just happen to have lying around the house, start producing massive amounts of free hydrogen with which to power your vehicle, house and shop ...hmmm ok.

I know of several good doctors in your area that can help with such delusions. -If that is truly your goal in coming here, then you're going to be sorely disappointed. You should probably make better use of your computer time by playing solitaire or something else equally as mind-numbing.

If however, you're here to actually learn something and to understand how you can participate in a wonderful and exciting field of research that has the potential to help the world; then you've come to the right place. Do I believe that Over Unity exists and that we will someday have free energy with which to power our civilization ...Most Definitely! That's the whole reason I created this site. But do I delude myself into thinking that I can come up with the solution over-night, without a solid foundation and understanding of the principals behind what it is I'm trying to do... Certainly NOT!

So where does that leave us then? -Well it leaves us at the beginning which is right where we should be when starting anything new. Even if you have dabbled in this area of research already, it may do you some good to read over this content. Why? -Because many people become involved in this research and start working on things without a proper knowledge or respect for the materials that they are working with. These individuals are not only a danger to themselves, but they are a danger to others through their lack of knowledge. Blowing oneself up due to stupidity is bad enough in itself, but injuring or killing ones friends or family members because we were too foolish or careless to take the proper precautions ...well let me just say that is something I would never want to live with.

OK, you want to make some hydrogen? Let's start with one of the most basic cells that anyone can make right now at home. Go grab the following items:

- A small battery, a 9 volt cell will work best but even a AAA battery will work for this little demonstration.
- 2 metal paper clips
- A small cup or bowl filled with TAP water (not filtered water)
- Some salt (WARNING!!! -ONLY use salt for this small scale demonstration. Use of salt in larger units will create TOXIC GAS that is very dangerous to breathe!!!

-It is also very caustic to the metal surfaces in your cells.)

Now let's assemble these components to make some hydrogen. Straighten 1 turn on each of your paper-clips and hold them onto the + and - terminals of your battery. You are safe to hold them on with your fingers as you will NOT be shocked at this low voltage.

Bend and adjust your paperclips so that you have the + and - coils running parallel to each other, but NOT touching. -Look at the picture for help.

Now dip the 2 paperclips down into the water and watch what happens. -If your battery is fresh, you should start to see bubbles coming off of the paper-clips. Those bubbles are Hydrogen and Oxygen.

Congratulations!!!! You just produced your first usable quantity of a 100% clean and renewable fuel source! -That is of course, if you discount where the electricity came from for the manufacturing processes involved in making your batteries. Welcome to the world of Electrolysis my friend.

Now you might question my using the term Usable quantity ...that's understandable, and you'll see in a moment just what I mean.

If you just wanted to simply say that you've done electrolysis, you can stop here, because you just did it. -If however, you'd like to learn a LOT more about this process and how to make it as efficient as possible, please continue to read.

Why the salt you ask? Well you see salt, when mixed into water, becomes an electrolyte. An electrolyte improves the ability of the water to carry the current and thereby improves the electrolytic reaction (electrolysis). By adding just a small amount of salt to our water, we should see an increase in gas production.

Try it now and see if you can detect more production. It may be difficult to see on this small scale. Remember the salt gives off a toxic gas, so never do this on a larger scale!

OK back to the Usable part. For this part of the experiment you'll need 2 more items:

-Some dish washing liquid
-A lighter... preferably one with a long tip like you'd use to light a grill

Now that you're producing more gas due to increasing the electrolyte levels in the water, you're going to see just how powerful this stuff really is!

Put a drop or two of dish washing liquid in the water and then start the electrolytic reaction again. The bubbles will collect on the surface of the water due to the dish washing liquid. You can gather them up with your finger or with a pencil or spoon, just try to get some into a small clump. Start small.

Now light the clump with your lighter!

And witness the power of a stoichiometric ratio of Hydrogen and Oxygen gas instantly combusting. Basically you're turning the gasses back into water though the combustion process. That big word, stoichiometric, just means: in the exact amounts you need them to be in to fully react with one another.

In other words, it's makes a really loud BANG for such a small amount of gas. OK you'll probably want to play with this for the next hour or two

-I know I still enjoy the exploding soap bubbles every time I see them!

NOTE: If you want to get a bang or pop of any value with soap bubbles, you will probably need a larger setup than just 2 paper-clips. This is because the soap bubbles are so thin that the hydrogen passes through them in about 30 seconds. So the production rate is not the problem, but rather the thing you're using to contain the gasses (namely the soap bubbles). Now since it would be difficult to properly contain the small amount of gas that you're making, the easy answer here is simply to make more gas FASTER!

As proof that what I am saying is correct, just look at my "Double Barrel Hydrogen Squirt Gun" project. You will see that it uses nothing more than 2 small wires to generate the gasses required for a very effective display http://oupower.com/index.php?dir=_My_Projects/_Some_Educational_and_Fun_Stuff/The_Double_Barrel_Hydrogen_Squirt_Gun. It takes that little device sometimes 6 or 7 minutes to generate a pea sized bubble of hydrogen & oxygen. The trick here is that it can't escape easily so the duration of production is not a problem in that case.

If you come up with a simple yet effective method of safely giving more production so that people can do the "soap bubbles" test, please e-mail me and I'll post your addition to this text.

... (time goes by so quickly when you're having fun! ) ... All done playing? Cool, let's look how you can improve your cell now.