On Sunday 23 March 2008 12:59, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > Electrolysis, yes, is very slow. Speeding it up to a rate to fill an > effective barrage balloon would probably (I'd set the odds at 99.999%) > cause an explosion.
I remember miessing with it on a couple of occasions when I was a kid, using stuff I found in that "Golden Book of Chemistry Experiements" or whatever it was. First thing I tried was those soup-can sized "dry cells" (condition dubious" and I had a lot of trouble seeing any activity on those carbon-rod electrodes at all, and it seemed to take darn near forever to get some gas in a test tube. Later on I got the bright idea of trying 120VAC, with the use of an old selenium rectifier I'd scavenged somewhere or other. It couldn't have handled more than 500mA or so of current, not like all sorts of diodes that are out there these days. The reaction was quite vigorous! :-) And adding water to replace what I'd used up, one interesting side reactoin was that the stuff left in the beaker got darker and darker as time went on, because all of the contaminants remained behind. I've never been into drinking tap water all that much ever since. :-) > As usual, I hate to agree with Larry, but tanks of gas (hydrogen works, > helium is expensive) are the better choice. You can fill the tanks > yourself, even using electrolysis, but to do it safely takes time, expensive > gear and a gagload of energy. Yeah, but how long can you store it? In discussions talking about the use of hydrogen in vehicles it was pointed out to me that the stuff *leaks*, pretty much continuously, because of the small size of the H2 molecule. I've heard of other methods of storing other than simply as a compressed gas, but how you'd get it out of that storage isn't something I've looked at. Heck, even helium balloons eventually leak to the point where what's left won't hold up the weight of the balloon any more, usually in a matter of days, roughly. -- Member of the toughest, meanest, deadliest, most unrelenting -- and ablest -- form of life in this section of space, a critter that can be killed but can't be tamed. --Robert A. Heinlein, "The Puppet Masters" - Information is more dangerous than cannon to a society ruled by lies. --James M Dakin
