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Forum Index : Other Stuff : NiFe, Nickel Iron Batteries, Ni-Fe
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| Georgen Guru  Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Discussion started on this thread of our Forum: http://www.thebackshed.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=5333&PN =0&TPN=1 but I think it would not be polite, to keep diverting original topic toward just Ni-Fe type of batteries. From my point of view it is worth to put together few posts to shed some light on the burried subject. Looks like bit of conspiracy got into sudden demise of this type of LONG LIFE battery. It is mentioned that they are cheap to manufacture, but because now it is picked up by affluent – tree hugging part of society, all of the sudden initial price searches show that NiFe battery is 10 times more expensive Ah for Ah than Lead Acid one. George |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
From this page looks that NaOH can be used instead of KOH http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/200532012/Ni_Fe_Battery.ht ml [quote] Specifications … Ni-Fe cell has a positive electrode with nickel hydroxide as active material and a ne-gative electrode made of iron power. NaOH or KOH solution is used as its electrolyte. [/quote] Right now I have house grade Caustic Soda, that would probably do it. Not sure how can I find out what sort of purity has domestic grade caustic soda bought at Woolworths in Australia. Recently did not see it there, but Bunnings Warehouse seems to have this item: http://www.bunnings.com.au/products_product_caustic-soda-dig gers-2kg-164022dig_P1560251.aspx?search=caustic+soda&searchT ype=any&searchSubType=products George |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Probably worth to include copy of NiFe information site posted on other thread: http://www.nickel-iron-battery.com/ George |
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yahoo2 Guru Joined: 05/04/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1166 |
Hi George, Sichuan Changhong Battery Co., Ltd. seems to be the source of most of the NiFe batteries on the market. They have a pdf on the Ni-Fe batteries they supply, interesting read. I wonder if there is someone importing into Oz from them? I would like to know a bit more about replacing the electrolyte. I do know that in the biodiesel game, quality, purity and keeping the hydroxide away from moisture until you are ready to mix it is key to a good result. NaoH is not the safest or easiest chemical to handle, I would stick to potassium if I have a choice. I'm confused, no wait... maybe I'm not... |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
http://www.changhongbatteries.com/Nickel-lron(Ni-Fe)_c13_m2. 2.1.html Will read info too. But so far all prices I found are 10 times of Lead Acid, so much for inexpensive battery. George |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
At least for me, the main interest in this is the possibility of one day building my own batteries. I agree, the commercial NiFe batteries seem stupidly expensive, even lead acid batteries are stupidly expensive when you look at the basic cost of lead and sulfuric acid. The attraction of NiFe chemistry is the much more ecologically "green" non toxic nature of the materials, and the potential for an extremely long life trouble free battery that should survive a lot of abuse. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
It would be fantastic if I could source materials to build my own inexpensive version of Ni-Fe batteries. Do you have an idea where to start looking for components? Another question would be how to calculate how much of what is needed for say 200Ah 1.2V cell? George |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
I did a bit of sniffing around the internet and found a guy that has already gone a fair way into this: http://www.noonco.com/edison/ Potassium Hydroxide flakes (KOH) are available from Bunnings Hardware, about $6.00 for 500 grams. I have also seen a 5Kg bags advertised for $14.00. There is a company in Bayswater Victoria called Kemicals that will sell a 25Kg bag of the stuff for around $40.00 It should be more or less readily available just about anywhere. Nickel sheet, and nickel wire can be obtained from a company called "George White" in Melbourne, and I believe Sydney too. George White sells non ferrous metals, copper, brass, nickel, silver, in tube, bar, sheet and wire. They have advertised, a sheet of pure nickel 1mm thick, 300mmm wide and 1800mm long, weight 4.8Kg, but I have no idea of the cost of that. That sounds unreasonably thick and heavy, except for very large flat plates, but they may also stock it in much thinner rolled up shim sheets as well. The always fluctuating daily price of nickel on the international metals market is around $17.00 per Kg, so it's not that expensive. Brand new commercial sheet nickel is obviously going to cost a lot more than that, but I have no idea exactly how much more. The particular nickel and iron oxides for the active plate material mentioned in the noonco website, should also be more or less readily available commercially, but I have not yet even tried to track these down. I had thought of using a single long length of thin nickel plate, and a single long length of thin steel plate, (both coated with the oxide powders) coiled up and sitting in a really big round glass jar, at least for a small experimental cell. Flat plates hanging in a small aquarium tank could also work for larger cells. One day I may build a single small experimental cell to play around with, but right now I already have far too many unfinished projects requiring my attention to pursue this any further. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
[quote] Potassium Hydroxide flakes (KOH) are available from Bunnings Hardware, about $6.00 for 500 grams [/quote] For some reason, my Bunnings search doesn’t come back with any “Potassium Hydroxide flakes” Only caustic soda 500g or 2kg is the closest to this description. Shellac flakes come first in “Potassium Hydroxide flakes (KOH)” search. But if other suppliers can provide KOH, it should be OK. Will have to look closer at NiFe Battery construction. Plate or wire is probably easy bit. Oxide and attaching it to any surface sounds bit complicated. Bumped into NI-Fe U-Tube video, but as usual cannot find it now. Well, patience is needed I suppose. George |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
You may be right George. A Google search "KOH Melbourne" found me at this thread : http://www.biofuelsforum.com/general_biodiesel_discussion/47 85-chemical_group_buy_melbourne.html A guy there said Bunnings have KOH, but I have not yet personally checked it out. Anyhow, it shouldn't be a big problem. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Got US located Co, same thing batteries price is taking into account that system can be used for long time. 12V 600Ah system over $5,000 plus delivery http://ironedison.com/nickel-iron-ni-fe-battery George |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Posts are 2006 - 2008, at the time Bunnings must have had KOH. Found this supplier: http://www.aussiesoapsupplies.com.au/potassium-hydroxide.htm l 5kg KOH 99% for $65 plus delivery George |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
They were successfully building these over a hundred years ago, it cannot be insanely out of reach high tech. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Got it wrong, KOH has to be picked up in person with photo ID "Aussie Soap Supplies® is located in Kardinya, Western Australia, not far from Fremantle." (Lucky those who live close to Fremantle) Find it hard to get any information on details. Looks that those who build NiFe batteries, keep info close to their chest. SA Supplier sells 1kg for $9 plus delivery , technical grade 90%. Probably not too good. http://www.southernskiessoapsupplies.com.au/potassium-hydrox ide-chemical-suppliers-south-australia/prod_193.html More and more keep thinking of NaOH if it substitutes KOH, it is quite easy to get. George |
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| yahoo2 Guru Joined: 05/04/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 1166 |
George, you are not comparing apples with apples here. KoH is cheap to manufacture to 90% (reagent quality) the other 10% is water from the air. Getting it drier than that is very technical and costly and not worth the effort because there is no good reason to do so. It will stay in a reasonably stable state and with some patience can be dissolved in most liquids. The best stuff I have seen is not flakes, it looks like halved mothballs and really crisply white, bit hard to get. recochem do 25 Kg bags of flakes KoH in bags form recochem .It has a tiny bit of potassium carbonate in it, the rest is water. NaoH is easily manufactured to 99% purity, lower purity sodium hydroxide has both water and other contaminants in it and is not considered reagent grade. However the second that high grade NaoH is exposed to any air, it absorbs the water and reacts with it. This forms a harder scummier looking solid that can be incredibly hard if not impossible to work with. For example it is almost impossible to consistently mix methanol with NaoH that is sold as drain cleaner or Lye at the supermarket, it is just to degraded by exposure to air and has a lot of sulphides? in it. I'm confused, no wait... maybe I'm not... |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Bumped into this page already, but could not find their internet shop. Suppose will have to contact them, when other components can be sourced to build 'inexpensive battery' George |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
I forgot about that. Bunnings also stock things like concentrated hydrochloric acid, kept locked up well out of sight in a "corrosive chemicals" locker around the back somewhere. It is there for the asking, but not advertised, and they won't sell to children. Australia post and the various couriers also become absolutely frantic if you try to ship anything like this. Go and pick it up personally, problem solved. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Warpspeed Guru Joined: 09/08/2007 Location: AustraliaPosts: 4406 |
That noonco.com website gives plenty of details and ideas of how to do this. Basic battery structure requires iron and nickel plates, because these materials will not react with the electrolyte, and last forever. But the iron and nickel plates make a very poor battery just by themselves. The secret ingredients are the specific iron and nickel oxide powders that greatly increase the battery activity. The big problem is that these oxide powders are very good at creating voltage, but they are truly horrible electrical conductors. The trick is to combine a very thin layer of oxide powder intimately attached (somehow) to highly electrically conductive pure metal structure. One way it was done 100 years ago was to use a metal tube punched with very fine holes. The tube was then filled with very thin alternate layers of oxide powder and pure metal filings. This was then rammed down fairly tight, and both ends of the tube sealed. The whole mess being porous to allow the electrolyte to freely permeate. One battery electrode was a punched iron tube with iron oxide, and iron filings. The other electrode was a punched nickel tube, with nickel oxide, and nickel filings. To get high battery capacity a very large number of these tubes are required per cell. Voltage was produced by the oxide layers, and current carried away by the highly conductive metal filing layers into the supporting tube. A much more modern way to achieve this is to first start out with a very clean flat plate of pure metal. Coat it with a thin smear of electrically conductive epoxy glue, then spread a layer of oxide powder onto the epoxy, and press it well into the epoxy. What you finally end up with should look like sandpaper. Iron plate (negative) with iron oxide powder. Nickel plate (positive) with nickel oxide powder. Special electrically conductive epoxy. These epoxies contain very fine powder, often silver, but could be other metals. One commercial use is the printing of the thin tracks on electrically heated rear windows of cars for de misting. That is the general idea as I understand it. Cheers, Tony. |
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| Georgen Guru Joined: 13/09/2011 Location: AustraliaPosts: 462 |
Anything more than plates few wires and solution would be asking bit much of my manufacturing capabilities. Any price that I can get for finished NiFe Battery seems to have 'tree hugging' component built into the price irrespectively if supplier is in China or US. Like PV Panels 20 years ago, when 1W could cost anything between $10 and $100 George |
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| ChargedUp Newbie  Joined: 23/12/2012 Location: United StatesPosts: 4 |
Hi, I'm interested in answering any specific questions you may have about the Nickel Iron batteries. I have a lot of experience working with, installing, and servicing Ni-Fe cells. 
There is a ton of great information around, especially when looking back at Edison's original documents. (Short document on Ni-Fe Chemistry) 2012-12-28_180325_The_Chemistry_of_the_Edison_Storage_Batter y.pdf (Long document detailing Edison's production methods) 2012-12-28_180409_The_Edison_alkaline_storage_battery.pdf |
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