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General Discussion Area / Re: Opinions from Electronics Experts
« on: 17 February 2007, 23:53:32 »
The basic anode/cathode/electron transfer theory works well, thats what's happening inside your car battery. But in order for it to work, it needs an electrolyte - battery acid - or in the case of a ship, salty sea water. The problem for a ship is the infinite volume of electrolyte. I used to run a supercharged GM 3-71 diesel tractor with a passive sacrificial anode just inside the filler cap and that worked well. It doesn't stop it, just slows it down - as per Hotel21's comments.
Supposedly this system gets around the electrolyte problem not by submerging your car in water
, but by using the paint layer as a capacitor (think of a capacitor as a very short term battery - two conductive surfaces in parallel but not actually touching, with the static charge across the two surfaces providing the voltage; the larger the surfaces the greater the charge, the closer the two surfaces without actually touching the greater the charge etc.) so in theory the ability to supply sacrificial electrons should be high, but where are they coming from, the exposed metal?
Supposedly this system gets around the electrolyte problem not by submerging your car in water
, but by using the paint layer as a capacitor (think of a capacitor as a very short term battery - two conductive surfaces in parallel but not actually touching, with the static charge across the two surfaces providing the voltage; the larger the surfaces the greater the charge, the closer the two surfaces without actually touching the greater the charge etc.) so in theory the ability to supply sacrificial electrons should be high, but where are they coming from, the exposed metal?