Battery effect possible with a bong?

[Adamu]

The shower head that I got is a garden hose attachment that is at least partially made of alluminium. I was paying more attention to the amount of holes it had than what it was made of when I bought it. :rolleyes:

It seems to me like the water would have to flow in a complete loop like wire does to create the battery affect. But since the water in the bong would be raining down (not connected) it wouldn't create the battery affect. Am I right or wrong about this?

Thanks

[Illah]

From what I can gather the battery effect is drastically overstated. It's something that occurs over time, a long time. By the time it gets to the point where there's any performance decrease you will have changed blocks twice.

But to answer your question, yes there would be some sort of battery effect.

--Illah

[Diggrr]

Electricity travels near the speed of light, so I think it can beat the pump upstream.
That said, I think that a bong drastically reduces the battery effect, and if there is a problem, it would be in your shower head, and not in your block as the aluminum is the metal under attack.

[schmide]

The battery effect is not based on the conductivity of current through the medium of water, but the exchange of charged particles of water carrying deposits of metal from one place to another.

Here are two things I've been pondering.

1. The garden hose attachment is most likely coated with zinc. Zinc is one of the most reactive or anodic metals and is often used as a sacrificial metal. Magnesium is more reactive than zinc. Here's two charts I found www.corrosionsource.com/handbook/galv_series.htm www.pemnet.com/design_information/galvanic.html. So if there is corrosion the zinc will go first, followed then by the aluminum. I remember reading somewhere that a zinc coating should last about a year. Since copper is the more noble metal it becomes the cathode and thusly does not corrode as fast or actually corrodes slower than it would normally. I guess you don't really care about this garden hose attachment.

2. This could be a bad thing or a good thing and I'm not quite sure exactly how it will work in your system. There is a unique effect called Waterfall Electricity. When water cascades and is aspirated. The smaller droplets, mist, and air become negatively charged and the larger drops and pools of liquid become positively charged. This will cause the body of water to become generally positive and the surrounding insulators and air generally negative. Since the galvanic reaction moves from positive to negative you end up with a pool of positive ions. I don't know if this will have the effect of pulling positive ions off the copper and aluminum or saturating them with positive ions thus preventing the flow of positive ions to and from the metals. I was also thinking you could throw some old pre 1979 pennies in the bottom of the bong to catch any positive aluminum and zinc ions thrown off the garden hose attachment. However this may just speed up the reaction.

Your best bet is to just get a plastic aspirator but I enjoy thinking and pondering these things. Any experts correct me where I'm wrong.

One other unique document www.amasci.com/emotor/kelvin.html

[Silver]

Been running mine with the aluminum garden head for going on two years now using tap water and copper blocks. Nothing to date and i have unsoldered the maze 3 to take a look. Now mineral deposits on the garden head (inside) are another story. Requires regular cleaning. BTW, made and tested many, many different heads and the garden head for some unknown reason always gives me the best temps.

[Adamu]

Thanks for your replies everyone! I'm planning on experimenting with different home made shower head desings sometime so this is not a problem as long as the block doesn't gets corroded.

Posted by Schmide

I was also thinking you could throw some old pre 1979 pennies in the bottom of the bong to catch any positive aluminum and zinc ions thrown off the garden hose attachment.

Thanks. If the corrosion of the attachment gets to bad I'll try this and see what happens.


Here's the what the finished product will be:

5'6" total hieght (4" PVC pipe)
7 Gallon ice chest res
Danner 3 350gph pump (177gph at 6')
Maze3 with 1/2" Tygon tubing
Panaflow L1A 80mm fan or a 120mm fan I have laying around.

I'll try and post some pics of it when I get it set up (may be a few weeks).

[SkiFletch]

jebus, that be a tall bong. I'd have to agree with Silver. the battery effect should take a very long time to set in for your project, and I doubt you'd ever notice much in the way of problems. whats the water like in ft worth? do you guys have real hard water, or is it softer? cause re-filling with distilled all the time might get expensive :eek: and if you have hard water, be prepared to clean out the head often

[Adamu]

Originally posted by SkiFletch
jebus, that be a tall bong. I'd have to agree with Silver. the battery effect should take a very long time to set in for your project, and I doubt you'd ever notice much in the way of problems. whats the water like in ft worth? do you guys have real hard water, or is it softer? cause re-filling with distilled all the time might get expensive :eek: and if you have hard water, be prepared to clean out the head often

The water here is a little hard, but I've got a water filter on the sink so I don't think it will be a problem.

[Ghastard]

I was worried about this myself, because I have a aluminum garden hose head in the setup I'm building. I guess I won't have to be as concerned as I thought. Thanks for the advice.