From: vbra676539@aol.com
Reply-To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Date: Wed, 08 Aug 2007 11:06:03 -0400
Joe,
You can do the venting external to the pressure hull. Just install
penetrations for the two sizes of tubing weld fixtures and run SS tubing up
near the conning tower somewhere, with ball valves if you like, although we
never had them, using Swagelok end plugs instead. It would probably be
easier to use HP air through a regulator (SCUBA bottle and first stage, for
instance), than trying to force fan driven air into a small pipe, but you
could probably do it either way. The only connections between pods or
compensated banks in the ABS class boats was electrical--no tubing
connectors--but that was just because we didn't need them.
As an alternative, you could build some Dan H. style penetrators (they are
beauties) and install your tubing connectors through the penetration, if
you like, plumb them to a common panel somewhere inside up near the conning
tower, then attach the vent and blow hoses through the hatch during
charging. The downside is that you are then forced to charge with the hatch
open, which might be unhandy at dockside during a south Florida
thunderstorm. If you run them outside to the walking deck, then you can
hook up and have at it without bailing rain water.
Still, if your charging cables plug into a panel,?the plumbing?could run
with them, and you could cook up a fiberglas cover or something to run them
through that would drop down onto the conning tower?to keep the errant
splashes and bikini clad girls out.
Vance
-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Perkel <joeperkel@hotmail.com>
To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Sent: Wed, 8 Aug 2007 9:11 am
Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Vance,
Will refer to these comments as I go, thanks!
........The hydrocaps are in Medley (Hialeah), as is a whole host of
industrial manufacturing, steel suppliers as well.
Carstens comment regarding dilution of H in a given cf space brings home
the importance of detection in a pod. No choice but to vent into the crew
space, hatch open and maybe the hose you mention to outside.?
".....All you have to do is bleed air through......."???
Do you mean?forced air ventilation, ie marine blower to input vent, self
exhaust out the other?
?"........Most flooding events are leakers, rather than sudden
gushes........."
Is there any value in a capability to temporarily pressurize the pod to
expell the water, or is there some hidden danger to this?
Sorry about the passing of a friend, however long ago.
Joe
?
From:??vbra676539@aol.com
Reply-To:??personal_submersibles@psubs.org
To:??personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Subject:??Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Date:??Tue, 07 Aug 2007 18:03:35 -0400
For normal ops, Hydro-catalators, FOB Miami, somewhere, recombine and drip
the results back into the cell--very cool actually, as your acid use goes
down to nearly nothing. However, they are sensitive to sulfuric acid
poisoning, and an expensive addition. They also build little cone shaped
cats that can mount in racks in the compartment, although the drip then
goes to your bilge.
Depth of DIScharge, rather than depth charge, is the real issue, and most
hydrogen is formed during charging (except for the accident...um,
scenario). If you are charging in a closed compartment, add a vent system
(it's of paramount importance!!!). All you have to do is bleed air
through...say, a quarter inch tube into your pod or compartment,?and vent
out with a...oh, how about half inch? Run a stack tube (garden hose
maybe?)?to vent the gas?up out of the way, and don't use matches to see if
the output will burn. At certain stages, it WILL!!!
And if you flood a pod, better get out of Dodge as fast as the old horse
will carry you. Most flooding events are leakers, rather than sudden
gushes, so with a good detector system (dirt simple, and run it on a
separate 9-volt) you'd have advance warning. The PC-9 incident started as
soon as we launched, only Joe Shanahan, senior pilot, forgot to turn the
leak detectors back on after an early pre-dive, and we didn't notice until
the sub started getting heavy on the bottom. THEN we noticed. I can still
hear that alarm box screaming!
That was very early in my career, and I remembered the look on that little
runt's face EVERY time I tested my own leak detectors. Boy, was he
surprised. On top of which, Joe was in the shop the day that PLC-4 blew its
top, so if anyone oughta know better, it was him. Dead now, our Joe, and
sorely missed.
Vance
-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph Perkel <joeperkel@hotmail.com>
To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Sent: Tue, 7 Aug 2007 5:40 pm
Subject: Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Vance,
Suppose one is inclined to put a 48V (245 ah) bank of AGMs?in a pod,
....what can you do failsafe wise if it floods? If you are discharging
submerged, vent caps are closed so as not to flood the crew, so what can be
done if anything to avoid "depth charging" yourself?
Joe
From:??vbra676539@aol.com
Reply-To:??personal_submersibles@psubs.org
To:??personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Subject:??Re: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Date:??Tue, 07 Aug 2007 16:29:12 -0400
Brent,
Will you be using lawnmower batteries for your submarine? I'm thinking not,
and I'm also thinking that you need to talk with the manufacturers. Your
experiment had somewhere in the neighborhood of exactly zip to do with a
seawater intrusion incident, which has more to do with voltage levels and
maximum load potential than anything else. Offshore, we often used a
plastic barrel of seawater to deep discharge banks when equalization was
necessary; just take two cables, positive and negative, add a couple of
feet of copper to the ends, and dip. You'll get boiling water in no time,
my friend, trust me.
As for chlorine gas, let me give you a cautionary tale--two, actually, one
of which I was involved with. Two battery explosions, one on PC-9 and one
on the old PLC-4. The former made VISIBLE chlorine gas (it really is green,
by the way), and the latter blew a two hundred pound hatch completely off
the submarine, all the way across the shop, and THROUGH a tin wall. Those
were both 120 volt systems, with a 220 amp capacity. PC-9 got flooded with
seawater due to a pod leak, which caused the violent discharge, which
caused the acid to boil,?which separated water into hydrogen and oxygen,
which ignited and caused a horrific bang, pretty much in that order. Deep
Diver had its charging vent closed during charging (an oversight), bubbled
out gas, and when the overload came (from the over-charging), popped an
internal in-line fuse, which made a spark, which made another one of those
horrific bangs, and might well have killed a few people, had they not all
been outside for lunch,!
!
??possibly congratulating each other on how clever they were.
Testing is one thing, my friend, but Ben Franklin?at least had enough sense
not to fly a kite on metal wire. Otherwise, we might never have heard about
it. I'd hate for the same thing to happen to you. And, if I had to guess,
I'd say your lawnmower battery probably has some warped plates, which means
it ain't going to last much longer, all things considered. No harm, no
foul? Maybe, but PLEASE, don't let this get to be a habit. There's as awful
lot of potential in a battery bank, and it'll bite your butt if you aren't
careful.
Best Regards,
Vance
-----Original Message-----
From: Brent Hartwig <brenthartwig@hotmail.com>
To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Sent: Tue, 7 Aug 2007 2:54 pm
Subject: RE: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
Ron,
?
When the battery was in seawater, the water slowly turned yellow. I'm not
sure why. I don't have a way to test for Chlorine gas at the moment. Is
there a cheap test, can you smell it? I'm not sure?I want to smell it.?When
I make colloidal silver by electrolysis of pure silver?electrodes, the
distilled water becomes a light yellow. Perhaps the lead post are sluffing
off lead into the water.
Regards,
Brent Hartwig
Date: Tue, 7 Aug 2007 10:23:07 -0700
From: ronleonard@shaw.ca
Subject: RE: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt
Lawnmower Battery
To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
Anyone heard that a battery submerged in salt water produces Chlorine gas?
?From those in the battery industry that I have asked it would appear to be
true.?
?
If it is correct, that would be a much larger problem than getting shocked
or splashed with acid.
?
Ron
?
From: owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org
[mailto:owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org] On Behalf Of Brent Hartwig
Sent: Monday, August 06, 2007 10:28 PM
To: PSUBSorg
Subject: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt Lawnmower
Battery
Sent: Monday, August 06, 2007 10:28 PM
To: PSUBSorg
Subject: [PSUBS-MAILIST] Real Live Submerge Testing on a 12 Volt Lawnmower
Battery
?
Well Boys and Girls, I did some testing.
?
Ya I know that usually means vacate the area with or without your shorts,
to another county. But it's to late, I already did it. One can talk about
it for only so long before they get off there arss and get dirty. It's more
fun to.
?
So I removed a fully charged 12 volt lawn mower battery, I could do with
out until next week, if it blow up anyways, and I did some testing.? I then
obtained a five gallon bucket, jumper cables, lots of protective clothing,
and a full face shield, among other things. I then put the battery in an
empty bucket and then put the end of the hose into it. Then I remotely
filled the bucket with slightly hard freshwater, I don't remember what the
PH of my water is. Nothing happened, or at least that's what I thought at
first.? I then removed the water and battery from the bucket and attached
jumper cables to it in the normal fashion. When striking the ends of the
cables together I got the normal sparks. When I put them underwater there
was some weak hydrogen production from the negative lead. Then when I
touched the leads together underwater, I got the same basic spark as I did
out of the water.
?
Then I went and found my old stash of aquarium stuff, and pulled out some
Instant Ocean brand sea salt and mixed it in freshwater, until I got a
specific gravity of 1.21, like most sea water. I then removed the
freshwater from the bucket and added the saltwater for some more testing.?
I tested the leads in the same way and got the same result, but with a bit
more hydrogen production from the negative lead.
?
Next I added enough salt into the one gallon in the bucket to make three
gallons of sea water, so I could completely submerge the battery. But
before I added the water I mixed in the salt and tested the leads again.
Now when I put the leads into the water on either side of the inside of the
bucket, the negative lead produced allot more hydrogen. When I then touched
the two leads under water there was a larger spark on the tangent surfaces
and they tried to stick together. They didn't try to stick together in
freshwater and not much in normal sea water.? Point is that if you take
your sub to the Great Salt Lake in Utah be careful.
?
Now I added two more gallons of freshwater to the mix, to get a specific
gravity of 1.21 again, and put in the battery remotely. Nothing much
happened, just some hydrogen production from the negative pole. This was
just a cheap normal battery, not a AGM sealed type. I then did some testing
and then put my bare finger in the water. Nothing, not even a tingle. I
then lowered the level of the water to about an inch over the top of the
poles. Then did some more testing and then put my finger directly between
the poles, nothing.
?
I then removed the salt water and refilled it with freshwater and did the
same testing, nothing. I would say that the battery would of slowly
discharged by producing hydrogen until spent.? No explosion when submerged
in this way. The hydrogen in an enclosed space would be real bad news.
You'll be safer in freshwater then salt since you'll have more time to get
out before the hydrogen levels get to high. Still you better get out ASAP
unless you can route the hydrogen into your AIP unit quickly. ; )'
?
Finally I reinstalled the battery in the mower and started the mower with
no trouble. I learned allot from doing this, how about you? Just remember
I'm a submarine half full kind of guy.
?
Here are my pictures of the submerged battery testing.
?
http://www.frappr.com/?a=viewphoto&id=4001713&pid=7357670
?
Regards,
Brent Hartwig
?
?
????????????????? ?"Do or do not,??????? There is no try"
??????????????????????????????????
?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
~? Yoda
=
AOL now offers free email to everyone.??Find out more about what's free
from AOL at AOL.com.
?
Ya I know that usually means vacate the area with or without your shorts,
to another county. But it's to late, I already did it. One can talk about
it for only so long before they get off there arss and get dirty. It's more
fun to.
?
So I removed a fully charged 12 volt lawn mower battery, I could do with
out until next week, if it blow up anyways, and I did some testing.? I then
obtained a five gallon bucket, jumper cables, lots of protective clothing,
and a full face shield, among other things. I then put the battery in an
empty bucket and then put the end of the hose into it. Then I remotely
filled the bucket with slightly hard freshwater, I don't remember what the
PH of my water is. Nothing happened, or at least that's what I thought at
first.? I then removed the water and battery from the bucket and attached
jumper cables to it in the normal fashion. When striking the ends of the
cables together I got the normal sparks. When I put them underwater there
was some weak hydrogen production from the negative lead. Then when I
touched the leads together underwater, I got the same basic spark as I did
out of the water.
?
Then I went and found my old stash of aquarium stuff, and pulled out some
Instant Ocean brand sea salt and mixed it in freshwater, until I got a
specific gravity of 1.21, like most sea water. I then removed the
freshwater from the bucket and added the saltwater for some more testing.?
I tested the leads in the same way and got the same result, but with a bit
more hydrogen production from the negative lead.
?
Next I added enough salt into the one gallon in the bucket to make three
gallons of sea water, so I could completely submerge the battery. But
before I added the water I mixed in the salt and tested the leads again.
Now when I put the leads into the water on either side of the inside of the
bucket, the negative lead produced allot more hydrogen. When I then touched
the two leads under water there was a larger spark on the tangent surfaces
and they tried to stick together. They didn't try to stick together in
freshwater and not much in normal sea water.? Point is that if you take
your sub to the Great Salt Lake in Utah be careful.
?
Now I added two more gallons of freshwater to the mix, to get a specific
gravity of 1.21 again, and put in the battery remotely. Nothing much
happened, just some hydrogen production from the negative pole. This was
just a cheap normal battery, not a AGM sealed type. I then did some testing
and then put my bare finger in the water. Nothing, not even a tingle. I
then lowered the level of the water to about an inch over the top of the
poles. Then did some more testing and then put my finger directly between
the poles, nothing.
?
I then removed the salt water and refilled it with freshwater and did the
same testing, nothing. I would say that the battery would of slowly
discharged by producing hydrogen until spent.? No explosion when submerged
in this way. The hydrogen in an enclosed space would be real bad news.
You'll be safer in freshwater then salt since you'll have more time to get
out before the hydrogen levels get to high. Still you better get out ASAP
unless you can route the hydrogen into your AIP unit quickly. ; )'
?
Finally I reinstalled the battery in the mower and started the mower with
no trouble. I learned allot from doing this, how about you? Just remember
I'm a submarine half full kind of guy.
?
Here are my pictures of the submerged battery testing.
?
http://www.frappr.com/?a=viewphoto&id=4001713&pid=7357670
?
Regards,
Brent Hartwig
?
?
????????????????? ?"Do or do not,??????? There is no try"
??????????????????????????????????
?????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????
~? Yoda
=
AOL now offers free email to everyone.??Find out more about what's free
from AOL at AOL.com.
=
AOL now offers free email to everyone.??Find out more about what's free
from AOL at AOL.com.
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