The Standard Electrical Dictionary Part 16

Battery, Carr?'s.

A Daniell battery for whose porous cup a vessel or species of sack made of parchment paper is subst.i.tuted. The battery has been used for electric light, and has been run for 200 successive hours, by replacing every 24 hours part of the zinc sulphate solution by water.

61 STANDARD ELECTRICAL DICTIONARY.

Battery, Cautery.

A battery used for heating a platinum wire or other conductor used for cauterization in electro-therapeutics. The term is descriptive, not generic.

Battery, Chloric Acid.

A battery of the Bunsen type in which an acidulated solution of pota.s.sium chlorate is used as depolarizer.

Battery, Chloride of Lime.

A battery in which bleaching powder is the excitant. The zinc electrode is immersed in a strong solution of salt, the carbon in a porous vessel is surrounded with fragments of carbon and is packed with chloride of lime (bleaching powder). There is no action on open circuit. It has to be hermetically sealed on account of the odor. Its electro-motive force is--initial, 1.65 volts; regular, 1.5 volts.

Synonym--Niaudet's Battery.

Battery, Chromic Acid.

Properly a battery in which chromic acid is used as a depolarizer. It includes the bichromate battery. (See Battery, Bichromate.)

Battery, Closed Circuit.

A battery adapted by its construction to maintain a current on a closed circuit for a long time without sensible polarization. The term is merely one of degree, for any battery becomes exhausted sooner or later.

As examples the Grove, Bunsen or Daniell batteries may be cited.

62 STANDARD ELECTRICAL DICTIONARY.

Fig. 41. COLUMN BATTERY.

Battery, Column.

The original Volta's pile. It consists of a series of compound circular plates, the upper or lower half, A, copper; the other, Z, of zinc.

Between each pair of plates some flannel or cloth, u, u, is laid, which is saturated with dilute acid. As shown in the cut, the parts are laid up in two piles, connected at the top with a bar, c, c, and with vessels of acidulated water, b, b, as electrodes. The great point in setting it up is to be sure that no acid runs from one disc of flannel to the next over the outside of the plates, as this would create a short circuit.

The plates are best compound, being made up of a zinc and a copper plate soldered together. They may, however, be separate, and merely laid one on the other. In such case great care must be taken to admit no acid between them.

Volta's pile is no longer used, except occasionally. Trouv?'s blotting paper battery (see Battery, Trouv?'s) is a relic of it, and the same is to be said for Zamboni's dry pile.

It rapidly polarizes, the flannel retains but little acid, so that it is soon spent, and it is very troublesome to set up. Great care must be taken to have the cloth discs thoroughly saturated, and wrung out to avoid short circuiting by squeezing out of the acid.

Battery, D'Arsonval's.

A battery of the Bunsen type, differing therefrom in the solutions. As excitant in which the zinc electrode is immersed, the following solution is used:

Water, 20 volumes; Sulphuric Acid (purified by shaking with a little olive or similar oil), 1 volume; hydrochloric acid, 1 volume.

As polarizer in which the carbon is immersed the following is used:

Nitric acid, 1 volume; hydrochloric acid, 1 volume; water acidulated with 1/20th sulphuric acid, 2 volumes.

Battery, de la Rue.

A battery with zinc positive and silver negative electrode; the depolarizer is silver chloride; the excitant common salt or ammonium chloride. The cut shows one of its forms of construction.

The right hand portion of the cut, Fig. 42, shows the zinc perforated at C for the connection from the next silver plate. The next to it is the negative electrode of silver around which a ma.s.s of silver chloride is cast in cylindrical form. A is a parchment paper cylinder with two holes near its top, through which the silver wire of the negative electrode is threaded, as shown in B. A solution of 23 parts ammonium chloride in 1,000 parts of water is the approved excitant. Its electro-motive force is 1.03 volts.

The jars are closed with paraffin.

Fig. 42. DE LA RUE'S BATTERY.

63 STANDARD ELECTRICAL DICTIONARY.

Battery, Dry.

(a) A form of open circuit battery in which the solutions by a ma.s.s of zinc oxychloride, gypsum, or by a gelatinous ma.s.s such as gelatinous silica, or glue jelly, are made practically solid. Numbers of such have been patented, and have met with considerable success.

(b) Zamboni's dry pile, q. v., is sometimes termed a dry battery.

Battery, Element of.

A term applied sometimes to a single plate, sometimes to the pair of plates, positive and negative, of the single couple.

Battery, Faradic.

A term applied, not very correctly however, to apparatus for producing medical faradic currents. It may be an induction coil with battery, or a magneto-generator worked by hand.

Battery, Ferric Chloride.

A battery of the Bunsen type, in which a solution of perchloride of iron (ferric chloride) is used for the depolarizing agent. A little bromine is added with advantage. The depolarizing agent recuperates on standing, by oxidation from the oxygen of the air.

Battery, Fuller's.

A battery of the Bunsen type. The zinc plate is short and conical, and rests in the porous jar into which some mercury is poured. An insulated copper wire connects with the zinc. A plate of carbon is in the outer jar. The solutions are used as in the Bunsen battery.

Synonym--Mercury Bichromate Battery.

Battery, Gas.

(a) A battery whose action depends on the oxidation of hydrogen as its generating factor. It was invented by Grove. Plates of platinum are immersed in cups of dilute acid, arranged as if they were plates of zinc and carbon, in an ordinary battery. Each plate is surrounded by a gla.s.s tube sealed at the top. The plates are filled with acid to the tops.

Through the top the connection is made. A current from another battery is then pa.s.sed through it, decomposing the water and surrounding the upper part of one set of plates with an atmosphere of oxygen and of the other with hydrogen. Considerable quant.i.ties of these ga.s.ses are also occluded by the plates. On now connecting the terminals of the battery, it gives a current in the reverse direction of that of the charging current.

This battery, which is experimental only, is interesting as being the first of the storage batteries.