I went to my dad's house the other day and kept seeing jam jars lying around. When I asked him about it, he said my younger brother was trying to make a hydrogen generator. It's something the three of us—my dad, my brother, and I—had tried to build years ago, but now, out of nowhere, my brother got interested in it again.
When I saw what he had put together, I joked that I could make a better one—just to mess with him, you know? But then he actually challenged me to do it... so I took it personally, lol.
I know the best material for this is stainless steel, but I didn’t have any on hand.
So I decided to give it a shot using aluminum mosquito mesh. The main issue with that was making sure the mesh didn’t touch in the middle.
I kept looking for better materials and noticed some empty aluminum cans. I started cutting and sanding them to remove the paint and plastic coating, but halfway through, something else caught my eye.
I found this old soldering iron holder we had lying around. It’s made of two metal spirals that don’t touch, and it even has a Bakelite cap on one end to keep them separated. I figured it might be a better starting point for this build. I wasn’t sure what material it was made of, but I knew it wasn’t aluminum. I hoped it was stainless steel, though I noticed it was magnetic—which isn’t ideal, since the best type of stainless steel for this kind of thing is usually non-magnetic.
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This setup works okay, I guess—but I started doing some research, because all I really remembered from when we first tried making one was that the basic principle is: two pieces of metal, close together but not touching, each connected to the positive and negative ends of a power supply.
I also just assumed that the more power you use, the more hydrogen you get. But after reading a bit more, I realized aluminum is actually a bad idea. It has several issues, like higher resistance and toxic byproducts. So from now on, stainless steel is the way to go—at least for anything serious.
better way of making this thing.
Next post on this will show a finished product and finding uses for the now created hydrogen...