Cupric oxalate, a new cathode material for reserve batteries

✍ Scribed by Y. Aoki; M. Hiroi

• Book ID: 103064224
• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1968
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 346 KB
• Volume: 13
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0013-4686
• DOI: 10.1016/0013-4686(68)80140-9

✦ Synopsis

Though cuprous chloride is a very effective cathode depolarizer, it is so unstable that the cell utilizing it as cathode depolarizer has a short life. Silver chloride, another well known excellent active material, is expensive and cannot be used widely.

To obtain a stable and commercially available active material, we investigated the polarization characteristics of various sparingly soluble salts in sea-water. The material, uniformly mixed with graphite powder, was moistened and pasted about 2 mm in thickness on to 40-mesh copper gauze electrode of 5 cmp. This electrode was cathodically polarized at increasing cd in sea-water ([Cl-] = 17 gll) at 2O"C, and the potential/cd curve determined.

At 60 mA/cma, Ag&O, showed $0.16 V (3.33 N Cl-ce), H&O, -0.15 V and CuGO, -0.18 V. Silver and mercuric oxalates are liable to explode, but cupric oxalate proved to be an excellent new cathode material for a battery using sea-water as electrolyte. A CuC,O,/Mg test battery was constructed, and the discharge characteristics proved practically useful.