The problem was that it needed pure hydrogen and pure oxygen, it used potassium hydroxide as it's electrolyte and wouldn't work eficiently (a slight missue of the term) until it was at about 80 degrees C. While I managed to get nearly 0.5Volts, the current output was in the microamps... thus the cell was dangerous (8molar potassium hydroxide at 80 degrees C is not plesant stuff) and useless. Also the water produced poisoned the electrolyte, hence why I had to use such a high concentration!
Zeolites weren't an option to keep the water concentration down?
Good stuff if you ask me! I wish I had managed to get that far in my own experiments, I might have a few patents and a hell of a lot more money now :-)
Don't feel bad. From your description I surmise you attempted a direct oxidation, which is rather tricky in its own right. Good membranes are worth their weight in gold, and that's what is the case here. Without the PEM this car could not exist.
Jolly good fun, and amazing to see how far this tech has come in the last 7 years.
Perhaps one day we
will see fuel cells of the type a Terminator uses. Those would be quite worthwhile :-).
