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Flow Battery Research Collective

  1. Home
  2. General Discussion
  3. Sourcing parts

Sourcing parts

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  • D Offline
    D Offline
    danielfp248
    wrote on last edited by danielfp248
    #2

    Thanks for posting! About your material choices.

    1. First one is ok for the silicone gasket material. Get 0.5mm silicone, which is the one we have tested.

    2. This is not adequate. It needs to be conductive graphite felt. For example this one. We use 3mm so the best deal would be the 3x200x1230 one piece.

    3. That is the correct link for the pumps. Make sure to get the KPK200 24B motors. Send them a message after you make the purchase to specify the pump. Make sure to be clear about needing the specific pump model because you have a project with dimensions for that specific pump. They have sent me more expensive pumps in the past because these were just not in stock. Tell them it HAS to be KPK200 24B. These pumps are expensive (probably close to 70EUR each), the cheaper versions just don't work for this purpose. Trust me, we tried every pump tier starting from 3EUR and this was the cheapest pump that would run reliably without getting killed by the chemistry or the stress of running continuously pumping the higher viscosity fluids. Cheaper pumps are not strong enough to compress the chemical tubing and the softer tubings leak active material that destroys the pumps at the contact points.

    4. This is not adequate, it has to be a graphoil sheet. Like this one. We have routinely used 0.5mm sheets. Graphoil used to be readily accessibly through Aliexpress, but China has recently banned the export of several carbon based materials, including graphoil. Alternatively thin Titanium foil could also be used as an electrode material for the cell. Even 0.1mm Ti foil should be adequate (like you can find here).

    5. This is not the proper tubing. The specific tubing from Kamoer we ordered (which is a PTFE lined BPT), is called "Tygon Chemical tubing" by them, they don't have an Aliepxress link for it but if you contact them directly they can sell it to you. The closest tubing they have a link for would be this BPT (here). The diameter would be 4ID 6OD.

    Let me know if you have any other questions!

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    • sepiS Offline
      sepiS Offline
      sepi
      wrote on last edited by
      #3

      @danielfp248 thanks so much for the comprehensive write-up. I had hoped to be more accurate :D. Maybe you should have those links in the BOM page.

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      • sepiS sepi

        @danielfp248 thanks so much for the comprehensive write-up. I had hoped to be more accurate :D. Maybe you should have those links in the BOM page.

        D Offline
        D Offline
        danielfp248
        wrote on last edited by
        #4

        @sepi Thanks for your reply! We would love to, but sadly Aliexpress/Amazon sellers change their links every few weeks (my guess is to stay relevant with the search algorithm of the platforms), so if we added them they wouldn't work in a month.

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        • V Offline
          V Offline
          Vorg
          wrote on last edited by Vorg
          #5

          A google for "graphoil sheet" comes up with some stuff under the brand name "Grafoil". Saw a number of sources including Ebay. Might try starting with google and then narrow it down. There was also some that included Ti foil in the layering

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          • sepiS Offline
            sepiS Offline
            sepi
            wrote on last edited by
            #6

            @Vorg I did my homework and research the material but sourcing mostly industrial use material can be challenging as an amateur. Especially since the manufacturer in this case is from the USA and I'm in Europe.

            kirkK D 2 Replies Last reply
            0
            • sepiS sepi

              @Vorg I did my homework and research the material but sourcing mostly industrial use material can be challenging as an amateur. Especially since the manufacturer in this case is from the USA and I'm in Europe.

              kirkK Offline
              kirkK Offline
              kirk
              wrote on last edited by
              #7

              @sepi said in Sourcing parts:

              @Vorg I did my homework and research the material but sourcing mostly industrial use material can be challenging as an amateur. Especially since the manufacturer in this case is from the USA and I'm in Europe.

              We strongly sympathize with you on this front! We've tried to make it as sourcable and low-cost as possible, but this has it limits.

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              • sepiS sepi

                @Vorg I did my homework and research the material but sourcing mostly industrial use material can be challenging as an amateur. Especially since the manufacturer in this case is from the USA and I'm in Europe.

                D Offline
                D Offline
                danielfp248
                wrote on last edited by
                #8

                @sepi We are in Europe and we sourced everything as private individuals, so it can be done! Let us know if we can be of any additional help.

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                • sepiS Offline
                  sepiS Offline
                  sepi
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #9

                  I ordered most parts now. Fingers crossed they are correct. I went for the Ti foil instead of the graphoil since it was way cheaper. Fingers crossed 🙂

                  1 Reply Last reply
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                  • sepiS Offline
                    sepiS Offline
                    sepi
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #10

                    About the triethylene glycol: can it be substituted for some other glycol maybe? I find it slightly hard to find. What's its purpose anyways?

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                    • sepiS sepi

                      About the triethylene glycol: can it be substituted for some other glycol maybe? I find it slightly hard to find. What's its purpose anyways?

                      D Offline
                      D Offline
                      danielfp248
                      wrote on last edited by danielfp248
                      #11

                      @sepi No, it absolutely has to be triethylene glycol. Other glycols won't work, its chemical structure is exactly required to stabilize I5- in solution. If you're in the EU, you can get it from laboratodiumdiscounter in the Neatherlands (https://www.laboratoriumdiscounter.nl/es/trietilenglicol-99-extra-puro.html). It is not very expensive, 1L is like 15 EUR.

                      It's main purpose is to stabilize higher order polyiodides in solution and therefore prevent solid I2 formation at high SOC values. However if you don't go to high SOC values (keep the battery charge state low, then you can do without it).

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                      • sepiS Offline
                        sepiS Offline
                        sepi
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #12

                        Ahh, excellent. Thanks for both the new reagents source and the explanation. ChatGPT told me that Propylene glycol might work, but then again why trust it :).

                        D 1 Reply Last reply
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                        • sepiS sepi

                          Ahh, excellent. Thanks for both the new reagents source and the explanation. ChatGPT told me that Propylene glycol might work, but then again why trust it :).

                          D Offline
                          D Offline
                          danielfp248
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #13

                          @sepi It doesn't, propylene glycol was also tested on the research paper that found triethyleneglycol worked. You need a very specific structure to stabilize the polyiodides.

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                          • sepiS Offline
                            sepiS Offline
                            sepi
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #14

                            @danielfp248 i just received the tubing and I think I ordered the wrong one. I guess I didnct read correctly what you wrote to me about it. I got PharMed BPT tubing that is not lined with teflon/ptfe. Am I correct that I should order the teflon lined one explicitely? Also how did you know that the one I originally wanted to order (as seen on screenshot) is not good?

                            D 1 Reply Last reply
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                            • sepiS sepi

                              @danielfp248 i just received the tubing and I think I ordered the wrong one. I guess I didnct read correctly what you wrote to me about it. I got PharMed BPT tubing that is not lined with teflon/ptfe. Am I correct that I should order the teflon lined one explicitely? Also how did you know that the one I originally wanted to order (as seen on screenshot) is not good?

                              D Offline
                              D Offline
                              danielfp248
                              wrote on last edited by danielfp248
                              #15

                              @sepi The pharMed BPT is not the correct tubing. It will work for a while but will slowly leak iodine at high SOC values (especially above 50% SOC). You should order the teflon lined one explicitly, they refer to it as "tygon chemical tubing". Make sure to confirm they are sending you PTFE lines tubing. As I mentioned they do NOT sell this through aliexpress so you will need to contact them directly.

                              Note that you can still run tests at lower SOC values with normal BPT tubing.

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                              • sepiS Offline
                                sepiS Offline
                                sepi
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #16

                                @danielfp248 did I understand correctly that Ti foil can be used to replace the grafoil bipolar plate/current collector? You talk about Ti foil as electrode. I'm not so sure about nomenclature here anymore.

                                D 1 Reply Last reply
                                1
                                • sepiS sepi

                                  @danielfp248 did I understand correctly that Ti foil can be used to replace the grafoil bipolar plate/current collector? You talk about Ti foil as electrode. I'm not so sure about nomenclature here anymore.

                                  D Offline
                                  D Offline
                                  danielfp248
                                  wrote on last edited by danielfp248
                                  #17

                                  @sepi The Ti foil can be used to replace the grafoil electrode. Ti can also be used to replace the current collector entirely, but then it would have to be a Ti plate and machining thick Ti is harder plus the conductivity of Ti is much lower than copper. You can use a brass/copper current collector and then have a thin Ti foil used for the electrode material instead of grafoil.

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                                  • sepiS Offline
                                    sepiS Offline
                                    sepi
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #18

                                    Ok, great, that's what I'm aiming for atm. Thanks for the quick reply. Btw I created 2 PRs on codeberg about docs. Maybe have a look if you find the time.

                                    D kirkK 2 Replies Last reply
                                    0
                                    • sepiS sepi

                                      Ok, great, that's what I'm aiming for atm. Thanks for the quick reply. Btw I created 2 PRs on codeberg about docs. Maybe have a look if you find the time.

                                      D Offline
                                      D Offline
                                      danielfp248
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #19

                                      @sepi @kirk is in charge of the documentation atm, I'll ask him to take a look.

                                      1 Reply Last reply
                                      0
                                      • sepiS sepi

                                        Ok, great, that's what I'm aiming for atm. Thanks for the quick reply. Btw I created 2 PRs on codeberg about docs. Maybe have a look if you find the time.

                                        kirkK Offline
                                        kirkK Offline
                                        kirk
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #20

                                        On it, thanks @sepi !

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