Introduction: Make Hydrogen From Water and Household Parts

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About: I was born and raised in Central Florida. I hold a bachelor's degree in business management and do network maintenance for a broadband/telecommunications company. I am married with two perfect girls. I li…

This project is to make a single hho cell out of household parts. This process produces hydrogen through electrolysis. This design is taken after others I have seen. I just worked with what I had lying around. I would assume this is no more than 20$ to buy the parts. I realize the parts do not fit perfectly, but it generates hydrogen and that was good enough for my first test run.

Step 1: Parts Needed

5- large stainless washers 4- smaller stainless washers 1- nylon bolt 2- nylon wing nuts 8- nylon washers 2- 10-14 gauge jumper wires with crimp on terminals 4- small stainless washers

Step 2: Start Stacking Washers

Either cut nylon bolt and use wing nuts on both sides like I did or use the head of the bolt to tighten against. Stack in this order: smallest stainless washer, wire jumper, smallest stainless washer, large washer, nylon washer, small washer, nylon washer, large washer, nylon washer, small washer, nylon washer, large washer, nylon washer, small washer, nylon washer, large washer, nylon washer, small washer, nylon washer, large washer, smallest stainless washer, wire jumper, smallest stainless washer, wing nut.

Step 3: Tighten and Test It Out

In order to test this, you will need a non-conductive container (plastic or glass), a 12 volt power source capable of a 5-7 amps (car battery, power wheels battery, lawn mower battery) water, and baking soda. First, fill your container with about five inches of water and add a couple tablespoons of baking soda. Now insert the hho cell and place one wire to the negative side of the battery and the other to the positive side. You should instantly see it start to bubble. If not, check your connections and make sure none of the metal washers are touching each other and that the jumper wires are making contact with the outermost large washers. There are lots of different designs for this cell out there, some use neutral plates like I did and others just use two back-to-back plates. I have read that ideally for 12 volts, there should be seven equal sized plates with 6 gaps and a charged plate in the middle. I worked with what I had and had about 1.7-2 volts between plates--a little mismatch due to using different sized plates ( I believe). As always, do your research to see what best suits your application and have fun with it. Be careful though because hydrogen is very flammable.

Step 4: Update- Better Design

I found 7 same-sized washers and replaced the smaller ones in my previous design with these and got much better output. My next plan is to energize the middle washer and see what happens. By this I mean it will be as follows: -NNN+NNN- with N meaning neutral plate.