There was some concern about production of chlorine in the process I
was using to remove steel by electrolysis. I thought I would
investigate this further.

I made a quick and dirty set-up using steel as anode and stainless
steel as cathode (identical to the actual process). I tried it in 1%
NaCl solution and the same solution acidified with a "splash" of
vinegar. I was going to collect the gases but this proved impractical.
Thus I judged the gas production by the number of bubbles produced at
each electrode. This is what I found:

1) There was *no* gas production at the anode with either electrolyte.
Not a single bubble.
2) There was copious gas production at the cathode. This I take to be
hydrogen. I did not light it up to confirm...
3) I changed the anode to copper. Still no gas production.
3) I changed the anode to stainless steel. While there was on-going
copious production of hydrogen at the cathode, there was minimal
bubble production at the anode with some yellow discoloration. I take
this to be chlorine.

Thus with my existing set-up and given the scale of the operation,
production of chlorine does not appear to be a concern.

Michael Koblic,
Campbell River, BC

wrote in message
...
There was some concern about production of chlorine in the process I
was using to remove steel by electrolysis. I thought I would
investigate this further.

I made a quick and dirty set-up using steel as anode and stainless
steel as cathode (identical to the actual process). I tried it in 1%
NaCl solution and the same solution acidified with a "splash" of
vinegar. I was going to collect the gases but this proved impractical.
Thus I judged the gas production by the number of bubbles produced at
each electrode. This is what I found:

1) There was *no* gas production at the anode with either electrolyte.
Not a single bubble.
2) There was copious gas production at the cathode. This I take to be
hydrogen. I did not light it up to confirm...
3) I changed the anode to copper. Still no gas production.
3) I changed the anode to stainless steel. While there was on-going
copious production of hydrogen at the cathode, there was minimal
bubble production at the anode with some yellow discoloration. I take
this to be chlorine.

Thus with my existing set-up and given the scale of the operation,
production of chlorine does not appear to be a concern.

Michael Koblic,
Campbell River, BC


That's good. I was using carbon electrodes (from dry cell batteries) to get
the Cl2. With C rods the bubbles of Cl2 are quite pronounced, though the
solution around the electrode seemed to go a little "scummy", although this
may have been caused by contaminant on the electrode itself.

Your posts on here prompted me to take my boys out to the shed and make some
hydrogen & chlorine for a bit of fun.

There's a discussion on different electrode types he

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/fo...php?topic=1298

On Sun, 31 Oct 2010 17:56:55 -0700, mkoblic wrote:

There was some concern about production of chlorine in the process I
was using to remove steel by electrolysis. I thought I would
investigate this further.

I made a quick and dirty set-up using steel as anode and stainless
steel as cathode (identical to the actual process). I tried it in 1%
NaCl solution and the same solution acidified with a "splash" of
vinegar. I was going to collect the gases but this proved impractical.
Thus I judged the gas production by the number of bubbles produced at
each electrode. This is what I found:

1) There was *no* gas production at the anode with either electrolyte.
Not a single bubble.
2) There was copious gas production at the cathode. This I take to be
hydrogen. I did not light it up to confirm...
3) I changed the anode to copper. Still no gas production.
3) I changed the anode to stainless steel. While there was on-going
copious production of hydrogen at the cathode, there was minimal
bubble production at the anode with some yellow discoloration. I take
this to be chlorine.

Thus with my existing set-up and given the scale of the operation,
production of chlorine does not appear to be a concern.

Why use any salt at all? Just the vinegar should ionize the water enough
to conduct well. (or a few drops of battery acid.)

Cheers!
Rich