Year: 1896

page_text: MICHAEL MARY BROPHY, Engineer 251 High Holborn W.C. JOSEPH DEVONPORT
FINNEY ANDREWS Electrical Engineer 45 Fulham Park Gardens S W do hereby declare
the nature of this invention to be as follows:-
This invention relates to improvements in electric batteries of the reversible type
known as accumulators.
I construct my electrodes preferably in the form of rods of various shapes, upon
the surface of such rods I form active material either by chemical or electrolytic
action on the rod, or by the application of a suitable oxide or salt in the form of a
paste. When the electrodes are of lead I prefer to use oxides or other bases or salts
of lead as such active material. These oxides I form into a stiff paste which I form
round the rod in any known manner. In order to effect a substantial adhesion and
contact between the lead rod and the paste, I may form the rod with a roughness or
with projections such as teeth or rings placed at intervals or I may slip on washers
suitably shaped at intervals, or I may make the rod with a screw thread upon it
such as a wood screw or with a longitudinal web which may be corrugated or
zigzagged, or the rod may be constructed of a strand of strips or wires or of a single
tape of lead preferably twisted. To increase the stability of the rod and also to
increase its conductivity I sometimes construct it with a core of a higher conducting
metal such as copper. Instead of applying the paste to the rod in the usual way by
hand or direct pressure in a mould I prefer to make the rod in long lengths and
force it through a body of paste and through a die to finish it. Force may be
applied by a power press to the paste while the rod is being drawn through it and
the die or I may arrange the power to squirt the rod and the paste together through
a die.
In order to make my rod electrodes suitable for various sizes and shapes of
accumulators I take several rods and form them into a grid fixing the ends of the
rods together with lead preferably cast or burnt on, I may also put one or more such
binders between the ends of the rods towards the centre.
When I wish to toughen the paste on the rods so as to minimise the risk of its
falling off, I mix asbestos fibre with the paste, or instead of forming a mixture I may
cover the pasted rod with a mantle of preferably woven asbestos or string or tape
lapped on.
I prefer to use sulphuric acid or sulphate of lead with my electrodes as the
electrolyte when they are of lead and its oxides and I may stand or suspend them in
the electrolyte in any suitable position such as in rows of rods alternately positive
and negative or in rows of positive and rows of negative alternately. When
I use my electrodes for work in which they would be subject to vibration I prefer

page_text: to place the rods horizontally in trays, in which case I would prefer to place the
positive and negative rods side by side alternately. When arranged in this way I
may find it preferable to apply the paste or active material to one side of this rod
only as the other side would be lying on the bottom of the containing vessel or on a
support in the containing vessel. When I have several vessels containing horizontal
rods I may place one vessel on the top of the other each vessel forming a cover to
the lower one. I would form a lip on the upper edge of each vessel all round and
bend it downwards to prevent direct creeping of moisture from one cell to the other.
I would further provide a recess on the edges of the cells so that the cells could fit
onto each other.
I would provide a vent hole from one cell to the other through the wall of the
cell which may be thickened in this place, this hole would have an opening on the
upper inside edge and through the bottom.
The connections between the cells may be made through holes similarly arranged.
14+1 A 1906
MICHL. M. BROPHY.
J. D. F. ANDREWS.
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in Electric Accumulators or Secondary Batteries.
MICHAEL MARY BROHPY 251 High Holborn, London W.C. Engineer, JOSEPH
DEVONPORT FINNEY ANDREWS 45 Fulham Park Gardens S.W. do hereby declare the
nature of this invention and in what manner the same is to be performed, to be
particularly described and ascertained in and by the following statement:-
This invention relates to improvements in electric batteries of the reversible type
known as accumulators.
We construct our electrodes preferably in the form of rods of various shapes.
Upon the surface, of such rods we form active material either by chemical or
electrolytic action on the rod or by the application of a suitable oxide or salt in the
form of a paste. When the electrodes are of lead we prefer to use oxides or other
bases or salts of lead as such active material. These oxides we form into a stiff
paste which we form round the rod in any known manner. In order to effect a
substantial adhesion and contact between the lead rod and the paste, we may form
the rod with a roughness or with projections such as teeth or rings placed at
intervals or we may slip on washers suitably shaped at intervals, or we may make a
rod with a screw thread upon it such as a wood screw or with a longitudinal web
which may be corrugated or zigzagged, or the rod may be constructed of a strand
of strips or wires or of a single tape of lead preferably twisted. To increase the
stability of the rod and also to increase its conductivity we sometimes construct it
with a core of a higher conducting metal such as copper. Instead of applying the
paste to the rod in the usual way by hand or direct pressure in a mould we prefer
to make the rod in long lengths and force it through a body of paste and through a
die to finish it. Force may be applied by a power press to the paste while the rod
is being drawn through it and the die.
In order to make our rod electrodes suitable for various sizes and shapes of
accumulators we take several rods and form them into a grid fixing the ends of the
rods together with lead preferably cast or burnt on, we may also put one or more
such binders between the ends of the rods towards the centre.
When we wish to toughen the paste on the rods so as to minimise the risk of its
falling off, we mix asbestos fibre with the paste, or instead of forming a mixture we

page_text: may cover the pasted rod with a mantle of preferably woven asbestos or string or
tape lapped on.
we
We prefer to use sulphuric acid with my electrodes as the electrolyte when they
are of lead and its oxides and we may stand or suspend them in the electrolyte in
any suitable position such
such as in rows of rods alternately positive and
negative or in rows of positive and rows of negative alternately. When
my electrodes for work in which they would be subject to
vibration we prefer to place the rods horizontally in trays, in which caso
we would prefer to place the positive and negative rods side by sido alternately.
When the rods are arranged in this way we may find it preferable to apply the paste
or active material to one side of the rod only as the other side would be lying on the
bottom of the containing vessel or on a support in the containing vessel. When we
have several vessels containing horizontal rods we may place one vessel on the top
of the other each vessel forming a cover to the lower one. We would form a lip on
the upper edge of each vessel all round and bend it downwards to prevent direct
creeping of moisture from one cell to the other. We would further provide a recess
on the edges of the cells so that the cells could fit onto each other.
We would provide a vent hole from one cell to the other through the wall of the
cell which may be thickened in this place, this hole would have an opening on the
upper inside edge and through the bottom.
The connections between the cells may be made through holes similarly arranged.
Fig. 1 represents a rod electrode constructed according to our invention in which
A is the lead rod surrounded by active material B. The rod A may be roughened
as a file or may be possessed of projections in any form to carry and hold the active
material one form of which is shown in Fig. 2 in which A is the rod provided with
a screw worm C upon it around which is the active material B.
In Fig. 3 we show the rod with longitudinal webbs A which in this case we show
four as best seen in Fig. 3. The active material B is formed on between and
around the webbs.
In Fig. 4 we show how we would increase the stability and conductivity of the
rod by providing a rod of high conducting metal D inside of the lead rod which we
would surround with active material as described above.
Fig. 5 and 5 represents our rod A constructed in the form of a tube pierced
with holes H to form a holding for the active material B.
Fig. 6 & G represont our rod A made of strip provided with webbs W curved
so as to hold in the active material B.
In Fig. 7 we illustrate the method of forming the activo material B onto the rod
A by drawing the rod through the active material which is under pressure of the
ram R.
In Fig. 8 we illustrate our rod electrodos arranged alternately positive and
negative on a tray the paste being applied to one side of the rod only. The rod in
this case is preferably made of strips S S, with the edges turned up & made up in
series or groups of 3 or more bound together at one end by the connection parts PP
ទេ
2
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of my said invention,.
and in what manner the same is to be performed, I declare that what I
claim is :-
1. The construction of electrodes for secondary batteries in the form of rods.
substantially as described and with reference to Figs. 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6.
2. The method of giving greater stability and higher conductivity to rod
electrodes for secondary batteries as described and with reference to Fig. 4.
3. The method of adding the active material to the rod by means of a power press,
substantially as described and with reference to Fig. 7.
4. The arrangement of rod electrodes in a secondary battery alternately positive
and negative in rows substantially as described and with reference to Fig. 8.
5. The arrangement of electrodes horizontally on a support or tray. The

page_text: positive and negative electrodes being arranged side by side, substantially as
described and with reference to Fig. 8.
141 M 1007
MICHL. M. BROPHY.
J. D. F. ANDREWS.