Improvements in Secondary or Storage Batteries.
Year: 1891

page_text: Date of Application. 6th Oct., 1891
Complete Specification Left, 6th Aug., 1892-Accepted, 1st Oct. 1892
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION.
[Communicated from abroad by PATRICK KENNEDY, of No. 105, .Johnson Street,
and CHARLES JOSEPH DISS, of No. 334, Pearl Street, both of Brooklyn,
New York, United States of America, Machinists.]
Improvements in Secondary or Storage Batteries.
I, HENRY HARRIS LAKE, of the firm of Haseltine Lake & Co., Patent Agents,
45 Southampton Buildings, in the County of Middlesex, do hereby declare the
nature of this invention to be as follows:-
This invention relates to a storage battery in which the electrical conductivity
necessary for the working of the apparatus is derived from a conductor of electricity
placed in due relation with the active material held in a supporting structure or
structures, each of which is itself a non-conductor of electricity.
Each non-conducting structure, whether one or more, used in connection with a
conductor of electricity is provided with means for holding the active material, and
in general, may comprise a plate of non-conducting material having cavities or
openings extending through it in which the active material is placed. Preferably
the conductor comprises a leaden plate or series of connected strips contined
between two of the non-conducting structures and in contact with the active
material in the openings of said structures. The apparatuses, each composed of a
conductor and a non-conducting structure or structures, the latter holding the
active matorial, are, when in use placed in a battery cell, and the conductors are
connected by circuit wires in a manner corresponding to that of the wires of an
ordinary storage battery composed of leaden plates constructed to themselves carry
the active material.
The object of the present invention, is to provide a non-conducting structure for
holding the active material which will be strong, light, durable, easily and cheaply
To this
manufactured, and not liable to warp out of shape when applied to use.
end the said invention comprises a structure for the purpose aforesaid composed of
a non-conducting material, capable, in a plastic condition, of being incorporated
with other substances and of subsequently coming, in such incorporated state, to a
condition sufficiently hard and rigid to retain its shape, in combination with a non-
conducting mineral substance, the particles, granules or fibres of which are united
in the mass by the originally plastic material incorporated as aforesaid, therewith.
The material, which for convenience I designate as the originally plastic material
may be a cohesive resin, gum, or gum resin, or it may be any other substance which
possesses to the requisite degree, the property of resistance to the passage of
electrical currents combined with the property of plasticity under some conditions
and of hardness or rigidity under others. The other ur mineral constituent of the
compound may be any mineral which is practically a non-conductor of electricity
and capable of being reduced to a condition in which it may be incorporated with a
plastic material. Silica, asbestos and other like substances may be employed for
The purpose. The better results are obtainable when the mineral is finely pulverized,
and those most satisfactory, will be secured when the mineral is reduced practically
to a floured condition.
So far as I am at present advised, shellac provides the best example of what I
term the originally plastic material as it may be readily brought to the plastic
condition in which it is introduced in the production of the compound, cools readily
to a sufficiently hard condition and possesses when cold a degree of cohesion highly
advantageous for my purpose. So far as I am at present aware, the best mineral
non-conductor for the purpose is floured or finely pulverized. glass. By combining

page_text: or incorporating shellac with glass reduced to the fineness of flour in the proportion
of one part by weight of the former and five parts by weight of the latter I secure
the most advantageous results.
Dated this 6th day of October 1891.
HASELTINE, LAKE & Co.,
45, Southampton Buildings, London, W.C., Agents for the Applicant.
COMPLETE SPECIFICATION.
Improvements in Secondary or Storage Batteries.
I, HENRY HARRIS LAKE, of the firm of Haseltine Lake & Co., Patent Agents,
45 Southampton Buildings, in the County of Middlesex, 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 storage batteries in which the electrical conductivity
necessary to the operation of the apparatus is provided by a conductor distinct
from the structure or structures which support the active material, the latter being
supported by a structure or structures composed of a material or materials which
are practically non-conductors of electricity. The method of making and using the
said structures is described and claimed in the Specification of Letters Patent
granted to me dated October 6th 1891 No. 16934.
The drawings illustrate apparatuses of this kind in which the present invention
may be employed,
Figure 1 being a transverse sectional view of such an apparatus, and
Figure 2 n transverse sectional view taken on the line x, x of Figure 1 and also
in the corresponding line of Figure 3, the latter representing an apparatus of
somewhat different construction but operating upon the same principle as that
shown in Figure 1.
Figure 4 shows a number of such apparatuses as placed and arranged in a cell of
a storage battery.
In the drawings, A is a conductor of electricity, disposed as a slotted plate in
contact with the side or sides of a structure B, which is provided with cavities a, in
which the active material is placed, and which is formed of a material which, to all
practical intents and purposes, is not a conductor of electricity. In Figure 1, but
one such structure is used, the opposite side of the conductor being covered by a
protecting plate a¹, also made of a non-conducting material. In Figure 3 two such
structures are used, one on each side of the conductor A. The active material C,
is placed in the cavities or openings of the structure or structures B, and in contact
with the conductor A. In the cell of a storage battery any desired number of
apparatuses made as described are placed and secured side by side and provided
with connecting conducting wires C corresponding to those which connect the
leaden plates of the ordinary storage battery.
The object of the present invention is to provide a non-conducting structure for
supporting the active material, which will be light, strong, durable, inexpensive,
easily manufactured, non-conductive in a high degree of electricity, not liable to
warp out of shape, and generally efficient for the purposes for which it is
intended.
In the practice of this invention I take a suitable bituminous resinous, gummy or
gum resinous material which is capable of being brought to a plastic condition,
capable in that condition of being mingled with powdered, granular or fibrous
mineral substances and capable thereafter of hardening or solidifying to bind the
particles, grains or fibres of such substance together and which in its hardened or
solidified condition is a non-conductor of electricity. In carrying out the said
invention first bring, in any suitable manner, the said material to a plastic

page_text: condition and combine or incorporate the same with a mineral non-conductor of
electricity, in a powdered, granular or fibrous condition in such manner that the
particles, fibres or granules of the mineral are united by the other material in its
plastic state and on hardening or solidification of the plastic mass provide a solid
substance. The material which, in the production of the compound is used in a
plastic condition I term for convenience "the originally plastic non-conductor of
electricity" because it is in a plastic condition when originally mingled or
incorporated with the powdered, granular, comminuted or fibrous substance or
substances and because when such incorporation is completed and the material
takes its final and operative place in the product it is itself a non-conductor of
electricity. Said original plastic material may consist of bitumen which hardens to
a solid condition at ordinary temperatures, or it may be a cohesive resin, or a gum
resin or any like material, provided it be capable of withstanding to a greater or
less extent the solvent or corrosive action of the liquid in the battery cell. The
mineral material may be silica, asbestos, or any other having, to a substantial or
relative degree, the property of resisting the passage of electrical currents, in other
words a non-conductor of electricity, and of a character capable of admixture and
incorporation with what I herein term the cohesive or originally plastic non-
conductor. The better results are obtained when the mineral is finely comminuted,
the more finely the better as a more coherent, stronger and more uniformly non-
conducting compound is by this means obtained. The best results are secured
when shellac is employed as the originally plastic material, and glass reduced to a
substantially floured or minutely powdered state is employed as the mineral
component of the product. The best proportions are, say, one part by weight of
shellac and five parts by weight of the floured or minutely powdered glass.
Substantially the same proportions may be used when other cohesive or originally
plastic material and other mineral materia: are employed, but these proportions
may be widely departed from without going beyond the scope and character of our
said invention.
The materials may be combined or incorporated in any suitable manner or by any
suitable means. The structures may be formed therefrom by casting in moulds when
the combined materials are in a plastic condition, or from the compound in its solid
condition by the use of suitable tools, the former being, in general the method to
be preferred. I do not confine myself to any particular form of structure for
holding the active material of a storage battery, the mere form itself being
immaterial to the present invention.
It will be observed that the originally plastic material, being incorporated with
the mineral material in a powdered, granular, comminuted, or fibrous state, cements
the particles, granules or fibres, as the case may be, firmly together and on the
hardening to a solid state of the compound, the cohesion of the originally plastic
material affords a permanent bond of union between the particles, granules or fibres
of the mineral component of the compound.
Having now particularly described and ascertained the nature of this inven-
tion and in what manner the same is to be performed as communicated to me
by my foreign correspondents I declare that what I claim is:-
1. The use in a structure or structures employed for holding the active material
of a storage battery, of a cohesive bitumen, resin, gum or gum resin and a mineral
non-conductor of electricity, substantially as herein set forth.
2. The use in a structure or structures employed for holding the active material
of a storage battery of a cohesive substance consisting of bitumen, resin, gum or
gum resin and a finely pulverized mineral non-conductor of electricity, substantially
as herein set forth.
3. The use in a structure or structures employed for holding the active material
of a storage battery of substances consisting of shellac and a mineral non-conductor
of electricity, substantially as herein set forth.

page_text: 4. The use in a structure or structures employed for holding the active material
of a storage battery composed of a cohesive bitumen, resin, gum or gum resin and a
floured mineral non-conductor of electricity, substantially as herein set forth.
Dated this 6th day of August 1892.
HASELTINE, LAKE & Co.,
45, Southampton Buildings, London, W.C., Agents for the Applicant.