JP3002101B2 - Electrolytic ozone generator - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an electrolytic ozone generator in which an anode and a cathode are provided with an ion-exchange membrane interposed therebetween, and these are supported and integrated by an anode-side support member and a cathode-side support member. In particular, its manufacturing technology.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Generally, as shown in FIG. 4, an electrolytic ozone generator for generating high-concentration ozone is provided with an anode 20 and a cathode 30 with a solid polymer electrolyte membrane 10 interposed therebetween. An integrated type supported by an anode plate 40 and a cathode plate 50 is known. In such a conventional electrolytic ozone generator, the anode plate 40 is provided with a rib 41 as shown in the drawing, and the rib 41 is pressed against the anode 20 so that the anode 20 and the solid polymer electrolyte are in contact with the cathode plate 50. The membrane 10 and the cathode 30 are clamped and supported. The ribs 41 are provided between the respective ribs so as to sufficiently supply pure water as an electrolytic solution to the membrane surface of the polymer electrolyte membrane 10 where electrolysis occurs, and to quickly release generated ozone gas from the membrane surface. Are provided in parallel at a fine pitch of about several mm so as to form. Also, a lead dioxide electrode (anode) which is a laminated sintered body of a platinum-coated titanium material and an untreated titanium material and has an electrodeposition layer of lead dioxide formed on a platinum layer of the platinum-coated titanium material is produced by ozone. Although an example using the apparatus is also disclosed (see Japanese Patent Publication No. 3-6997), this ozone producing apparatus also has an anode plate 4 shown in FIG.
The main electrode plate made of titanium corresponding to (1) has an inner surface rib.

The anode plate 40 having such a shape is usually manufactured by machining from a solid material such as titanium. However, it is not easy to form the ribs 41 by providing the cavities 42 at both ends as passages for pure water or ozone gas, projecting between them, and cutting a large number of rows of grooves in the projections. However, there has been a problem that the processing time increases and the processing time also increases. Further, when an anode plate having such a shape is manufactured from an integral material by cutting, there is a problem that a large amount of material is wasted and the material cost is increased.

[0004]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to solve the above-mentioned problems in the prior art, and to provide an electrolytic ozone generator which is easy to manufacture and has reduced processing and material costs.

[0005]

According to the present invention, an anode and a cathode are provided with an ion-exchange membrane interposed therebetween, and the anode and the cathode are connected to each other. In the electrolytic ozone generator integrally supported by a support member, the anode is made of a short-fibrous metal sintered body.
It has a disk shape or a rectangular plate shape, and a large number of grooves are machined at intervals on the surface of the anode that contacts the anode-side support member.
In addition to the above, the invention according to claim 2 is characterized in that the anode-side support member is a plate-like body, and is in contact with the anode-side support member and covers an end surface of the anode. An anode chamber forming member is provided.

[0006]

According to the first aspect of the present invention, since the anode has a large number of grooves formed at intervals on the surface in contact with the anode-side support member, the edges of the grooves become protruding ridges. The anode is supported by the anode-side support member via the ridges, and a large number of grooves supply sufficient pure water as an electrolyte to the membrane surface of the ion exchange membrane, and quickly generate the ozone gas generated on the membrane surface. It acts as a passage for detaching from the vehicle. Therefore, the groove processing conventionally performed on the anode-side support member becomes unnecessary. In this case, the anode supporting member is made of solid metallic material such as titanium for example, because its shape to form the anode chamber is complicated, but it is not easy grooving, short fibrous as the material of the anode Since a metal sintered body is used, the porosity of this material is large, and since the anode has a simple shape such as a disk shape or a square plate shape, it is extremely easy to form a groove on one side thereof. is there.

On the other hand, in the short- fibrous metal sintered body, the individual metal fibers have sufficient strength, and the metal fibers are sintered in a complicated manner at a plurality of points, so that the sintered portion is not formed. It has sufficient strength against the force of peeling, and enables machine cutting after sintering such as grooving. That is, a sintered metal such as titanium microspheres manufactured by a conventional method such as an atomizer method or a plasma rotating electrode method has a three-dimensional bond with the short fibrous metal sintered body employed in the present invention. The structure is different, and the material properties such as tensile strength and flexibility
It is significantly inferior to the short fibrous metal sintered body. For this reason, when the groove of the configuration of the present invention is formed on the anode made of such a conventional porous body, the corners may be chipped, or the entire sintered body may be formed by the processing depending on the size of the groove to be processed. Of the groove, causing cracks at the root of the groove. Further, when the warp caused by the groove processing is large, when the warp is pressed against the ion exchange membrane, there is often caused a problem that only the protrusions are strong and uniform contact cannot be obtained as a whole. For this reason, in the case of a conventionally used metal sintered body of titanium powder, a structure in which a groove is formed in the anode cannot be put to practical use. In contrast,
The short fibrous metal sintered body employed in the present invention has good workability and sufficient mechanical strength, and the above-mentioned problems are solved. In addition, since this sintered body has excellent flexibility, it can be uniformly contacted with the entire membrane surface with a small pressing force when pressed against the ion exchange membrane, and can be uniformly contacted with a membrane which is particularly important as an ozone generating electrode. Sex is achieved.

According to the second aspect of the present invention, the anode-side support member is a plate-like body, and the anode chamber constituting member that comes into contact with the anode-side support member and covers the peripheral end surface of the anode is provided. The anode chamber can be formed by the anode-side support member having a simple shape without any portion and the anode chamber constituent member. As a result, it is not necessary to form the anode chamber by cutting the anode-side support member from a thick metal material, so that the material to be used is saved and the machining operation is greatly reduced.

[0009]

FIG. 1 shows the configuration of an electrolytic ozone generator according to an embodiment. This example is a bipolar device, and the drawing shows two units thereof. In the electrolytic ozone generator, an anode 2 and a cathode 3 are disposed with a solid polymer electrolyte membrane 1 as an ion exchange membrane interposed therebetween, and these are used as an anode plate 4 as an anode support member and a cathode as a cathode support member. It is integrally formed by being clamped and supported by the cathode plate 5. The anode plate 4 and the cathode plate 5 are integrally fastened together with a through bolt (not shown).

As the solid polymer electrolyte membrane 1, for example, a perchlorocarbon sulfonic acid type cation exchange membrane is used. The anode 2 is made of a short fibrous metal sintered body. As shown in FIG. 2, an example of the shape is shown, and in this embodiment, the anode 2 has a disk shape and protrudes from a surface that contacts the anode plate 4. A large number of grooves 2b are formed at intervals so as to form a large number of ribs 2a whose free end contacts the anode plate 4.
As the fibers of the short fibrous metal sintered body, those manufactured from a molten metal, manufactured by cutting a wire-shaped metal, or manufactured by various other methods can be used. A chatter-cut metal short fiber manufactured by a chatter vibration cutting method for cutting using a self-excited vibration change of an elastic tool is advantageously used. Not only can this metal fiber be produced at low cost, but also there is little dimensional variation, and the sintered body has sufficient tensile strength and flexibility, has good workability and hardly breaks during processing.

The anode plate 4 is also formed in a disk shape to correspond to this, is a flat plate, and is not provided with a flange-shaped protrusion on the periphery. For this reason, a cylindrical body 6 is provided as an anode chamber constituent member that contacts the anode plate 4 and covers the periphery of the end face 2c of the anode 2. As the anode plate 4, for example, titanium having excellent oxidation resistance is used. The cylindrical body 6 may be made of a suitable material, but is made of an inexpensive resin material such as PTFE. A supply port 6a for sending pure water to the cylindrical body 6.
An outlet 6b for discharging pure water and ozone is provided. A packing 7 is interposed between the cylindrical body 6 and the anode plate 4. The periphery of the cathode plate 5 projects in a flange shape, and a hydrogen outlet 5a for discharging hydrogen generated by electrolysis is provided at the upper end thereof.

The solid polymer electrolyte membrane 1 described above, the anode 2 and the cathode 3 on both sides thereof, the anode plate 4 and the cathode plate 5 sandwiching them, the cylindrical body 6 forming the anode chamber, and the like are each integrated. To form one pole of the electrolytic ozone generator,
Such poles are combined to form a multi-pole device. In such an electrolytic ozone generator, a pure water tank 8 for supplying pure water and separating ozone gas is provided at the top of the discharge port 6b, and the bottom of the pure water tank 8 is connected to the supply port 6a. At the same time, the outlet 6b is connected to the side of the pure water tank to separate ozone gas while circulating and using pure water, and to take out ozone gas from the top of the pure water tank. Hydrogen generated from the hydrogen outlet 5a on the cathode side is released to the atmosphere unless particularly collected.

According to such an electrolytic ozone generator, the grooves 2b formed between the plurality of ribs 2a formed on the anode have the same function as the grooves provided on the anode plate in the past, and the solid polymer electrolyte membrane is formed. In addition to supplying necessary pure water to the film surface, the generated ozone gas is quickly released from the film surface. or,
When the anode plate 4 and the cathode plate 5 on both sides are tightened, the rib 2a has its free end pressed against the anode plate 4 and withstands the tightening force with the groove 2b secured, thereby enabling integration of the device. I have.

In the above, the ribs 2a of the anode 2 are formed on one surface side of the anode 2 by grooving with an appropriate depth. In this case, since the anode 2 is made of a short fibrous metal sintered body such as a chatter-cut metal short fiber sintered body, the metal fibers are sintered at many positions to form a strong bond. Therefore, even if the above-mentioned machining is performed, it can withstand it sufficiently. That is, even if a thin rib having a width of about several mm is processed, there is always a sintered portion between the metal fibers in the rib portion, and this portion is subjected to stress such as tension or shear generated at the time of processing. Withstands and forms a rib shape without peeling. Also, no processing distortion such as cracks at the corners of the groove or overall warpage occurs. The above points were sufficiently confirmed by experiments by the inventors.

On the other hand, such a sintered body has a large porosity of about 70% despite the fact that there are many bonding parts by sintering. For this reason, processing becomes easier as compared with processing a solid material of a metal such as titanium. Further, since the anode 2 has a simple disk-like shape, it is extremely easy to perform the grooving process, and the processing time is greatly reduced. Further, for the anode plate 4, by selecting a material having the same thickness as the plate thickness at the time of assembly, processing other than the outer peripheral processing becomes unnecessary. In other words, as in the conventional case, the outer peripheral flange-shaped portion is cut out from a thick material, and a protruding portion for a groove is formed in the inside. The processing time is greatly reduced and the material is largely saved. If the anode chamber is formed as a separate body as in the present embodiment, even when grooves are formed on the anode plate side, the processing time and the material can be reduced as compared with the conventional case.

FIG. 3 shows a monopolar electrolytic ozone generator as another embodiment. This device is different from that of FIG.
That all components such as the solid polymer electrolyte membrane 1 are one, that the periphery of the anode plate 4 is a projection 4a, in which an anode chamber is formed, and that the inlet of pure water is provided. 4
b, outlet 4c for pure water and ozone gas, and hydrogen outlet 5b
Are provided on the anode plate 4 and the cathode plate 5, respectively, and therefore, the cylindrical body 6 in the apparatus of FIG. 1 is not provided. A rib 2a is formed on the anode 2 as in the apparatus shown in FIG.

Also in this apparatus, the groove processing for forming the rib 2a is easy as in the apparatus of FIG. 1, and the processing cost and processing time of the entire apparatus are reduced as compared with the conventional apparatus. In the above embodiment, the case where the electrolytic ozone generator is of a round type has been described. However, it is needless to say that the present invention can be applied to a square or other shapes of the apparatus.

[0018]

As described above, according to the present invention, according to the first aspect of the present invention, a combination of a structure using a short fibrous metal sintered body as a material for the anode and a structure for forming grooves in the anode is provided. Therefore, the groove processing of the anode-side support member having a complicated shape is not required, the processing is facilitated, and a remarkable effect that the processing time and the processing cost of the entire apparatus are greatly reduced is obtained. In the invention of claim 2, in addition to the above,
Since the anode chamber forming member is provided separately from the anode side supporting member and the anode side supporting member is made into a plate-like body, machining of the anode side supporting member is almost eliminated, thereby reducing the material cost of the entire apparatus and processing. The cost can be further reduced, and the cost of the electrolytic ozone generator can be further reduced.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a configuration of an electrolytic ozone generator according to an embodiment.

2 (a) and 2 (b) are a front view and a plan view of an anode of the upper device.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a structure of an electrolytic ozone generator according to another embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a sectional view showing the structure of a conventional electrolytic ozone generator.

[Explanation of symbols]

 Reference Signs List 1 solid polymer electrolyte membrane (ion exchange membrane) 2 anode 2b groove 2c end face 3 cathode 4 anode plate (anode support member) 5 cathode plate (cathode support member) 6 cylinder (anode chamber constituent member)

Continuation of the front page (72) Inventor Eiichi Toriyo 3-9-20 Higashikyuhoji, Yao-shi, Osaka (56) References JP-A-1-312092 (JP, A) JP-A-6-158376 (JP, A) (58) Field surveyed (Int. Cl. ⁷ , DB name) C25B 1/00-15/08

Claims (2)

(57) [Claims] 1. An electrolytic ozone generator in which an anode and a cathode are provided with an ion exchange membrane interposed therebetween, and these are supported and integrated by an anode-side support member and a cathode-side support member. Disk-shaped or made of sintered metal
It has a square plate shape, and a large number of grooves are formed at intervals on the surface of the anode that contacts the anode-side support member by machining.
Electrolytic ozone generating apparatus characterized by being formed me. 2. The electrolytic solution according to claim 1, wherein the anode-side support member is a plate-like body, and an anode chamber forming member is provided to contact the anode-side support member and cover an end surface of the anode. Type ozone generator.