JPH0142934Y2 - - Google Patents

Description

[Detailed explanation of the invention] This invention relates to a fuel cell, and to be more specific, it consists of a pair of electrodes sandwiching an electrolyte, and a gas flow path through which an oxidant gas and a fuel gas flow through the electrodes, respectively. This invention relates to a fuel cell formed by stacking a plurality of unit cells.

Conventionally, the unit cell of this type of fuel cell is usually
It was constructed as shown in Figure 1. In the figure, electrodes 2a, 2b sandwiching an electrolyte matrix 1 impregnated with an electrolytic solution, and a separator plate 3 are provided with a plurality of parallel gas passages 4 for circulating oxidizing gas and fuel gas on the back surfaces of the electrodes 2a, 2b. It consists of This unit battery is stacked in multiple stages to obtain a practical voltage. With this configuration, the oxidant gas and fuel gas supplied to the fuel cell flow through the plurality of gas channels 4 provided in the separator plate 3. At this time, a portion of the oxidizing gas and the fuel gas pass through the back surfaces of the electrodes 2a and 2b, respectively, causing a chemical reaction in the electrolyte matrix 1, and at this time electrical energy can be extracted from between the electrodes 2a and 2b.

In order to obtain a practical voltage for a fuel cell, it is necessary to stack many of the above unit cells, but in order to make the device compact, it is necessary to stack separator plates 3
It is necessary to provide a large number of channels 4 with small single channel cross-sectional areas in parallel.

Gas flow path 4 provided in conventional separator plate 3
Usually, a plurality of unidirectional flow channels are formed at equal intervals as described above. However, in this configuration, although the number of man-hours required for processing the gas flow path 4 is small, the cross-sectional area of a single flow path is small, so if a part of the gas flow path 4 becomes clogged with an obstacle, the gas flow path 4 is likely to be blocked. There was a drawback that there was no flow in the entire gas flow path 4, and the reaction area of the battery was reduced, resulting in a decrease in battery performance.

This idea was made in order to eliminate the above-mentioned drawbacks of the conventional ones. It is an object of the present invention to provide a fuel cell that can exhibit stable performance without reducing the reaction area of the cell even if a part of the gas flow path is blocked by appropriately providing the flow path.

An embodiment of this invention will be described below with reference to the drawings. In FIG. 2, diagonally to the gas flow direction of the gas passages 4 arranged in parallel to the separator plate 3,
A connecting channel 5 is formed to communicate adjacent gas channels 4.

Next, the action and effect will be explained. In FIG. 3, the reaction gas is supplied from one end surface of the separator plate 3. Gas flows through the gas flow path 4, but if a certain gas flow path 4a is blocked by some kind of obstruction 6, or the flow path area becomes small and flow path resistance increases, the gas flows through the obstruction 6. The adjacent gas flow path 4b is detoured and passed through the connecting flow path 5a.
flows into. Further, since the gas from the gas flow path 4c adjacent to the gas flow path 4a flows into the downstream side of the gas flow path 4a via the connecting flow path 5b, it is possible to almost reduce the reaction area of the gas flow path 4a. It is possible to maintain a stable reaction without any problems. Further, since the connecting flow path 5 is provided with an inclination to the gas flow path 4, pressure loss due to detours and branching of the gas flow can be minimized.

In the above embodiment, the gas flow direction in the connecting channel 5 was set to only one side (the right side in FIG. 2) with respect to the gas flow direction in the gas channel 4, but as shown in FIG. The connecting passage 5 is configured to branch from the passage 4 to both sides, and the connecting passage 5 is arranged so that the angles formed between the gas flow direction of the connecting passage 5 and the gas flow direction of the gas passage 4 are alternately acute angles and obtuse angles. Alternatively, the same effect as in the above embodiment can be obtained.

Further, in the above embodiment, the separator plate 3 is provided with a gas flow path 4, but this gas flow path is connected to the electrolyte matrix 1 of the electrodes 2a, 2b themselves.
It may be formed on the back surface that is not in contact with the In this case, it goes without saying that the separator plate 3 does not require a gas flow path.

As described above, according to this invention, a connecting flow path is provided between the gas flow paths of the reaction gas, which has an oblique angle with respect to the gas flow direction of the gas flow path. Even if it is blocked by objects, the reaction area of the battery will hardly decrease.
This has the effect of providing a fuel cell that exhibits stable cell performance.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

Fig. 1 is an exploded perspective view showing a unit cell of a conventional fuel cell, Fig. 2 is a plan view of the main part of an embodiment of this invention, Fig. 3 is an explanatory diagram of the gas flow situation, and Fig. 4 is an exploded perspective view of a unit cell of a conventional fuel cell. FIG. 7 is a plan view of main parts of another embodiment of the invention. DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1... Electrolyte matrix, 2a, 2b... Electrode, 3... Separator plate, 4... Gas flow path, 5...
... Connecting channel, 6... Obstacle. In each figure, the same reference numerals indicate the same or equivalent parts.

Claims (1)

[Claims for Utility Model Registration] (1) A pair of electrodes arranged with an electrolyte matrix in between, a separator plate abutting the back surfaces of these electrodes, and an oxidizing gas flowing along the back surfaces of the pair of electrodes. , in a fuel cell formed by stacking a plurality of unit cells each having a plurality of parallel gas flow paths through which fuel gas flows along the back surface of the other electrode, the gas flow path is connected between adjacent gas flow paths. What is claimed is: 1. A fuel cell characterized in that the fuel cell is provided with a connecting channel communicating at an oblique angle with respect to the gas flow direction. (2) The fuel cell according to claim 1, wherein the gas flow path and the connecting flow path are formed in the separator plate. (3) The fuel cell according to claim 1, wherein the gas flow path and the connecting flow path are formed in the electrode.