Batteries antimony

See also Lead storage battery antimony battery grids, 3 52 arsenic applications, 3 271 assembly, 3 539-540 barium in, 3 349... 

Silver is employed for low resistance electrical contacts and conductors, and in silver cell batteries. Antimony is used in lead add storage batteries to improve the workability of the lead and lead oxides. Copper and copper alloy wires, connectors, cables, switches, printed drcuit boards, and transistor and rectifier bases are common throughout the industry. Nickel is used in high resistance heating elements, glass-to-metal seals, batteries, and spedalty steels for power generation equipment Household appliances employ stainless and electroplated steel containing nickel. 

The float current for the calcium-lead and antimonial lead batteries is shown in Fig. 23.43 under float charge at voltages between 2.15 and 2.40 V per cell. It has been found that more than 50 mV positive and negative overpotential is necessary to prevent self-discharge so that 0.005 A float current per 100 Ah of battery capacity is required for the lead-calcium batteries. Antimonial lead batteries initially require at least 0.06 A per 100 Ah, but this increases to 0.6 A per 100 Ah as the battery ages. The higher float current also increases the rate of water consumption and evolution of hydrogen gas. 

The lead-bearing components ate released from the case and other nordead-containing parts, followed by the smelting of the battery plates, and refinement to pure lead or specification alloys. The trend toward battery grid alloys having Httle or no antimony, increases the abiHty of a recovery process to produce soft lead (refined). As requited in the production of primary lead, each step in the secondary operations must meet the environmental standards for lead concentration in ait (see Air pollution Lead compounds, industrial toxicology). 

Reverberator Furnace. Using a reverberatory furnace, a fine particle feed can be used, the antimony content can be controlled, and batch operations can be carried out when the supply of scrap material is limited. However, the antimony-rich slags formed must be reduced in a blast furnace to recover the contained antimony and lead. For treating battery scrap, the reverberatory furnace serves as a large melting faciUty where the metallic components are hquefted and the oxides and sulfate in the filler material are concurrently reduced to lead metal and the antimony is oxidized. The furnace products are antimony-rich (5 to 9%) slag and low antimony (less than 1%) lead. 

Automobile battery grids employ about 1—3 wt % antimony—lead alloys. Hybrid batteries use low (1.6—2.5 wt %) alloys for the positive grids and nonantimony alloys for the negative grids to give reduced or no water loss. The posts and straps of virtually all lead—acid batteries are made of alloys containing about 3 wt % antimony. 

Fig. 4. Grain structure of lead—2 wt % antimony alloy battery grid at a magnification of 50x (a) no nucleants (b) containing 0.025 wt % selenium as a grain...

Low (2—5 wt %) antimony, low (2—5 wt %) tin lead alloys are used for automobde body solder. Special lead—antimony alloys containing 1—4 wt % antimony are used for wheel-balancing weights, battery cable clamps, collapsible tubes, and highly machined isotope pots. 

Rea.ctivity ofLea.d—Ca.lcium Alloys. Precise control of the calcium content is required to control the grain stmcture, corrosion resistance, and mechanical properties of lead—calcium alloys. Calcium reacts readily with air and other elements such as antimony, arsenic, and sulfur to produce oxides or intermetaUic compounds (see Calciumand calciumalloys). In these reactions, calcium is lost and suspended soHds reduce fluidity and castibiUty. The very thin grids that are required for automotive batteries are difficult to cast from lead—calcium alloys. 

Wrought lead—calcium—tin alloys contain more tin, have higher mechanical strength, exhibit greater stabiUty, and are more creep resistant than the cast alloys. RoUed lead—calcium—tin alloy strip is used to produce automotive battery grids in a continuous process (13). Table 5 Hsts the mechanical properties of roUed lead—calcium—tin alloys, compared with lead—copper and roUed lead—antimony (6 wt %) alloys. 

Silver reduces the oxygen evolution potential at the anode, which reduces the rate of corrosion and decreases lead contamination of the cathode. Lead—antimony—silver alloy anodes are used for the production of thin copper foil for use in electronics. Lead—silver (2 wt %), lead—silver (1 wt %)—tin (1 wt %), and lead—antimony (6 wt %)—silver (1—2 wt %) alloys ate used as anodes in cathodic protection of steel pipes and stmctures in fresh, brackish, or seawater. The lead dioxide layer is not only conductive, but also resists decomposition in chloride environments. Silver-free alloys rapidly become passivated and scale badly in seawater. Silver is also added to the positive grids of lead—acid batteries in small amounts (0.005—0.05 wt %) to reduce the rate of corrosion. 

Selenium acts as a grain refiner in lead antimony alloys (114,115). The addition of 0.02% Se to a 2.5% antimonial lead alloy yields a sound casting having a fine-grain stmcture. Battery grids produced from this alloy permit the manufacture of low maintenance and maintenance-free lead—acid batteries with an insignificant loss of electrolyte and good performance stability. 

Recycling of antimony provides a large proportion of the domestic supply of antimony. Secondary antimony is obtained from the treatment of antimony-hearing lead and tin scrap such as battery plates, type metal, beating metal, antimonial lead, etc. The scrap are charged iato blast furnaces, reverberatory furnaces, or rotary furnaces, and an impure lead bulHon or lead alloy is produced. Pure lead or antimony is then added to meet the specifications of the desired lead—antimony alloy. 

Industrial Consumption. The total consumption of primary antimony fell during the period from 1970 to 1986 (Table 3) because of the declining demand for antimony in most types of metallic uses. Since 1986, the demand for primary antimony in antimonial lead has increased, probably because of an increase in demand for starting—lighting—ignition (SLI) batteries. Total consumption in nonmetallic uses has remained stable. However, an increasing proportion of this is made up of flame retardant uses. Currendy, batteries and flame retardants are the two largest markets for antimony. 

Demand for high performance SLI batteries has led to the development of smaller, lighter batteries that require less maintenance. The level of antimony is being decreased from the conventional 3—5% to 1.75—2.75% to minimise the detrimental effects. Lead alloys that contain no antimony have also been introduced. Hybrid batteries use a low antimony—lead alloy in the positive plate and a calcium—lead alloy in the negative plate. 

Trace quantities of arsenic are added to lead-antimony grid alloys used ia lead—acid batteries (18) (see Batteries, lead acid). The addition of arsenic permits the use of a lower antimony content, thus minimising the self-discharging characteristics of the batteries that result from higher antimony concentrations. No significant loss ia hardness and casting characteristics of the grid alloy is observed (19,20). 

A simple, rapid and seleetive eleetroehemieal method is proposed as a novel and powerful analytieal teehnique for the solid phase determination of less than 4% antimony in lead-antimony alloys without any separation and ehemieal pretreatment. The proposed method is based on the surfaee antimony oxidation of Pb/Sb alloy to Sb(III) at the thin oxide layer of PbSOyPbO that is formed by oxidation of Pb and using linear sweep voltammetrie (LSV) teehnique. Determination was earried out in eoneentrate H SO solution. The influenee of reagent eoneentration and variable parameters was studied. The method has deteetion limit of 0.056% and maximum relative standard deviation of 4.26%. This method was applied for the determination of Sb in lead/aeid battery grids satisfaetory. 

Lead-acid batteries are produced using lead, sulfuric acid, additives such as antimony, and various other raw materials. Your facility s battery production capacity is 5,000 batleries per day, and the facility normally operates 24 hours per day, 300 days per year. 

Of the elements commonly found in lead alloys, zinc and bismuth aggravate corrosion in most circumstances, while additions of copper, tellurium, antimony, nickel, silver, tin, arsenic and calcium may reduce corrosion resistance only slightly, or even improve it depending on the service conditions. Alloying elements that are of increasing importance are calcium especially in maintenance-free battery alloys and selenium, or sulphur combined with copper as nucleants in low antimony battery alloys. Other elements of interest are indium in anodesaluminium in batteries and selenium in chemical lead as a grain refiner ". 

The closest relative to the wood veneer surprisingly has retained some of its properties, which differentiate these separators from pure synthetic ones primarily, a positive effect in reducing the water loss in starter batteries [39, 70-72], This impact tends to decrease as the antimony content in the alloys is lowered, but it still represents an advantage over other leaf separators, unless a microporous pocket is required by the alloy anyway. 

The above comparative evaluation of starter battery separators refers to moderate ambient temperatures the standard battery tests arc performed at 40 or 50 °C. What happens, however, on going to significantly higher temperatures, such as 60 or 75 °C This question cannot be answered without considering the alloys used batteries with antimonial alloys show a water consumption that rises steeply with increasing temperature [40], leaving as the only possibilities for such applications either the hybrid construction, i.c., positive electrode with low-antimony alloy, negative electrode lead-calcium, or even both... 

Special applications are often governed by different priorities as already discussed in relation to golf carts, the low water loss and the delay in antimony poisoning in heavy-duty service of a forklift are of eminent importance, with the result that rubber separators remain the preferred product there. Submarine batteries offer a different... 

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