Pressure influence on the structural characteristics of modified absorptive glass mat separators: A standard contact porosimetry study

The article presents a comparative analysis of the structural characteristics of absorptive glass mats manufactured by “Hollingsworth & Vose” (a 2.8 mm thickness) and “Bernard Dumas” (a 3.0 mm thickness) modified by impregnation with polymeric emulsions based on polyvinylidene fluoride, a polyvinylpyrrolidone styrene copolymer, and polytetrafluoroethylene, by means of standard contact porosimetry. The key study is influence of features of the porous structure on the compression properties, the rate of wicking, and the oxygen cycle efficiency in lead-acid battery mock-ups under several plate-group compression pressures. It is found that the treatment of the absorptive glass mat separators with polymeric emulsions leads to redistribution of their pores by size. An increased pressure in the electrode unit insignificantly changes the pore structure of the modified absorptive glass mat separators, and the oxygen cycle efficiency rises in comparison with unmodified separators.