Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.

Panasonic Corporation

Katsumi Kozu

Junji Fujiwara

Takeshi Ishimaru

Toshihiko Ichinose

Satoshi Shibutani

Kenji Senda

Iichiro Mori

Masatoshi Izaki

Koichi Toriyama

Satoshi Kataoka

So Kuranaka

Masahiro Mizuta

Yoshiki Osawa

Tatsuhisa Chikada

Shinsuke Fukuda

Kenjin Masumoto

Hideharu Takezawa

Masato Fujikawa

Tadao Kimura

Masahiro Takada

Yasuhiro Ogawa

Takashi Takemura

Kohei Suzuki

Takeshi Shimamoto

Keisuke Tanaka

Kunio Tsuruta

Ryoichi Kaiwa

Shigeru Kajiwara

Shoji Konishi

Masaaki Kaneda

Tetsuo Hirabayashi

Shigeo Aoki

Junko Shimamoto, Legal Representative

Motohide Masui

Yoshinori Koyanagi

Masaki Mitsui

Tadashi Watanabe

Naohiro Hamao

Koici Toriyama

Koichi Inaba

Kajiwara Shigeru

In a fuel cell stack, a cell stack formed by laminating a membrane electrode assembly and a separator and sandwiching them from the both sides in the laminating direction with a pair of end plates is fastened by being tightened in the laminating direction with a first plate spring. The first plate spring includes two arm sections for pressing the pair of end plates and a connecting section connecting the arm sections, and has a C-shaped cross-section.

Fuel cell stack and fuel cell using the same

A clean power supply unit with a high fuel utilization rate using a fuel cell is provided. The power supply unit of the present invention comprises a fuel cell using methanol as fuel; a secondary battery for supplying power to a load; a fuel cell control part for controlling the amount of fuel and/or air supplied to the above-mentioned fuel cell; and a power converter for converting the power output from the above-mentioned fuel cell to a predetermined voltage or current, supplying power to the load and/or the above-mentioned secondary battery and controlling the supplied power so as to fall within a predetermined range including the value at which the amount of methanol discharged from the above-mentioned fuel cell becomes minimized.

Power supply unit

A fuel cartridge for fuel cells is configured to include an inner bag made of a flexible material and filled with liquid fuel, a valve provided to the inner bag for discharging the fuel, and an outer case encasing the inner bag with the valve being exposed to the outside, the outer case being deformable by a hand and able to recover its initial shape by itself. The fuel cartridge allows the liquid fuel inside to be used almost completely irrespective of its attachment direction, and can be used in both applications where the cartridge is hand-pressed to discharge fuel and where fuel is pumped-out from the cartridge.

Fuel cartridge for a fuel cell having a flexible outer casing

A method for operating a direct methanol fuel cell is provided. The fuel cell includes a fuel cell main body having a fuel electrode and an air electrode disposed in opposing positions on either side of an electrolyte film. In this method, an aqueous methanol solution is supplied directly to the fuel electrode. A quantity of the aqueous methanol solution supplied is controlled in accordance with an electric current value drawn from the fuel cell main body so as to minimize a quantity of unused methanol within a discharge fluid discharged from the fuel electrode.

Method for operating fuel cell and fuel cell system

A heat insulation sheet () covers a temperature fuse () arranged on a sealing plate () of a rechargeable battery () so as to provide a shield from heat of resin that is filled in a gap between the rechargeable battery () and a circuit substrate () to form a primary mold () and to prevent destruction of the temperature fuse () caused by the heat.

Method for manufacturing battery pack

A fuel cell system including a fuel cell, constructed as an integrated stack comprising a laminate, produced by stacking a plurality of cells between two end plates, and a fuel supply device for supplying fuel to the fuel cell. In this fuel cell system, a plurality of individual fuel supply ports, for supplying fuel independently from the fuel supply device to each of the plurality of cells, are formed on the end plates, thus forming individual fuel supply channels that deliver fuel from the plurality of individual fuel supply ports to the fuel electrodes of the corresponding cells, respectively. This fuel cell system is compact, and enables equal supply of a predetermined quantity of fuel to each of the plurality of cells.

Fuel cell system that supplies to individual cells of a fuel cell stack independently

A rechargeable battery () and a circuit substrate () are connected by lead plates () and united by a primary mold () that is formed by filling resin therebetween, after which a secondary mold () is formed on the outer face by filling resin at necessary locations and a winding sheet () is wound around the periphery, thereby forming a battery pack.

Method for manufacturing a battery pack

A battery pack is provided, in which a plurality of rechargeable batteries are held by a center frame, a bottom-side frame, and a terminal-side frame in a parallel spaced relationship, the plurality of rechargeable batteries being connected in series and integrated with a circuit substrate by mounting the circuit substrate on the terminal-side frame, the circuit substrate being provided with a resin mold, whereby the battery pack is free of damage to electrical circuit parts even in the event of entrance of water or dust through vents that are provided for suppressing temperature rise of the rechargeable batteries. The plurality of rechargeable batteries are connected in series by joining connection plates to the positive and negative electrode terminals formed on the sealing plates of plurality of the rechargeable batteries that are held by the terminal-side frame, and connection projections formed to each connection plate are fitted in respective connection holes in the circuit substrate so as to integrate the circuit substrate with the rechargeable batteries, whereby the wiring for connecting each of the rechargeable batteries to the circuit substrate is made simple.

Battery pack

A circuit substrate () being electrically connected to a rechargeable battery () is arranged upon a sealing plate () with a gap therebetween and united with the rechargeable battery () by filling resin in the gap. A primary mold () formed by the resin is firmly retained by undercut portions formed in engaging protrusions (). The engaging protrusions () may be formed by welding separate engaging members ().

Battery and method of manufacturing the battery

A power supply is provided, which is capable of stabilizing a generated output of the fuel cell using neither a voltage nor a current outputted from the fuel cell as a negative feedback signal. The power supply includes a fuel cell, a DC-DC converterthat adjusts a voltage outputted from the fuel cellaccording to a PWM signal and then outputs the voltage to a load device, a switching controllerthat generates the PWM signal and outputs this signal to the DC-DC converter, a voltmeterthat measures a voltage Vout outputted from the DC-DC converter, and a rechargeable batteryconnected to the load devicein parallel. The DC-DC convertercalculates a duty ratio of the PWM signal by performing a specific computation using the voltage Vout and a target fuel cell voltage Vt.

Power supply

An outer case () for housing a rechargeable battery () and a battery circuit therein is composed of an upper case () and a lower case (), each being formed as a half-shell body. The respective bottom faces of the upper case () and the lower case () are formed of film members (), and are integrally formed with resin moldings () forming circumferential side faces.

A fuel cell system with a valve mechanism composed of valves provided to a fuel cell unit and a fuel cartridge, respectively. Part of the male valve is inserted into the female valve to cause their respective stems extending from the respective valve seal parts towards the valve ends to be pushed in so as to open the valve seal parts and to establish fluid communication. The valve mechanism ensures that no leakage occurs during disconnection of the valves by a design in which a cylindrical resilient member is fitted on the stem of the female valve such that its peripheral wall will be warped outwardly when pushed by the male valve as the valves are being connected, and liquid fuel that has remained outside the valve seal parts is sucked into the tubular space around the stem of the female valve as the valves are being disconnected.

Fuel cell system

Growing community of inventors

Sanda, Japan

Katsumi Kozu