Fuel cell system and control method thereof
AssigneeHonda Motor Co., Ltd.
InventorsTakahiro NISHI, Hiromichi INOUE, Tomohito KOTAKE
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A fuel cell system including a first three-axis magnetic sensor provided in an anode flow field of at least one fuel cell. A control device determines that an air-in-anode startup takes place if a flow of a corrosion current in an anode is detected based on an output of the first three-axis magnetic sensor at the time of starting up the fuel cell system.
Claims7
A fuel cell system comprising:
- a fuel cell stack including a plurality of fuel cells stacked in a thickness direction, each of the fuel cells including a membrane electrode assembly formed of an electrolyte membrane, and a cathode and an anode sandwiching the electrolyte membrane, and a cathode separator in which a cathode flow field is formed and an anode separator in which anode flow field is formed, the membrane electrode assembly being sandwiched by the cathode separator and the anode separator;
- and
- a first three-axis magnetic sensor provided in the anode flow field of at least one of the plurality of fuel cells,
- one or more processors that execute computer-executable instructions stored in a memory, wherein
- the one or more processors execute the computer-executable instructions to cause the fuel cell system to:
- determine, upon detecting a corrosion current flowing in the anode based on an output of the first three-axis magnetic sensor at a time when the fuel cell stack is started up, an air-in-anode startup of the fuel cell stack in which the fuel cell stack is started up in a state where air is present in the anode flow field of each of the plurality of fuel cells.
A control method of the fuel cell system comprising a fuel cell stack including a plurality of fuel cells stacked in a thickness direction, each of the fuel cells including a membrane electrode assembly formed of an electrolyte membrane, and a cathode and an anode sandwiching the electrolyte membrane, and a cathode separator in which a cathode flow field is formed and an anode separator in which anode flow field is formed, the membrane electrode assembly being sandwiched by the cathode separator and the anode separator;
- The control method comprising:
- providing a first three-axis magnetic sensor provided in the anode flow field of at least one of the plurality of fuel cells,
- acquiring an output of the first three-axis magnetic sensor at a time when the fuel cell stack is started up;
- and
- determining, upon detecting a corrosion current flowing in the anode based on the acquired output of the first three-axis magnetic sensor, an air-in-anode startup of the fuel cell stack in which the fuel cell stack is started up in a state where air is present in the anode flow field of each of the plurality of fuel cells.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.