The influence of particle size distribution of some manganese dioxide on practical zinc chloride cell performance

The influence of particle size distribution of manganese dioxide on performance of a zinc chloride cell on continuous discharge and intermittent discharge was studied, using I.C.S. No. 1 (emd), No. 7 (nmd) and No. 12 (cmd). The fine particle nmd showed not only better MnO₂ utilization efficiency but also better cell capacity than the course one, which was considered to be due to the different discharge mechanism of the fine particle nmd from that of the coarse particle nmd. In the case of emd, the fine particle MnO₂ showed better MnO₂ efficiency than the coarse particle one, however, the performance of the fine particle cell was not improved because the fine particle MnO₂ needed more electrolyte than coarse particle MnO₂ did and, as a result, the packing density of the fine particle emd at the maximum MnO₂ utilization efficiency was much lower than that of the coarse particle emd. The influence of particle size distribution of cmd on discharge performance was negligible.