Customer Reviews

Designing and Building Fuel Cells

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I have been designing, building, and writing about fuel cells for a number of years. During this time I have not seen one text that is as comprehensive and at the same time contain the wealth of detail as "Designing And Building Fuel Cells". This book will easily satisfy the needs of Engineers, Teachers, and Students. This book is easy to read, practical and I believe one of the best available texts on fuel cells and fuel cell systems.

In a field where only a limited number of books are available on the subject, it is refreshing when such a well written, compressive volume is released. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. The author has skillfully combined an easy to understand description of fuel cell technology with enough meat (equations) to keep an engineer satisfied. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in fuel cells.

The opening chapters to this book are an excellent introduction to fuels cells and their application. I especially like Dr. Spiegel's enthusiasm for the potential of the fuel cell industry. Later chapters explain the thermodynamic and chemical principles behind fuel cell design. If you do not have knowledge of advanced calculus and its application (like me), you will not understand some of the explanations.

I found it somewhat lacking in practical detail around the actual construction of a fuel cell. My background is in manufacturing engineering. I need to know such things as how many layers at how many square inches are needed to achieve this voltage and current output. It was difficult for me to distill this information from the text. I bought the book for the purpose of constructing a fuel cell (out in the garage! - as my wife says), but didn't feel I came away with this knowledge.

Dr. Spiegel is clearly an authority in the field of fuel cells. Don't be put off by the advanced math. The book is an informative and engaging read. I am looking forward to her new book, "The Brilliant Mind: Fuel Cell Experiments for a Bright Future", to provide me with more applied knowledge of fuel cells. In the meantime, there is a wealth of information on the Internet about fuel cells and their construction (Google: Phillip Hurley).

I have been looking for a book like this for some time. The math and physics are at the college level, but I figure I need to learn something new. This could be worth working on. Now to find the materials and get to building. Who knows, I might be able to convert my car, build a new airplane, or even a classy cabin cruiser. Great book.

On the whole, this is an excellent text, but I was a bit put off some of the opening discussion. The chapter on the "Hydrogen Economy" -- while well-written -- really didn't belong in the front of this book. It feels like an opinion piece, and the discussion questions at the end of that chapter felt biased. The first few paragraphs of the book aren't about fuel cells, they're about pollution, fossil fuel use, and global warming. While these are important topics worthy of discussion, they aren't fuel cells. The same print space could have told me something about nomenclature (What's a PEM cell? You'll have to flip ahead to chapter 3 to find out).

If I'm reading this book, I get that fuel cells are an important part of our technological future. What I wanted was an unbiased exploration and explanation of the technology. I got that, mostly, but I also got the author's opinion on government regulations (the author is clearly for them, and appears to feel that they are the best -- possibly only -- way to create the Hydrogen Economy) and was told that Carbon Dioxide is a pollutant directly responsible for global warming. Reasonable people can and have disagreed with both of these assertions, and I could and have read both sides of these arguments elsewhere. I didn't need them here.

Fuel cells are a new topic for me, and I selected this book because the title and description seemed interesting. It was a great choice because it is written in easy to understand language - making a complicated subject understandable. Although there are many parts of the book geared toward designing a fuel cell with mathematical equations - -there are also other parts that simply describe how the fuel cell works, different types of fuel cells, different sources of hydrogen, the hydrogen economy etc. A "must read" for anyone interested in fuel cell technology.

This book serves as a basic comprehensive guide to fuel cells. While the information appears to be accurate, there are several major cons that have bothered me while I read through it:

CONS
*Numerous typos in chemical reaction equations
*Chapter 2 should be condensed or eliminated. The Hydrogen Economy is too opinionated for a textbook.
*Chapter 1 is good for a thesis on Why We Need Fuel Cells but doesn't fit in a fuel cells textbook that should be an unbiased look at the chemistry and physics
*I'm biased on this because I hold an M.S. degree and understand much of the basics, but the language seems geared for a less educated audience (i.e. high school) and the grammar is not as professional as it could be in the early chapters.
*There are too many acronyms for unimportant things.
*PEM isn't defined when it's first given, which by the way, is Proton Exchange Membrane.
*Equations are missing + or - signs. Even though the final answer may be correct, the steps showing how to get there aren't.
*Solution Manual doesn't appear to exist so the problems at the end of the chapter are pointless.
*Being a big-time publisher, McGraw-Hill should've proofread this a little closer.

PROS
*Covers many parts of fuel cells without boring into too many derivations (at least through chapter 5)
*Excellent figures depicting different types of fuel cells and how they work

Finally, is it really necessary to repeat the words, Fuel Cell, in every chapter title?

Despite the CONS, which are more annoyance than actual dislike, the book is easy to read if you're looking for a crash course in Fuel Cells. I would recommend it but be wary of the equations and calculations as the numbers may not be accurate.

It is an amazing book that covers all subjects related to fuel cells in an understandable manner. It is the best book to be used as text book in a fuel cell course. It is really the unique book that truthfully has the necessary amount of information to build a PEMFC.