PURPOSE: To increase the wettability and the strength of an electrolyte holding matrix for a fuel cell by adding a given amount of polytetrafluoroethylene to an inorganic compound, forming the mixture into a sheet, and impregnating the sheet with an electrolyte added with a surfactant.
CONSTITUTION: A fuel electrode 1, an air electrode 2 and a matrix, which is interposed between the electrodes 1 and 2, are placed between non-woven carbon fabrics 4, which serve as main bodies of the electrodes 1 and 2, to make a unit. A fuel cell is constituted by stacking several units with each bipolar separator 7, the surfaces of which are provided with grooves 5 and 6 perpendicular to each other, interposed between two units. Here, a base body for the matrix 3 is formed by adding 10∼50wt% polytetrafluoroethylene to an inorganic compound such as silicon carbide, kneading the mixture, and forming the kneaded mixture into a sheet. After that, thus formed sheet-like base boy is impregnated with an electrolyte (such as phosphoric acid) added with 10∼500ppm of a surfactant, such as a fluorine system surfactant, thereby the matrix 3 is obtained.
UENO SANJI
MURATA KENJI
SHIROGAMI TAMOTSU
