OT Why Hydrogen Cylinders in Church Tower?

[pepper]

I visited a small village church last weekend and saw some hydrogen cylinde rs in the church at the bottom of the bell tower - any ideas what they coul d be for? They were definitely hydrogen, about 6 foot tall with fine, (app rox 5mm diameter?) copper tube winding its way up the walls towards the bel fry. There were other cylinders too, (about 6 in total); I think one was n itrogen and one was something like 'synthetic air', all of which were fed b y the same sized copper tube up into the belfry. I'm guessing that they're something to do with ringing the bells, in some way, but how? And why if s omething flammable is needed for some reason then why not more readily avai lable butane or propane? Any ideas?

[dennis]

any film crews about?

[pepper]

Nope- looked like part of the infrastructure; in a cage, warning sign on outside of door etc

[Jeremy Nicoll - news posts]

outside of door etc

Hmm, maybe nothing to do with the church as such - could the gas be powering some sort of scientific or meterological equipment or something that's been placed in the tower because it's high up?

[Bob Eager]

Very likely to be to run fuel cells for powering a mobile phone base station in emergency.

[Windmill]

Someone must be planning a balloon ride so as to get 'nearer my God to thee' !

[Dave Liquorice]

Interesting and quite an old story. But thicko journalist again:

"Hydrogen fuel cells work like a battery, using the readily available substance to create electricity and emitting little more than oxygen and water."

If a fuel cell is emmitting much oxygen it's not working very well and if hydrogen was "readily available" it would be used far more than it is.

[Brian Gaff]

But you are not supposed to use Hydrogen these days. come to that, Hydrogen is inherently difficult to contain in anything, so it does seem its being used for something that only Hydrogen will do for.

Brian

[Bob Eager]

I agree. I actually made a working fuel cell (not very efficient) as a school project!

But that was just an example. There seem to be lots of articles about the same idea, and I hear that it is becoming more common.

[fred]

It's a brilliant idea, I'm just amazed that any of the UK mobile providers have bothered their arse about power failure resilience.

In the example you linked to I could only see the 3 cylinders and what looked like the standard base-station rack, I wasn't sure if the rack was actually a modular fuel cell.

I see now that they are used for backup of Tetra base stations but wonder if something like that would be in a church tower.

[Roger Tonkin]

the same sized copper tube up into the belfry. I'm guessing that they're something to do with ringing the bells, in some way, but how? And why if something flammable is needed for some reason then why not more readily available butane or propane? Any ideas?

Never heard of it! We sometimes need oxygen when we've climbed a tower to ring, but never seen any cylinders about.

[Graham.]

I'd hazard a guess that a cylinder or two of CO2 were used to deliver liquid refreshment later.

[newshound]

The bell-ringers *I* know would not hear of such a thing!

[spuorgelgoog]

Teetotallers, or real ale fans?

Owain

[Vir Campestris]

And there was me wondering if they were going to tune the bells by fiddling with the gas around them :)

But isn't hydrogen a bit dangerous to leave unattended?

Andy

[SteveW]

No. The tiny amounts that leak will just drift upwards and away. LPG on the other hand will pool in any low point just waiting to ignite.

Hydrogen's main danger is that it takes very little energy to ignite, so the tiniest of sparks will do it. On the other hand it takes quite a high temperature to self-ignite, so hot surfaces aren't normally a problem.

SteveW

[newshound]

Oh the latter, do you need to ask? I gather there is also quite a long tradition of atheism among bell-ringers, in the days when there was much more pressure to conform it was one of the easier ways to avoid attending services.

[Martin Brown]

It sounds like some automated gas chromatography air quality monitoring installation or other.

I am a bit surprised that they have bulk hydrogen cylinders these days most labs make their own by electrolysis of water to avoid having bulk high pressure hydrogen which can be more than a bit unforgiving in the event of a leak (explosive mixture in almost all combinations with air and a flame in clean air that you cannot actually see).

Might have been easier to ask a local what it was for. It seems highly unlikely that they would need hydrogen or reference synthetic air just to make the bells ring.

I have a feeling that modern practice requires that hydrogen cylinders should be chained up in a cage *outside* the building so they may not be code compliant (ie their insurance is invalid if it ever goes pop!)

[Andrew Mawson]

I seem to remember that the C of E 'self insures'

AWEM

[Martin Brown]

A bit like last year for the Diamond Jubilee when some enterprising company was selling massive propane powered flares to put on the top of your church tower - again using portable gas appliances on the premises is another thing that often voids your commercial buildings insurance.

Did any church towers burn down as a result of them I wonder?