Investigating the Pressure Dependent Ionic Conductivity of a Solid Electrolyte with the CompreFrame

Manual force control

The CompreFrame is our latest solution to allow reproducible pressure and temperature conditions for your solid electrolyte testing. The pressure is continuously monitored, and is applied uniformly and uniaxially to the sample. The temperature is actively regulated and can be automatically controlled. As opposed to the completely automated CompreDrive, the force is manually controlled. This makes the CompreFrame a simpler and smaller device.

Controlling solid-state test conditions

Solid state electrolytes have the potential to revolutionalize the battery field, but measurement conditions vary a lot in literature, making it difficult to judge and compare results. Conductivities of solid electrolytes are often reported without mention of the pressure applied during preparation or measurement, and sometimes even without mentioning the sample temperature!

Conductivity measured during pelletization

As an example of what is possible with this setup, we loaded a CompreCell with a commercial solid electrolyte powder, and applied successively higher forces in the CompreFrame to pelletize the sample (black curve in figure a). This was all done at a constant temperature (red curve in figure a). EIS spectra were collected in situ (“in-die”) at each applied force, causing the overall impedance to decrease (figure b). When fitting a simple equivalent circuit to the data, the decrease in ionic resistance as the pelletization progresses is evident (figure c). Read the application note below for all the experimental details on this setup!