Zinc Strip

Zinc strip anodes are mounted on the hull of yacht leisure vessels to protect the exposed steel prolonging their life. Due to the shape of the anode they minimise any drag that may slow down the vessel. The zinc strip can be manufactured with a non-reactive aluminium insert for the protection of aluminium-hulled vessels in seawater. Zinc is the only material that has an official specification, the American MIL-A-18001 K spec. Zinc is a well-proven anode material and its capacity is virtually unaffected by the operating current density, although the driving voltage diminishes with increasing temperature therefore it has limited application. If zinc is not to this specification i.e. commercial purity zinc, it will have a limited use as an anode material because of excessive polarisation due to iron present as an impurity.