For the sake of just finding out, can you rig a set of shut-off valves and Ts to let the full pressure side tube (once full) release the water down into the input side, while the output side goes to level-ish (~0 barg). Just to see if the valves pop open and just let the water flow through the pump. (No pumping).
Prominent Gamma/L 0232 Flow Rate Test
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Nice! Thank you for taking on this project Alan!
Two observations here ...
1) The discharge height for the pumps feeding into the 4 Big Frankies at the Doral plant is small. 12 inches is the maximum and possibly it is more like 3-6 inches. So on that score, run 30M sounds right. The suction heights for the pumps at Doral seem to vary between about 2 and 7 feet.
2) For the final 5 months of the 1-year test, the bottom row of pumps were inactive because the Big Frankie unit that they are supposed to feed had been taken offline (I think because of water leaks). This leaves 18 pumps to handle the load. Often during these 5 months the pumped volume was the usual 36,000 L/day (e.g., all of November). So when you calculate total output per day you should multiply by 18 and not 24.
Taking these 2 considerations into account for the case of the realistic 30M run; if 18 pumps are used instead of 24 the total capacity is 22,832 L/day. That is 0.634 of the scaled 1MW capacity. And this may be only a maximum if suction height affects pumping at these very low backpressures. I don't know if you have data on that point or not. If you still have an appetite to continue with these trials, then I would suggest you focus on 6 inch discharge height with up to 6 foot suction height. If pumping declines at all with increase in suction height, then the 0.634 MW figure I just computed is a maximum and reality could be quite a bit smaller.
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Point 2 : Penon didn't report a constant "24-pump" volume. He downgraded it to "18-pumps" on occasion. So my use of "1MW" base is fair. (There may be other data to indicate Penon's data is wrong).
I'm not understanding your point here. I don't see anything wrong with using the 36,000 L/day "1MW" base. What I am saying is that there were times (such as all of November 2015) when only 18 pumps were available and yet Penon reports the entire 36,000 L/day is being pumped every day. Doesn't this mean that for those times your scaled up daily pumped volume estimate (line 77 in your spreadsheet) should be calculated as line73 * 24 * 18? For run 30M this corresponds to 0.634 MW rather than the 0.846 MW that you list for 24 pumps. Your use of the "1MW" base is fair either way.
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Hi Alan. I don't think you have exactly grasped the point I am making and the evidence for it. I'll fill you in,
There is a crucial document that was published on the court docket for the recent lawsuit. This is document 207-55 which is a composite of daily logs kept separately by Fabiani and Rossi during the operations of the 1-year test and of several of Penon's reports including his final report. You can view and download this document from a wonderful resource page maintained by Abd Ul-Ramen Lomax (http://coldfusioncommunity.net…en-docket-and-case-files/).
Fabiani's log, shown in the first part of the document, records the trouble the group was having with the Big Frankie (BF) units in August and September of 2015. BF4 (the unit nearest the floor) was a particular problem. On August 18 there is the following notation (translated from Italian via the internet) "Isolated Reactor 4 output power delivered to 750kwh/h (short circuit heating boilers)". I believe this signifies that BF4 has been taken off line and the overall power output of the plant taken down to 3/4 MW. In this same time frame we see that according to Penon's reports (207-55, page 22) the water being pumped has been taken down from 36,000 L/day to 27,000 L/day. This is, I think what you have in mind.
The troubles continued throughout the rest of August and September. Penon's reports show 27,000 L/day being pumped each and every day during this time. Finally, on October 1 2015 the pumping rate goes back up to 36,000 L/day and the reported energy production goes back to 1 MW (actually it went to 2.03E10+7 Wh/day which is 0.845MW, but this was always the maximum for the plant over the entire 1-year trial). One would think that everything is back to normal but that isn't true. Penon visited the plant on Oct 12-14 and found that the bottom-most Big Frankie (BF4) had been taken permanently offline. During this visit he made measurements on the energy absorption of BF units 1, 2, and 3 but not BF 4 (visible in document 207-58 on page 10). In his deposition (also available at Lomax's site http://coldfusioncommunity.net…t-and-case-files/#Neutral) he was asked why he didn't measure BF4 and in essence he replies that he ignored it because it wasn't working (see page 193 of the deposition in document 207-10 ). And yet on these days Penon reports that the plant was still pumping 36,000 L/day and producing energy at near 1MW .
You might think that the pump outputs for the inactive BF unit were just redirected to the remaining Big Frankies. But there is no evidence of this. Instead, in a photograph that Engineer48 prepared, one can see no difference in the routing of the tubes coming out of the pumps compared with earlier photos. And, if you follow the metal piping of the collective output you see that, unlike for the active units, it has been stripped of its insulation (because it is no longer carrying hot water), and that the sight glass of the BF unit it goes into shows that the unit is dry. So no water is flowing through these pumps
By the way, this photo shows why I think that the output head is only inches high for the active pumps. Engineer48 has indicated with yellow arrows the flow pattern of condensate around the units. The horizontal yellow lines are at the levels of the meniscus in some of the sight glasses and so show the water levels in the BF units. You can see they are only slightly above the pumps.
OK. I hope I have been able to make a case that from October on, the plant was operating on only 18 pumps and yet officially pumping 36,000 L/day and producing energy at its maximum rate. Let me know if you have any observations on all of this.
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Is it just an optical illusion due to the viewer angle, or do the pumps on the left end of each row show OL on the display?
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Is the general idea that the steam made in the boilers is drawn into the main outlet pipe by relative vacuum (caused by condensation in the Customer side) in order to get 0 barg at the outlet point of the Plant?
Otherwise there would be pressure in the BF boiler units.
There are smaller pipes from the BFs before the main outlet pipe collector, possibly representing a restriction. (The outlet from the BF is relatively small).
I don't quite follow the whole steam pressure from source to condenser plan.
What I am getting at is, what is the pressure inside the BF? Regardless of the pump lift, which is minimal, how does the BF interior maintain 0 barg?
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Then I'll move back inside (porch) and try to replicate the suction and discharge heights for the four big frankies.
Fabulous. This will be most welcome. I'm looking forward to it!
The photo from Engineer48 that I recently posted may help in estimating heights.
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What I am getting at is, what is the pressure inside the BF? Regardless of the pump lift, which is minimal, how does the BF interior maintain 0 barg?
I've been wondering too. It has to be higher than 0 barg or the steam would not head out of the reactor container. To achieve 0 barg at the measuring point requires a balance between upstream pressure and downstream suction but I no idea how to calculate how precise this balance has to be. Is it relatively unlikely that the measuring point is exactly 0 barg or is it broadly possible under many circumstances.
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Found this again: 1582 L total?
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There are smaller pipes from the BFs before the main outlet pipe collector, possibly representing a restriction. (The outlet from the BF is relatively small).
I don't quite follow the whole steam pressure from source to condenser plan.
What I am getting at is, what is the pressure inside the BF? Regardless of the pump lift, which is minimal, how does the BF interior maintain 0 barg?@PDM: Any fluid has an evaporation pressure given by its temperature. I would used it as the backpressure. Further: Only halve of the kinetic energy directly goes into pipe flow motion. Thus the density above evaporation can be calculated! (From mean kinetic stationary vs. tot. kin. moving.)
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@PDM: Any fluid has an evaporation pressure given by its temperature. I would used it as the backpressure. Further: Only halve of the kinetic energy directly goes into pipe flow motion. Thus the density above evaporation can be calculated! (From mean kinetic stationary vs. tot. kin. moving.)
I think we can take it as a fact that the temperature of the liquid-phase within the Big Frankies was near 100C. Barry West testified that he heard the noise of vigorous boiling coming from inside the Big Frankies.
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I think we can take it as a fact that the temperature of the liquid-phase within the Big Frankies was near 100C. Barry West testified that he heard the noise of vigorous boiling coming from inside the Big Frankies.
I though that BW was referring to the reservoir boiling.
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I though that BW was referring to the reservoir boiling.
That was Engineer48's interpretation. That reservoir is supposed to hold the return condensate and Rossi himself claims that the temperature was usually near 70C. Also the reservoir is unheated and, according to Engineer48 (but not me), pressurized. So Engineer's interpretation is loopy and I think he knows it. He only came up with that. and then stuck to it, to avoid admitting he had been wrong about something else.
I should admit to my own mistake here, however. The statement about hearing boiling didn't come up directly in Barry West's testimony. It is something that Murray reported West told him. Pages 33-34 of document 235-11 contain a memo Murray wrote after interviewing West in July 2015. In it (point 10) Murray says "BW indicated that it is clear that when standing near the E-CAT heater tank that the water in the tank is boiling vigorously". The "ECAT heater tank", to Murray, it is a literally a tank that holds E-CATS (i.e, the Big Frankies). It isn't the internal condensate return reservoir which Murray elsewhere in the same memo calls the "feedwater" tank.
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Ask yourself when a water tank with a heater in it makes the most noise. Is it when the water is boiling, or when the water is close to boiling but not quite there? I favour the second case generally,
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Ask yourself when a water tank with a heater in it makes the most noise. Is it when the water is boiling, or when the water is close to boiling but not quite there? I favour the second case generally,
Good point ... I know exactly what you mean! They are quite different noises though. The noise of a full boil is a knocking sound whereas the louder preboiling noise is more continuous and high pitched. The two sounds are very distinct and I have no trouble telling when my electric reaches a boil.
Noise isn't actually mentioned in Murray's testimony. It could be mainly vibration that Barry West experienced.
And now we have reached a point on which I am totally ignorant and has nothing to do with LENR. It's just my curiosity. What makes the noise heard during preboiling?
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Steam bubbles collapsing.
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Because the water is now hot enough to allow the steam bubbles to reach the surface before they cool/collapse. Also the bubbles would be larger, as the element's surface is hotter (it leads the water temp by <20C), which helps them rise faster.
For bonus points: I reckon that noise only starts when the element surface temperature reaches the waters boiling point.
