An improvised quick carbon arc experiment [result: inconclusive]

Quote from Curbina

Now, when using tap water you are getting usually between 250 up to 500 ppm (if not more, in my city the TDS of the tap water is up to 1500 ppm) of impurities in the water that introduce all sorts of noise. Add that the carbon rods can have a lot of impurities themselves, and that’s why experiments with “certified” purity materials are a minimum when doing experiments intended to find some reproducible results.

A question might be whether 500–1500 ppm iron in the water would cause visually observable ferromagnetic effects in the floating graphite particles. I could have used distilled water but I did not want to waste it for a quick crude test. I might try later, but I do not have high-purity electrodes that I can use.

Furthermore, if it really is some sort of decaying effect, it could be something else than iron that is causing it.

I made another test using distilled water and some particles were apparently ferromagnetic also in this case. I made a video showing the rather crude process I would typically use (minute 0:00) and magnet verification (at minute 2:58).

In the first part I use one long graphite electrode and a worn one. Typically I would strike the electrodes in the air to warm them up, then slowly submerge them in the distilled water while a short arc was formed. Initially (not depicted) I used a less worn (almost new) 150mm electrode but I couldn't get it heated enough and particle production was low. Peak current with that electrode at 12V (nominal) was about 30–35A, while with the worn one it was probably higher but it wasn't measured. Voltage probably sagged from 12V (not measured)

In the second part at minute 2:58 I had to disable audio due to privacy reason, hopefully that is ok. Some particles isolated from the bulk appear to be ferromagnetic and attracted to the magnet through the glass jar wall. When the magnet is removed the particles are attracted back to the bulk.

The jar was previously washed and dried and it's unlikely to have contained relevant amounts of iron. So the only plausible option left is that there is iron in the graphite electrodes. They should be made entirely of graphite, but are probably not high-purity. If they were pencil leads, they would have surely contained various clays, which often contain iron.

I made (yet) another test with two almost pristine 150mm long graphite electrodes (bringing in contact the unused ends) and although I had significantly difficulties producing a large amount of graphite particles (I suspect due to too low temperatures), the small amount of floating ones formed appeared again to be ferromagnetic. I repeated the test due to concerns of Fe contamination of the previously used worn electrode from prior experimental history.

I cannot make a video of this because the amount of particles produced is so low that they look like a semi-transparent layer on the water surface.

EDIT: it also doesn't help that apparently the effect decays with time—it seems easier to observe it immediately after the experiment is conducted.

Curbina

After I noticed that it seemed more difficult to reproduce the effect with the magnet after a while, I tried stirring the water to remobilize particles that may have sedimented, but this only helped somewhat.

What I think I'm seeing is that in the beginning almost rigid large clusters are formed on the surface, but after a while the particles distribute themselves more homogeneously on the surface and tend to cluster less strongly. This clustering (as well as the ferromagnetic effect observed) could be the effect of some temporary property or excitation caused by the arcing, and if so, it could decay over time.

However, until the presence of ferromagnetic impurities can be ruled out, the above is mostly speculation. Also, I think I need a stronger power supply to produce a larger amount of particles, or figure out what conditions exactly cause such large particle production. This might be simply a matter of using thinner electrodes (which I don't have yet).

Quote from can

Curbina

From the Singh et al. paper it could be interesting to repeat the experiment by injecting air (or possibly, only nitrogen) into the water rather than covering the jar to prevent possible dust contamination. Part of the results could be from dissolved gases rather than environmental dust.

Quote from Curbina

Just for having it as a point of comparison, here is Sundaresan and Bockris paper on the replication of Oshawa’s claims.

By the way, Sundaresan and Bockris also observed, citing Ohsawa, that the reaction did not work by replacing dissolved oxygen in the water with nitrogen (but this test does not seem to be described in detail in the paper). So, experiments using degassed water or adopting measures preventing air from interacting with the arcing electrodes and/or water might not work.

Quote

When dissolved O2, was replaced by N2 in the solution, no iron was formed.

Curbina

Thanks for the review paper. It should be worth looking up the studies by Hanawa and Ogura et al. cited there, as they should be relevant to the tests performed here.

There might also be a related phenomenon that does not strictly involve electric arcs, which is what I've been secretly using as a basis for some of my comments. It is known that atomic and molecular species may get excited in desorption at high temperatures from non-metal surfaces like oxides or carbon. According to Leif Holmlid, such thermally excited species condense into a metastable excited phase of matter composed of such states (in the "circular form") called Rydberg matter.

In the 90's, his work was often about graphite desorption experiments. As the desorbing species typically alkali atoms like Cs or K would be employed, but H₂ and hydrocarbons like ethylene (C₂H₄) would work as well. Carbon was often used as pyrolitic graphite foils or a thin graphitic film deposited on a metal surface like Ir, and heated up to 1500K (depending on the experiment) in a vacuum, and a source of gaseous species made to diffuse through such heated samples.

Up to recently no specific study on transmutations was performed, but in recent informal communication it was suggested that those experiments, even those which did not involve hydrogen, did in fact show transmutation. However, no published studies exist about them, and to my knowledge neither a detailed review of all the underlying experiments (there is one for the ones performed at lower temperatures with Fe oxide catalysts). As far as I understand, the clusters formed in those early experiments might have not necessarily always been purely Rydberg matter.

Regarding transmutations, see:

• https://www.researchgate.net/p…c5d9b93/citation/download

Some semi-randomly selected papers below. Graphite was always used in some form and the experiments would not work without it:

• https://doi.org/10.1016/0039-6028(89)90779-6
• https://www.cambridge.org/core…8A6E1AA46DCF62A1865DAC455
• https://doi.org/10.1063/1.349562
• https://doi.org/10.1016/0301-0104(92)80080-F
• https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984/4/49/008
• https://doi.org/10.1039/FT9969204581

I tried improving the cabling with crimp terminals and 2.5 mm² copper wire, but while it worked better I still couldn't get the floating graphite particle production as large as earlier, and although some particles do appear to be attracted to the same magnet, the effect is considerably lower than earlier—to the point of being ambiguous. Peak current using a 8 mm-diameter 300 mm electrode and a 150 mm one was about 45–50A (measured with a 400A clamp meter) at 12V, but actual voltage under load was likely lower (not measured). If I use two 150 mm electrodes, the power supply shuts off. I tried sanding off with Si-C sandpaper part of the tip of one electrode to make it thinner and hopefully make it heat more, but no significant change was achieved.

While I couldn't achieve the same temperatures, it's still possible that the previously used worn electrode (now broken) was "special" or, not unlikely, contaminated with Fe.

Curbina

Most importantly, the condensed state of matter described by Holmlid is supposed to be formed by "circular" Rydberg states, where the electrons form almost classical, Bohr-like thin ring orbits similar to the ones of Santilli's magnecules that you often brought up. As such circular orbits are current loops, they would exhibit magnetism like electromagnets / solenoids do. So, if some of the particles produced contain metastable Rydberg matter clusters, they should respond to magnetic fields without involving the formation of new ferromagnetic elements.

I think I (almost) solved the issue with the electrodes not heating up enough, but even though I managed to produce a significantly larger amount of graphite particles like those observed initially, they do not seem to exhibit to the same extent the same ferromagnetic effect. Some small particles are strongly attracted to the magnet and in some instances there appears to be a very weak attraction from larger graphite clusters, but for the most part the effect is just not observed. So it's likely that it previously was due to iron contamination.

More in detail what I did was as follows:

• Added a few KOH flakes to the tap water. The reaction became much more vigorous despite peak current being about the same (35A). Boiling temperature was easily achieved, and gas evolution from electrolysis (when an arc was not formed) was large. The plasma also became occasionally brighter and whiter, which was easier to observe while sliding the electrodes against each other.
• Perhaps due to excess electrolysis electrode erosion was large, but most of the particles sank to the bottom. I disposed the solution and tried striking the electrodes without an aqueous solution.
• At this point I noticed that they would produce a very bright plasma easily also in the atmosphere (enclosed, empty jar). The tips would heat up quickly and remain incandescent for a noticeably long period of time, sometimes getting engulfed in a flame by the temperature. Some particles dropped to the bottom of the empty jar.
• I filled the jar with some distilled water and noticed that a few of the particles seemed attracted to the magnet, so it seemed promising.
• I repeated the same procedure as earlier: I struck the electrodes above the water level, heating them up (but still not as much as I could yesterday), and submerged them slowly in the water. As a result, many graphite particles dropped from the electrodes and appeared to be floating.
• Test successful? Unfortunately not. After checking out with a magnet, the effect observed yesterday was not seen again.

Here is the test with KOH which displayed a whiter, brighter plasma and a vigorous reaction (but no ferromagnetic particles and limited amount of floating graphite particles):

This is the test made a bit later with an empty jar and air arcing. At 2:09 I made a magnetic test after filling the jar with some distilled water and some particles on the top right corner of the screen can be seen quickly attracted to the magnet. However, that's about it and I couldn't show more of the effect in the video.

Here is when I tried to replicate yesterday's procedure with the now somewhat functional graphite electrodes (which seem to have kind of become "activated" following exposure to KOH and/or electrolysis), in distilled water. Lots of floating particles produced, especially initially, but no ferromagnetic effect observed to any significant extent afterwards.

BruceInKonstanz

Most pencil cores almost certainly contain iron oxides. Even if they do not initially show significant ferromagnetism, they might become magnetized after getting exposed to heat and current. They can also easily explode when heated too much, something I have never observed with the more or less pure graphite rods I now have (the worn one which showed the effect was probably contaminated).

What power supply do you plan using for the planed tests? I find it's difficult to reliably obtain good bright arcs with 12V. I have often thought of getting a cheap IGBT-based welding power supply for these experiments but I can't see myself justifying the cost.