Mizuno reports increased excess heat

    The R20 setup with the nickel mesh adjacent to the 316ss reactor wall

    could be useful (LATER!!) to investigate the radioactivity-mitigating properties of

    the nuclear mechanism responsible for the extreme non-chemical heat output.


    Natural rock radioactivity derives from uranium, thorium and K40.


    It may be possible to put a small layer of radioactive monazite or zircon sand btw the mesh

    and the reactor wall and as a first crude measure collect the grains after 8 hours of extended reaction and

    record the before/after becquerels/gm


    Suitable samples.

    1.Crushed Cornwall pitchblende

    2.Guarapari brown sand

    3.Uranium foil- for the foolhardy only

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    Quote from JedRothwell

    Not as far as I know.

    If so, I can't see any logical explanation for why a thin insulation around the reactor would not provide high enough reactor wall temperature, equal to or higher than for a free standing unit. If you have a layer with high heat resistance, the method to cool its outer surface is of minor importance, whether its solid copper, air convection or water-cooled tubes.


    If not so, if water-cooled coils really suppress the reaction even when the reactor wall temperature is the same as in the presented experiments, that mechanism should be understood. It will say something important about the reaction - or the measurements.


    Would it be just as bad using insulation but no coils?


    Would measured COP be effected if the air temperature inside the enclosure is raised (by lowering the fan speed)?


    I agree with you that in many cases the calorimetric method chosen can have an effect on the results, increase or suppress any measured excess heat. However, in Mizuno's experiment, the power levels and temperatures are perfect for water calorimetry. If using it kills the reaction, that is a problem. In my first post I suggested using both the present air cooling system and a second water calorimetry circuit. Now it seems even more justified to exclude the existence of a systematic gross error in Mizuno's air calorimetry.



    Quote from JedRothwell

    Not as far as I know.

    • Official Post
    Quote from Birger

    If so, I can't see any logical explanation for why a thin insulation around the reactor would not provide high enough reactor wall temperature, equal to or higher than for a free standing unit. If you have a layer with high heat resistance, the method to cool its outer surface is of minor importance, whether its solid copper, air convection or water-cooled tubes.


    It may be that a large Dt between mesh and reactor wall is important. It has often been observed that the heat extraction rate of a LENR system is a critical factor, Cool too fast and the reaction stops, cool too slow and it disrupts the system.


    A gross physical analogy might be a fluidised-bed furnace, where a delicate balance between fuel feed rate, blower air velocity and heat-exchanger surface temperature is required to hit the sweet spot where all the fuel (often crushed coal) is completely combusted, rather than being discharged part-burnt via the exhaust flue, and at the other extreme dropping the blown air rate and fuel feed rates so low that the fluidised bed becomes a solid (sintered) mass of smouldering ashes.


    Understanding all these interlinked factors will require a lot more experimentation, and a somewhat more sophisticated system than R20 - though I'm sure that it can be uprated as required. Mizuno is a very skilled operator.

    Quote from RobertBryant

    Show some mathematical justification

    Then people might take notice... otherwise its just vague words.


    Robert - it is common sense.


    Water will cool the surface it flows over more than air, but you can add insulation between the reactor surface and the water or air - in which case the reactor temp can stay as high as you want by adjusting this.

    Quote from Birger

    If so, I can't see any logical explanation for why a thin insulation around the reactor would not provide high enough reactor wall temperature, equal to or higher than for a free standing unit.


    I do not need to see a logical explanation. The experimental data clearly showed that with the tubes, and with the tubes separated by insulation, the reactor was not producing much heat. When he moved that same reactor to an air-flow calorimeter, it began producing much more heat. It began that day. The temperature of the reactor walls was higher, as I recall. Perhaps some arrangement with additional insulation would work, but the air-flow calorimeter worked better. The air-flow calorimeter has other advantages.


    Mizuno & I tend to go with experimental results, without always looking for a logical explanation. When we see a trend in the data, we go after it, without worrying why it showed up, or what it means.

    Another difference between the air cooling and added insulation or water cooling is that the temperature profile across the surface would be different.


    With air cooling, the end nearest the air inlet gets much cooler air than the end near the exit cooled by preheated air. With insulation or water cooling, the surface temperature may be more uniform. Maybe there is a sweet spot where the dT across the mesh is ideal for the reaction, and with air cooling, at least some of the mesh it near that sweet spot.

    I hope all of this improvement with air calorimetry isn't simply nurturing some weird artifact and no, I don't know what it would be. I do wish someone would do some simple temperature or better yet, heat flow measurements on the more powerful reactor and get an estimate of output other than "it feels like." That went out centuries ago. I am puzzled when people fail to do such easy and obvious things.

    Jed,


    I have been thinking that I can replicate without the turbopump (as mentioned by Alan Smith -- use a two stage rougher) and without the RGA/mass spec.


    I would order and have pre-built for me the conflat assembly with vacuum fitting and place for heater. Ideally I can get them to put the heater in, vacuum sealed. The gets rid of the hard part.


    I need then a cylinder of D2 (which I will purchase), and a few valves: one to regulate and then isolate the D2. (Have to think about how to get very small pressures of D2 into the conflat, there must be a valve regulator that will do that), and one to evacuate the rig, and then one to isolate it for the run.


    I need one Pirani type vacuum gage.


    I need a few rtgs or thermocouples to measure the temperature.


    And then I need the power supply -- preferably DC, so that I can easily measure volts and amps.


    Some kind of recording device would be helpful to gather the 7 or so channels of data.


    Of course the nickel screen and palladium


    Maybe this can be built for $4K (assuming one Oz of palladium).


    I would evacuate and bake out until the vacuum was minimized on the gage, do leak pressure rise testing vs time. I then do calibration runs of temperature vs. power in. At that point I would assume the unit if it leak tests with a very slow rise in pressure is ready to introduce the D2 for the loading. I can load it a few times to recombine any residual O2 with the D2 and get then baked out as water, and then re-evacute it. I am then ready for the final loading. It then gets valved off from the outside and is ready for a heat run.


    Does this sound reasonable or must we use higher vacuum turbopump and an RGA, thereby raising the bill of materials by about $10K?


    My longer term objective is to get the replication bill of materials cheaper and faster, in the form perhaps of a kit sold by Alan Smith, so that we can get the masses involved in making heat in their garage. That makes it incontrovertible so that we don't have to rely on Nature's editorial board.


    Thank you

    Quote from seven_of_twenty

    I hope all of this improvement with air calorimetry isn't simply nurturing some weird artifact and no, I don't know what it would be. I do wish someone would do some simple temperature or better yet, heat flow measurements . . .


    Your wish is granted! We also measured the heat using the reactor itself as a isoperibolic calorimeter. That is to say, by using the surface temperature of the reactor to measure the heat produced by it. The reactor temperature is not well-suited for this purpose because the temperature is not uniform. However it does give you a reasonable estimate, and it confirms the air flow method. That is a simple temperature measurement. You don't get any simpler. To be specific, during a 50 W calibration test, the reactor temperature is 28 deg C. During an excess heat test with 50 W of input, the reactor temperature is 380 deg C. That's a big difference! The temperature difference cannot be used to estimate output accurately, because the surface is unevenly heated, because the heat originates in the mesh. But this does definitely indicate a big difference and much more heat than 50 W can produce.


    Plus, we both measured and estimated heat losses from the calorimeter chamber walls, as described on p. 8 of the ICCF21 paper. These measurements also confirmed the airflow calorimetry.


    Both techniques -- the reactor as isoperibolic calorimeter, and chamber wall radiation -- showed far more energy coming out of the reactor than input. These methods are much less precise than the air flow method, but they are a good "reality check."

    Quote from anonymous

    I have been thinking that I can replicate without the turbopump (as mentioned by Alan Smith -- use a two stage rougher) and without the RGA/mass spec.


    I would order and have pre-built for me the conflat assembly with vacuum fitting and place for heater. Ideally I can get them to put the heater in, vacuum sealed. The gets rid of the hard part.


    You must have a precision pressure gauge. I do not see that in your list of instruments. I do not see how you can do this without a mass spectrometer, because you will not know whether contamination and water have been driven out of the reactor.


    I cannot judge your plans, because I do not know much about things like vacuum pumps. I do not wish to discourage you or anyone else, but my feeling is that unless a person has all this equipment in hand, and knows how to use it, it is probably not a good idea to try to replicate this experiment. In the paper, I said, "we hope this is enough detail to allow persons skilled in the art to independently replicate the results." I meant people who already have the proper instruments and who know how to use them. That would not include me: I don't know how to use a vacuum pump or a precision pressure gauge. I could not replicate this. As I said, my main role in this was asking stupid questions, noodling with the data, and writing the papers.

    Quote from Ahlfors

    Ask for calorimetric help DW


    What patent is this? Who filed it? It does not look like the kind of calorimeter Mizuno recommended, but I do not know what to make of it.


    I suggest people should follow his instructions and use an air flow calorimeter, or something with performance similar to an air-flow calorimeter. The one you linked to looked like a high temperature small dimension Seebeck calorimeter. It seems well insulated. I hope it would not insulate too well. As I wrote here before, that might lead to a runaway reaction. The cell has to be free to radiate a lot of heat and reach a reasonable terminal temperature, as shown in Table 1.


    Frankly, I do not understand why people are casting about trying to think of different ways to do this experiment before they even try it the way Mizuno instructed. Someone just wrote to me saying he intends to try it, but at a much higher temperature. I responded:


    "PLEASE do not make any changes until you have tested the same materials in the same conditions as the original!! Please follow the instructions as closely as you can, and stay at the recommended temperatures. If you successfully produce excess heat, then you can go to higher temperatures, or make any other changes you like. If it stops working you can return to the original design.


    Dr. Mizuno spent many years developing this experiment. He tried many different materials, techniques and variations. Most of them did not work. It is impossible for him, or me, or anyone to say what aspects of this experiment are essential, and what can be changed. But I think that temperatures and pressures are among the critical parameters. So, please do not change them in the first round of experiments."


    It seems perverse to me that anyone would begin a replication by deliberately changing what may be a critical parameter -- or any parameter.

    Quote

    Plus, we both measured and estimated heat losses from the calorimeter chamber walls, as described on p. 8 of the ICCF21 paper. These measurements also confirmed the airflow calorimetry.

    Both techniques -- the reactor as isoperibolic calorimeter, and chamber wall radiation -- showed far more energy coming out of the reactor than input. These methods are much less precise than the air flow method, but they are a good "reality check."

    One of us isn't understanding the other. You did this on the 3kW output reactor/erstwhile room heater? That's what my message asked about.

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