Hit me over the head with a 2x4 but I never thought of that. I will. Is the campaign still underway?
It is closed. I meant next time you want to make an anonymous donation, that's how you can do it.
[But why do you care?]
Nasty and uncalled for and illustration of the attitude that often is the reason LENR is scorned or ignored.
You misunderstand! I didn't mean that. I meant: Why do you care whether anyone knows you contributed? Why be anonymous?
Oh, OK. understood. Sorry. Lots of old attacks make me touchy.
I don't want to use my real name for various reasons, mainly spam and unnecessary hassles from strangers. Your method is a good suggestion which I will use next time it comes up and maybe elsewhere too.
The anemometer being hooked up all the time is a good idea. Which position of the outlet does it monitor?
However, the impression from the papers is that the blower power is being used to calculate, via a semi-empirical formula, the air velocity based on prior testing. So an increase in blower power would be expected to represent an increase in blower speed.
And, indeed, that is what is done on the spreadsheets that have been posted. For sure.
This is a good point - there is one more parameter here that needs to be controlled. The issue is whether the airflow restriction, and hence fan back pressure, is the same between the power / airflow fan calibration run and the runs using that info. Jed however says that for some of these measurements (R20 I guess) the air speed was independently measured. Presumably that matched the calculated speed from fan power - though we have no details of that check. As with most of this stuff, I don't expect it to be an issue, but I wish it could be ruled out, especially when historic calibration curves are used...
I don’t see how historic calibrations can be used. (Maybe I misunderstand what you mean by historic.) The outlet was previously a different size and the fan operated at a different power. Even the fan was different at one point.
I don’t see how historic calibrations can be used. (Maybe I misunderstand what you mean by historic.) The outlet was previously a different size and the fan operated at a different power. Even the fan was different at one point.
One would hope that although historic, they are not that far back in history and relate to the same equipment. My unease at this procedure, done without explicit documentation and notes, is that is is easy for the calibration to be done on a different setup as you say.
However, Jed hints that air velocity has been independently measured in later tests, and one would hope that was used to check whether calculated air velocity values remain correct. So frustrating that a lot of the necessary checks are just not documented, even though they may have been done.
Jed, my comment has no relationship to Mizuno's skill as a scientist or his skill at measuring excess energy. The question is, "Why did he think this method would cause LENR"? I have seen no justification from him or anyone to think this method would work, . . .
I do not know if he has any justification. He does not need one. As I said, all of technology up to 1600 was developed with no justification, and no theory.
For example, in prehistoric times someone discovered lumps of copper can be worked, and then someone else discovered that when you heat copper ore, it becomes metal. People tried heating all kinds of different dirt and discovered other ores. Somehow they discovered that a charcoal fire with air pumped into it becomes extra hot, and you can smelt iron ore with that. That would never occur to anyone. It might have been discovered by careful observation, for example, if someone happened to make an extra hot fire and a small chuck of iron ore was smelted in it. There are places in Georgia above ground where iron-rich rock are everywhere. They were mined in abundance until the 1930s. If ancient people built an extra hot fire with one of these rocks in it, they might have discovered a small piece of one was smelted. They would have known about other ores already.
The point is, a long chain of discoveries led to the iron age. Some were fortuitous, but others were informed by careful observations and deep knowledge of materials, how to make fires, how to contain fires in clay furnaces, and so on. This is a slow process compared to modern science. Knowledge that we gain in a decade would have taken centuries or thousands of years to accumulate. It is slow, but it works. No theory was needed to develop most technology, although it has vastly and rapidly improved with theory. For example, experts say that more progress has been made in wine making in the last generation than in the whole 7000-year history of making wine.
Many methods have been used to treat Pd in ways thought to create active material. Some improved success and some do not. None have been replicated with sufficient success to convince the skeptics and provide a method that can support research, i.e. be a lab rat.
I think Violante's materials might have served as a lab rat. That's my reading of McKubre's graphs showing similar behavior of ENEA materials tested in different labs. Nothing would have convinced the skeptics. No level of performance will sway them. Only commercial products. But we don't need to convince them. We just need to help non-skeptical scientists replicate.
Violante met with a lot of opposition and was forced to quit. That was academic politics. It had nothing to do with whether his materials were good enough to serve as a lab rat.
I don’t see how historic calibrations can be used. (Maybe I misunderstand what you mean by historic.) The outlet was previously a different size and the fan operated at a different power. Even the fan was different at one point.
Mizuno has made two air flow calorimeters, and he went through several blowers. I think he only has one calorimeter that is fully working at present. Before he starts a test, he always cleans out the blowers and does various checks. He seals the reactors in the box, and then he recalibrates before excess heat testing. He never uses "historic" data. No one does that. That would be a nutty thing to do. I have not followed the discussion here, but if that is what THH thinks, he made that up.
As it happens, with the same blower and insulation in place, when you recalibrate you find the numbers have hardly changed. You can use old calibrations for various purposes, and I have done this in my presentation. But only because we are sure the calibration constant has not changed significantly. It might have gone from 0.05533 to 0.05546. It always changes a little after you open, close, and reseal the chamber.
Interesting discussion on Google
research on Physics World podcast
starting at 36:40
Storms 2. The amount of D reacted with the metals will determine the amount of NAE that can be produced. However, the NAE is produce only during a deloading event. Therefore, for success to be achieved, deuterium must first be acquired by the metals followed by removal of the D.
That's why I was suggesting electro-co-deposition of Pd to maximally load with D and then degassing in vacuum - a way of creating NAEs?
Storms 2. The amount of D reacted with the metals will determine the amount of NAE that can be produced. However, the NAE is produce only during a deloading event. Therefore, for success to be achieved, deuterium must first be acquired by the metals followed by removal of the D.
That's why I was suggesting electro-co-deposition of Pd to maximally load with D and then degassing in vacuum - a way of creating NAEs?
The process is not as simple as adding D and deloading, although this process is essential for gaps to be created. When Pd reacts with D or H, cracks will always be produced. Generating cracks is easy, actually too easy. The challenge is to make many small cracks rather than a few big ones. Unfortunately, Nature wants to make a few big ones. That is why LENR is hard to cause. Nature always wins. Success results when a condition is present in the material that encourages formation of many small gaps along with some big cracks that Nature requires. Addition of inclusions seems to work. I have been exploring other methods with some success. Hopefully the burnishing method will work.
This is a very complex problem requiring careful study and proper instruments to detect what is actually happening. Very few people have the skill and proper tools to do the job. By skill, I also mean knowledge about what is known about how PdD behaves. One reason this has been such a difficult problem to solve results because the required skill set is very rare. Knowledge about nuclear physics or physics in general is useless although this seems to be the common skill set applied to the problem. Knowledge about electrochemistry is also useless, except when using the electrochemical method to react Pd with D. In this case, electrochemisry is only a tool with no relationship to the LENR process. Electrolysis is simply a method used cause a reaction between Pd and D, a reaction which can be caused equally well using other methods. Consequently, the skill sets that have been applied have been largely counter productive. Knowledge about material science, crystallography, and phase relationships are required. Until people with this skill set are educated about LENR as well as the strange behavior of PdD, we will continue to have the blind leading the blind.
It might have been discovered by careful observation, for example, if someone happened to make an extra hot fire and a small chuck of iron ore was smelted in it. There are places in Georgia above ground where iron-rich rock are everywhere. They were mined in abundance until the 1930s. If ancient people built an extra hot fire with one of these rocks in it, they might have discovered a small piece of one was smelted. They would have known about other ores already.
The development of the blue LED took in total 20 years by a single 1 man team. The big team with 20+ people won the race for the red & green LED, but not the check-pot. The reward the company offers to the 1 man team was about 4000$.... The court finally proposed about 100'000'000$....
What can we learn? One man can do it if the parameter space is well known and the methods are standard. Every time the parameter space increases by 1 you can multiply time needed for success by about 20. The parameter space of LENR is huge, especially if you have no knowledge of a working model. Even if you document every step and reproduce it carefully the reproduction will fail because the parameters space has e.g. 3 more dimensions than you know and consequently were not documented.
Measurements show that success can depend on temperature within a narrow range. But I'm not talking about the final productive temperature. Its the temperature were you can activate the fuel. If you miss that crucial step, then you will end up with e.g. 30% as we see now.
Back to 100'000'000$...: That's needed for serious research in this area and an individual will get nothing even if he finds a perfect method to produce LENR because he most likely will not be able to reproduce it.
Final conclusion: If 100 people with a little money and a lot of brain start to cooperate = talk to each other with no secretes and forget about 100'000'000$...then may be there will be a path to success. But as I know people the 100'000'000$....will blind 99 out of 100 and the remaining 1 is the fool ...
The development of the blue LED took in total 20 years by a single 1 man team.
It wasn't anywhere near that long! It was discovered by Shuji Nakamura. I read his autobiography in Japanese. He was at Nichia Corp. for 16 years. He worked on various things, with the blue LED from time to time. They told him to stop, but he kept doing it in his spare time. He began serious work in 1988. They finally began production in 1993.
Interesting discussion on Google
research on Physics World podcast
starting at 36:40
Thanks Sam. Good listen applicable to this thread. I suggest skipping to :42. There you will hear a familiar name mentioned the first time. If too busy to listen in full to the next 10 minutes, pay attention at :42/:47/:52. I think there is much more to TG's Nature article, than most realize. IMO, orsova picked up on that the other day in his well written post, and this PW commentator takes it a step further.
First time I post here. I probably won’t take part in the discussions very much, but I’d like to share an idea for the planned experiments.
I have no direct preference for any particular experiment. Because LENR seems so elusive I would in the initial phase opt for experiments, in which different variants or samples of materials could be investigated in a short time under the same conditions.
Take the Mizuno experiment for instance. This dictates that a nickel wire mesh is rubbed with palladium. This is a manual process that can lead to uneven distribution, which even might be desirable. But I would initially rub the mesh mechanically and create a segmentation on the mesh where palladium is applied in different intensities. This can be done, for example, by wrapping the mesh around a cylinder and rubbing it on a lathe from left to right in successive steps for a longer period of time. Then turn the gauze 90 degrees and do this again with a different intensity. This way you can make a distribution of palladium that runs in density for example from 1-25 or 1-100 on one mesh.
I would attach that mesh to a flat heating plate, which has been checked beforehand for an even heat distribution. I would then use a thermal camera to observe and record the temperature of the entire surface of the mesh, when it is heated. Are there specific places that are getting warmer or colder? If so, is it constant or does it fluctuate in time and is there a relationship with the intensity or direction of rubbing? If there are any light effects, what is their spectral composition?
Furthermore, I would rub the mesh in different ways and angles: perpendicular, with rotation, but still mechanical and reproducible. This makes it possible to detect anomalies and to see when and where they occur. Then, if you do find them, you can zoom in on the conditions under which they occur, reproduce these on one mesh and make actual measurements in an original Mizuno configuration. I would do qualitative investigations first to find the best candidates for quantitative experiments. For other experiments (non-Mizuno) you might think up a similar procedure.
MIT joins the act... Partnering up with google.
https://dmse.mit.edu/news/2019/reopening-case-cold-fusion
August 16, 2019
A team of researchers from MIT, the University of British Columbia, the University of Maryland, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Google are conducting a multiyear investigation into "cold fusion", the production of energy using a benign nuclear reaction at room temperature. In 1989, experiments were reported that raised hopes that cold fusion had been achieved. If true, it could potentially be a source of limitless, carbon-free energy. However, researchers were unable to reproduce the results, and the topic laid largely dormant for years.
Professor Yet-Ming Chiang is part of the Google-sponsored team that is now revisiting the possibility of cold fusion. In a paper published in Nature, they publicly unveiled their efforts; while they haven't found evidence of cold fusion as originally described, they have discovered new insights into metal-hydrogen interactions and measurement techniques at high temperatures and pressures. Since 2015, their efforts have yielded three preprints and 10 peer-reviewed publications. Professor Chiang says, "That is why we got involved, [and] that's actually the work we are continuing to do. This project is by no means over. There's lots of ongoing work we're interested in doing."
Very worthwhile reads - particularly the Q&A.
WOW!
Since 2015, their efforts have yielded three preprints and 10 peer-reviewed publications. Professor Chiang says, "That is why we got involved
Mission accomplished
Since 2015, their efforts have yielded three preprints and 10 peer-reviewed publications. Professor Chiang says, "That is why we got involved
Mission accomplished
From the podcast I got the same impression, that te interest on taking part was partly due to the permanent need of academic achievement was easily fulfilled.
I did not like the joking about conspiracy that came around when they discussed that Google had kept their involvement in LENR research even from their own employees for 4 years. I knew they had to be doing it in secret because it had be going on within Google X (where I have my Brother in Law working at, and he had never heard of it until I sent him the link to the Nature article. They have tight NDAs with every employee and he generally knows of many ongoing projects besides his own involvement, but of this one he knew nothing).
Display MoreMIT joins the act... Partnering up with google.
https://dmse.mit.edu/news/2019/reopening-case-cold-fusion
Reopening the case of cold fusion
August 16, 2019
A team of researchers from MIT, the University of British Columbia, the University of Maryland, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Google are conducting a multiyear investigation into "cold fusion", the production of energy using a benign nuclear reaction at room temperature. In 1989, experiments were reported that raised hopes that cold fusion had been achieved. If true, it could potentially be a source of limitless, carbon-free energy. However, researchers were unable to reproduce the results, and the topic laid largely dormant for years.
Professor Yet-Ming Chiang is part of the Google-sponsored team that is now revisiting the possibility of cold fusion. In a paper published in Nature, they publicly unveiled their efforts; while they haven't found evidence of cold fusion as originally described, they have discovered new insights into metal-hydrogen interactions and measurement techniques at high temperatures and pressures. Since 2015, their efforts have yielded three preprints and 10 peer-reviewed publications. Professor Chiang says, "That is why we got involved, [and] that's actually the work we are continuing to do. This project is by no means over. There's lots of ongoing work we're interested in doing."
Outside References
Very worthwhile reads - particularly the Q&A.
I agree, having a paper published in Nature that even mentions LENR is impressive. Also, having a company like Google doing work even slightly related to LENR is impressive. Thanks to the false myth created by the skeptics, any company or researcher who shows the slightest interest in the subject takes a risk. But let's step out of the political situation and look at what this paper says about the science of LENR. Unfortunately, most people can not do this because they know very little about the science of LENR or about what is actually known about the subject. Consequently, they are encouraged to believe what is said has meaning where there is none
The paper has two major flaws. First, it confuses cold fusion with hot fusion. These are two entirely different and independent nuclear processes having different nuclear products and conditions required to cause the reactions. This confusion shows that the authors know nothing about what is now known about the cold fusion process. Second, they do not cite the sources of known information. For example I have written two books and 10 reviews over the years that summarize what is known. Based on their comments about cold fusion, the authors apparently have read none of this information. Even the cited work of Claytor is misinterpreted. In other words, such a poorly researched paper would normally not be accepted for publication if it were applied to any other field of study.
But what does this mean? Does this mean that people supported by Google do not know how to do their home work. Or does this mean a paper about LENR can not be published in Nature unless it is seriously flawed? What does such a flawed paper say about the approach Google is taking toward cold fusion? While we can be grateful for their interest, what progress can we expect to see from such a flawed description of their efforts? Ordinary people read the paper and believe their description of LENR is accurate and authoritative, when actually it only adds confusion to the debate. That is why I'm not hopeful about what Google is doing.
I knew they had to be doing it in secret because it had be going on within Google X
Loosely secret. I heard about it from time to time.
