Posted on 06/02/2013 7:17:12 PM PDT by Kevmo
Has the E-Cat been proven to work?
5.23.2013 | by Mike Weaver
In the world of LENR or cold fusion, one cannot help but come across Andrea Rossi’s E-Cat device. Rossi claims to harness LENR or cold fusion via a nickel-hydrogen process to produce excess thermal energy in his energy catalyzer. On May 20th, a report on independent testing of the E-Cat HT device was released. Let’s take a look!(updated 5-23-13 14:39EST)
First off, the reading list: ■The Report ■An article at ExtremeTech about the report ■An article at eCat News on the report
The report is billed as independent verification that the E-Cat device produces anomalous heat at levels far higher than can be accounted for by the energy inputs. At first blush, the report is quite interesting. The authors tested E-Cat HT devices in two experimental runs, 96 hours and 116 hours in length each performed in December 2012 and March 2013 respectively. Each test run produced anomalous heat output. I liked that they ran an E-Cat without “fuel” as a control during the 116 hour test and showed that it did not produce any heat beyond what was expected from the internal heating elements. The report references an earlier test made in November of 2012 which resulted in catastrophic failure of the E-Cat device.
The tests held in December 2012 and March 2013 are in fact subsequent to a previous attempt in November 2012 to make accurate measurements on a similar model of the E-Cat HT on the same premises. In that experiment the device was destroyed in the course of the experimental run, when the steel cylinder containing the active charge overheated and melted. The partial data gathered before the failure, however, yielded interesting results which warranted further in-depth investigation in future tests. Although the run was not successful as far as obtaining complete data is concerned, it was fruitful in that it demonstrated a huge production of excess heat, which however could not be quantified. The device used had similar, but not identical, features to those of the E-Cat HT used in the December and March runs.[1]
The device used for the November test is shown in these images.
If the thermal camera is correct, that is quite warm, indeed.
The key characteristic of the devices used appears to be heating elements with a core of “powder charge” which is the fuel.
As in the original E-Cat, the reaction is fueled by a mixture of nickel, hydrogen, and a catalyst, which is kept as an industrial trade secret. The charge sets off the production of thermal energy after having been activated by heat produced by a set of resistor coils located inside the reactor. Once operating temperature is reached, it is possible to control the reaction by regulating the power to the coils.[1]
Interesting stuff. I did see an item that troubled me somewhat, however.
It was not possible to evaluate the weight of the internal steel cylinder or of the caps because the ECat HT was already running when the test began. Weighing operations were therefore performed on another perfectly similar device present on the premises, comparing a cap-sealed cylinder containing the active charge with another identical cylinder, empty and without caps. The difference in weight obtained is 0.236 kg: this is therefore to be assigned to the charge loaded into the E-Cat HT and to the weight (not subtracted in the present test) of the two metal caps.[1]
Why weren’t they able to weigh the actual test device? How did they know that the one they did weigh was exactly identical? While this may not be a real issue, it continues to reinforce the impression that Rossi gives of possible shenanigans. A little thing, perhaps, but it does trouble me.
The report goes on to detail the methods used to gather data and the data itself. I have no real issue with any of this, and, frankly, I’m probably not qualified to judge a lot of it on its face. I am curious as to why they used estimates of energy output based upon thermal camera imaging. I would have thought that a calorimeter-style setup would have been far more precise and useful. Immerse the device (or the device + heat-tolerant, waterproof shell) into a container of water, seal the lid, and measure the temperature of the water over time. Easy, simple, precise measurement of energy output. Far simpler and less prone to confounders than their estimates and secondary measurement techniques. While I’m sure there was a good reason, again, it bothers me.
The report concludes:
The results obtained indicate that energy was produced in decidedly higher quantities than what may be gained from any conventional source.[1]
And
Even from the standpoint of a “blind” evaluation of volumetric energy density, if we consider the whole volume of the reactor core and the most conservative figures on energy production, we still get a value of (7.93 ± 0.8) 102 MJ/Liter that is one order of magnitude higher than any conventional source.[1]
Hrm. Interesting. The claim is that, not only did the E-Cat produce excess energy, it did so in such a way that the energy density of the “fuel” would be at least an order of magnitude higher than any conventional source. This report is interesting and it does provide evidence for the E-Cat and perhaps for LENR as a whole. I look forward to the scientific community’s response to this and, most importantly, to see if it can be replicated by an independent research group. Preferably without Rossi or his people controlling the experimental conditions.
Update 5-23-13 14:49EST: Came across this blog with a good analysis of the report. Give it a look, Ethan Siegel makes some very good points that I missed.
Be well
[1] http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1305/1305.3913.pdf
Have 419 scams been proven to work?
They can break into one of Rossi’s facilities, or conduct computer espionage.
***It is likely that more nations than China are keying up to do just that.
Rossi should have either filed for a patent or kept everything totally secret.
***He was doing exactly that until about 2 years ago. It was Focardi who pushed him to do the demos, because he’s in ill health and wanted the credit due to him. So, Rossi obliged. He did a crappy job of it. His instinct is to keep it a secret, so everything he did on these demos went against his instinct.
But if this whole thing is a con, it is the greatest con in the history of science, and Rossi is the best demo artist of all time. No other magician can do his magic trick without being on the stage manipulating things. I don’t have such a high opinion of Rossi. He’s a mediocre demonstrator, an undisciplined scientist, and perhaps just an Edisonian inventor who got lucky.
Regardless of the reason, if his sauce is real the Chinese already have it. He may as well file a patent at this point, or get a big industrial partner.
or get a big industrial partner.
***He appears to be choosing the latter strategy
If I had a million bucks, I’d create a LENR experimental array, with perhaps 100 canisters that could be independently controlled for gas ingredients, total and partial pressures, temperatures, and rates of change of all the above. Then I’d pop some metal samples (e.g, nickel) into each one, and tune each one to a different point in a wide range of multidimensional variable values.
If any one of them got hotter than would be predicted from the input energy, I’d get another million and start a new experiment, with a hundred more canisters having environmental values scattered around the values in the hot one. I’d cherry pick the best from that experiment and start new experiments with variations around those values. And so on.
This should quickly focus in on effective gas and temperature environments for LENR. If the hot fusion lobby hadn’t united to prevent funding for “cold fusion”, we’d be there now.
Thank you for the link to the patent. I wasn’t aware of this.
I have been interested in so called ‘cold fusion’ since my courses in science particularly physical chemistry at UC Berkeley. What intrigued me was a chart/graph showing the relation between the bombs, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were just a fey years past. What was intriguing was the showing of ‘potential nuclear’ energy from Uranium/plutonium through the elements to hydrogen in particular. All noted elements had a level of such energy. It seemed to me that some of these middle elements might also just need a ‘key’ to unlock this low level energy. As such ‘cold fusion’ is very interesting to me.
I wonder what's taking the Chinese so long? They've probably known the secret for a couple of years. There's also the Japanese, Russians and Israelis to worry about. Rossi better hurry or those distribution rights will be worthless.
Actually, this is the approach that successful investigators of LENR have pursued. It isn't "100 canisters", as in the past most people were working the Pons/Fleischmann electrolysis Pd/D2 systems, so the individual reactors are a bit pricey. They "have" done them in batches of 10. The researchers (several different) used this method to prove experimentally that the major overall reaction pathway in Pd/D2 was:
2D2 ----> He4
And that the heat yield per nucleon was very near to the theoretically predicted value of 24MEV/nucleon.
Precisely your approach has been suggested for "gas-loaded" systems (both Pd/D2 and Ni/H) on the Vortex-L mailing list. I suspect there are people out there doing precisely that
Actually not. The stated policy of the Patent Office is to automatically reject applications about "cold fusion" as being in the same category as "perpetual motion". There have been a very few people who have managed to sneak things past the gates by proper selection of weasel-wordy terminology.
So yes, there have been patents granted about the topic area of "cold fusion", but called something else. In the case of your specific reference, this is about "Dislocation Site Formation Techniques", though the substance of the patent is all about "cold fusion".
You neglect the possibility that Rossi’s new industrial partner will simply steal the secret themselves. Basically, that’s what Defkalion did.
Rossi will need to navigate a treacherous minefield to prevail in this. In the end, the most likely outcome, even if he has invented a secret sauce, is that he will be a tragic figure.
I remember reading about this well over a year ago. Seems it’s on FR almost every day.
I'm highly suspicious of the OP's motives for continuing to post this despite the fact that many people have pointed out that the claim is fraudulent. I'm also curious why anyone is allowed to keep promoting an obvious scam on FR.
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