1995.09.03 / Tom Droege / Re: How To Spend the $700 Originally-From: Tom Droege Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: How To Spend the $700 Date: 3 Sep 1995 03:28:00 GMT Organization: The Amateur Sky Survey hheffner@matsu.ak.net (Horace Heffner) wrote: >In article <42a0i4$csi@fnnews.fnal.gov>, Droege@fnal.fnal.gov (Tom Droege) >wrote: > >> In article <199509011926.AA15102@storm.fnal.gov>, droege@fnal.fnal.gov >(Tom Droege) says: >> > >> >OK folks, here is a proposal to get rid of the $700. >> > > >[snip] > >Why be in a hurry? There may be more newbies like myself willing to >contribute. It was way before my time lurking here, but what was the >original purpose of the fund? Was it for research/validation work? If >so, it seems like a good fund to have around. Besides, it's been fun >watching the suggestions! > >BTW, where do you send contributions. Is anyone still taking them? Is >there a standard donation, like $50? > >Thanks, > >Horace > >-- >Horace Heffner 907-746-0820 >PO Box 325 Palmer, AK 99645 > The money was collected at about $20-30 a crack to send me to Rome (GA) to investigate the Griggs device. Which we did. The problem is that I am going to do something with it before December, 31 or I will have an income tax problem. I tried to give it to Scott Little to help the work on the Potapov device. So far, I have not been able to get him to accept it. After the trip, several of the contributors proposed that I give it to my favorite charity. At the moment this is The Amateur Sky Survey. OK, the contributors (only contributors have a vote in this matter) have until early December to tell me what to do. BTW, I do construe the money as a "gift". Otherwise there would be a tax problem. I still want to do something before the end of the year to eliminate any question. Tom Droege cudkeys: cuddy3 cudendroege cudfnTom cudlnDroege cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Alan M / Re: How To Spend the $700 Originally-From: "Alan M. Dunsmuir" Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: How To Spend the $700 Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 08:25:10 +0100 Organization: Home In article: <42b7c0$jj3@sake.wwa.com> Tom Droege writes: > OK, the contributors (only contributors have a vote in this matter) have > until early December to tell me what to do. BTW, I do construe the money > as a "gift". Otherwise there would be a tax problem. I still want to > do something before the end of the year to eliminate any question. > If you really can't get Scott to accept it (why?) I hereby give you full authority to dispose of my portion of the fund as and how you alone consider most appropriate. -- Alan M. Dunsmuir [@ his wits end] (Can't even quote poetry right) I am his Highness' dog at Kew Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you? [Alexander Pope] PGP Public Key available on request. cudkeys: cuddy03 cudenAlan cudfnAlan cudlnM cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / ZoltanCCC / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: 3 Sep 1995 06:38:14 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) A truly intriguing line of thought. It seems to me from the above that I could build a nuclear reactor using a pile of Lithium Deuterid, not quite big enough to go berserk (i.e. supercritical) but just big enough to generate a little heat. I would surround this pile with a neutron absorbing medium and a heat exchanger. In the center of the pile I would have the electric neutron generator described above. When I turn my generator on the emitted neutrons would cause the reactions resulting in neutron amplification. The fast neutrons would be absobed by the absorbent medium and the heat exchanger would take the heat away where it eventually drives a turbine. Why is this scheme not feasible? Why is it not done? I know it works because the little "shrimp" produced 15 megatons of energy. Obviously about ten tons would be supercritical. Our home device would have to be smaller than that. I wonder if there is any data on which direction the neutrons are emitted in. I mean in the reaction: n + Li7 -> Li6 + n + n if there is a directional effect this could be utilized as a linear neutron amplifier. A two meter long rod that produces say 10^6 times the neutrons coming into it. Of course it does not have to be a rod, any old lump will do if it is not big enough to go boom. Zoltan Szakaly cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenzoltanccc cudlnZoltanCCC cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / John Seney / Digital Scope.FAQ Originally-From: john@wd1v.mv.com (John Seney) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Digital Scope.FAQ Date: Sun, 3 Sep 1995 13:40:22 GMT Organization: MV Communications, Inc. \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ FALL / 1995 DIGITAL SCOPE.FAQ - VERSION 2.00 ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: ::Date/Time | O O :: :: /\ | :: :: / \ | O O :: :: / \ /\ | :: ::__/ \ / \ /`| O O :: :: \ / \/ | :: :: \ / | O O :: ::1 GHz BW \/ 2 GS/s |________:: ::________________________|A B C D :: :: rise 1.5 ns | x x x :: :: fall 4.9 ns | x x x :: ::_________________________________:: ::(*) (*) (*) (*) (*) (*) :: ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: ::: ::: Dear Technologist(s): This Digital Storage Scope.FAQ file contains many (but not all) of your answers to the more "Frequently Asked Questions" re: Digital Storage Oscilloscopes (DSOs). The answers and suggestions come from > a decade of my experience as a DSO sales engineer in Boston, MA. The opinions are mine and represent no company or service - they are meant simply to be helpful, generic, and easy to understand. Thanks to the hundreds of responses to the earlier versions of this FAQ. Feel free to contact me anytime (john@wd1v.mv.com) if you have additional questions or comments. If you want the next version of this file sent to you automatically, send an EMAIL where the subject field contains the text "subscribe scope.faq". \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ KEY ISSUES REVIEWED IN THIS FAQ (in order of appearance) * DSO INDUSTRY TRENDS (Whats happening in DSO technology this year?) * DSO FORM FACTORS (What types of DSOs are there?) * PRIMARY DSO FUNCTIONS (What can DSOs actually do?) * COMPARISONS (How can I best compare various models) * APPLICATIONS (What are the most common DSO applications?) * ADCs (What speed do I really need on each channel?) * BANDWIDTH & TRIGGER (What numbers and functions are right?) * ARCHIVAL & MEMORY (How fast, how deep, and can I get more?) * DISPLAYS (What am I really looking at?) * MEASUREMENTS (How much is my signal changing over time?) * DIGITAL SIGNAL PROCESSING (How can I obtain more useful information?) * DEMOS & PURCHASING (How can I see and get the DSO I really need?) Best regards, \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/ John D. Seney, WD1V Internet: john@wd1v.mv.com 144 Pepperidge Drive America On Line: jseney@aol.com Manchester, NH 03103-6150 AX.25 Pkt: wd1v@wb1dsw.nh.usa.na (H) 603-668-1096 Ampernet: wd1v@wd1v.ampr.org \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/ LeCroy Sales Engineering - Maine, New Hampshire, and Northeastern Massachusetts (O) 800-553-2769 (F) 603-627-1623 (P) 800-SKYPAGE #5956779 All opinions are my own, including Digital Storage Scope.FAQ To obtain the latest copy automatically, simply send me an EMAIL with "subscribe scope.faq" in the subject field. \/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/ cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenjohn cudfnJohn cudlnSeney cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / C Mueller / Re: Pulse mechanism, why they pulse, why they shut down Originally-From: Christian Mueller Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,sci.physics,alt.sci.physics.new-theories, ci.astro,sci.energy,sci.physics.electromag,sci.physics.particle,sci.rese rch,sci.skeptic Subject: Re: Pulse mechanism, why they pulse, why they shut down Date: 3 Sep 1995 14:03:48 GMT Organization: sedat - networks for the bodensee region, germany In article <41ut8i$udv@dartvax.dartmouth.edu> Archimedes Plutonium wrote: > >Big Hunch: Every star has planets. Every star has a modified > >Titius-Bode rule for the spaing of those planets. Every star has > >planets and as those planets grow, somehow there is a "purposeful need" > >to have an asteroid belt and so every star which has approximately the > >size of our Sun has an asteroid belt which originated from a growing > >planet which exploded. Every star around the size of our Sun has a > >planet with life on it. In a purposeful universe, the key operating > >concept is uniformity and so life would not be a fluke on one planet. > >The trouble I have with this hunch is that I really can not see any > >real purpose that the asteroid belt interacts with Life on Earth. Some > >purpose that asteroids have that life on Earth could not exist if it > >were not for asteroids being in a belt in the Solar System. If I can > >see some "purposeful" interaction, then that 50-50 probability would > >turn in favor that this hunch is really true. Perhaps something like > >iridium is essential for life, and the only "minimal energy" way of > >transporting iridium around in Solar systems is by asteroids. I think you are drifting into the realm of philosophy. I don't mean any offence, but what you write has nothing to do with plasma physics. Why has everyone to send articles concerning space or physosophy to sci.physics.plasma and not just to sci.space? Are they afraid of their article not being read ? And there is a even bigger hunch in your article: Not every star has planets. Did you ever hear of double star systems ? Yes ? And every star system has live in it ? Do you really believe that? You are approaching the problem the wrong way. You cannot use the rules of uniformity in the case of solar systems, simply because there are too many variables. Instead of talking of the need for a asteroid belt you should rather ask youself if you a sure that everything in the universee has a meaning to our live, and if we are the most important thing in the universe. We are but a step in evolution, and we will be nothing more to the next species of man than the homo sapiens neandertalensis is to us: a primitive being. Besides , I welcome Bryan G. Wallases article (Re: The farce of physics) , because it deals with PLASMA PHYSICS and not phylosophical issues. Bye then. cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenCmueller cudfnChristian cudlnMueller cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / C Mueller / Re: Pulse mechanism, why they pulse, why they shut down Originally-From: Christian Mueller Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Pulse mechanism, why they pulse, why they shut down Date: 3 Sep 1995 13:57:30 GMT Organization: sedat - networks for the bodensee region, germany This is a multi-part message in MIME format. --------------------------------2834585009830 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Please read the attachment. --------------------------------2834585009830 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain In article <41ut8i$udv@dartvax.dartmouth.edu> Archimedes Plutonium wrote: >I have a conjecture here, a big hunch, something I don't want to >be held to as of yet because it's chances of being wrong or right are >50-50 at this moment, but there is a chance that a partial intuition of >this hunch is true. >Big Hunch: Every star has planets. Every star has a modified >Titius-Bode rule for the spaing of those planets. Every star has >planets and as those planets grow, somehow there is a "purposeful need" >to have an asteroid belt and so every star which has approximately the >size of our Sun has an asteroid belt which originated from a growing >planet which exploded. Every star around the size of our Sun has a >planet with life on it. In a purposeful universe, the key operating >concept is uniformity and so life would not be a fluke on one planet. >The trouble I have with this hunch is that I really can not see any >real purpose that the asteroid belt interacts with Life on Earth. Some >purpose that asteroids have that life on Earth could not exist if it >were not for asteroids being in a belt in the Solar System. If I can >see some "purposeful" interaction, then that 50-50 probability would >turn in favor that this hunch is really true. Perhaps something like >iridium is essential for life, and the only "minimal energy" way of >transporting iridium around in Solar systems is by asteroids. I think you are drifting into the realm of philosophy. I don't mean any offence, but what you write has nothing to do with plasma physics. Why has everyone to send articles concerning space or physosophy to sci.physics.plasma and not just to sci.space? Are they afraid of their article not being read ? And there is a even bigger hunch in your article: Not every star has planets. Did you ever hear of double star systems ? Yes ? And every star system has live in it ? Do you really believe that? You are approaching the problem the wrong way. You cannot use the rules of uniformity in the case of solar systems, simply because there are too many variables. Instead of talking of the need for a asteroid belt you should rather ask youself if you a sure that everything in the universe has a meaning to our live, and if we are the most important thing in the universe. We are but a step in evolution, and we will be nothing more to the next species of man than the homo sapiens neandertalensis is to us: a primitive being. Besides , I welcome Bryan G. Wallases article (Re: The farce of physics) , because it deals with PLASMA PHYSICS and not phylosophical issues. Bye then. --------------------------------2834585009830-- cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenCmueller cudfnChristian cudlnMueller cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Arthur TOK / Re: Answer to zero-point energy question by Robin Originally-From: awc@slcawc.aug.ipp-garching.mpg.de (Arthur Carlson TOK ) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Answer to zero-point energy question by Robin Date: 04 Sep 1995 07:10:30 GMT Organization: Rechenzentrum der Max-Planck-Gesellschaft in Garching In article <428s0c$c5c@news.internetmci.com> kevin.romero@internetmci.co (Kevin Romero) writes: > > If you borrow out of the quantum vacuum , you have to put it back right away or violate > the uncertainty principle. > > Which leaves the nagging question, well where did the mass of the universe come from > if not from the quantum vacuum in some great cosmic burp. Certainly with all the energy > in the universe, by the above argument it would have been over before it started {figuratively}. Who says there's a lot of energy in the universe? The conventional wisdom is that the *negative* gravitational energy just balances all the positive energy, leaving a marginally "closed" universe with zero net energy. (Nobel Prize thought: Is the necessity of zero total energy for the universe to grow from a quantum fluctuation an alternative to the inflationary scenario, which also tries to explain the fine tuning of the net energy in the universe?) (Warning: Posting outside of expertise!) -- To study, to finish, to publish. -- Benjamin Franklin Dr. Arthur Carlson Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics Garching, Germany carlson@ipp-garching.mpg.de cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenawc cudfnArthur cudlnTOK cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.08.31 / jonesse@plasma / Re: Hello again / Solar stove Originally-From: jonesse@plasma.byu.edu Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Hello again / Solar stove Date: 31 Aug 95 09:50:29 -0600 Organization: Brigham Young University In article <41tmlf$7r5@fnnews.fnal.gov>, Droege@fnal.fnal.gov (Tom Droege) writes: >>In article <1995Aug26.212055.2372@plasma.byu.edu> jonesse@plasma.byu.edu writes: >>>Thanks to all for responses regarding the solar stove development. Possible >>>applications in 3rd-world countries will be considered with the help of BYU's >>>Benson Institute, which has considerable experience already in these countries >>>with solar homes, water-supply systems, etc. One solution to the problem of >>>focussing the sun on the bottom of a pan or plate without risking eye damage is >>>to look *through* the inflatable parabolic mirror at the focussed bright spot, >>>since the aluminized plastic transmits some light. Automatically tracking >>>the sun's motion > > I assume you have thought about Fresnel lenses. I have tested some of > the ones Edmund Scientific sells. They are much too good for this > purpose. The 10" I tested was good to about 2' of arc. So you could > make them much more crudely. I figure you could stamp them out of > plexiglass or the very cheapest plastic. All you need is a pretty > simple frame. The trick would be to *not* get a sharp focus. You > don't want to burn a hole through the bottom of the pot. You should > not have much trouble getting a 6" spot from a 3'x3' lens. Should cook > a lot of yams. > > Tom Droege Yes, Tom, we had thought of the cheap Fresnel lens. But this has been on the back burner as we worked out the inflatable (cheap) parabolic mirror. The Fresnel len idea has some distinct advantages of simplicity and (I think) hardiness in the field that the mirror lacks. We'll see what we can do -- thanks for the timely reminder. --Steve Jones cudkeys: cuddy31 cudenjonesse cudmo8 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Ieromnimon F / Re: Answer to zero-point energy question by Robin Originally-From: ierof@brave4.essex.ac.uk (Ieromnimon F) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Answer to zero-point energy question by Robin Date: 4 Sep 1995 09:57:07 GMT Organization: University of Essex, Colchester, UK In article <428s0c$c5c@news.internetmci.com> kevin.romero@internetmci.co (Kevin Romero) writes: >You wrote: >>One frequently sees solutions to QM problems, that involve "borrowing" >>energy from the vacuum. Could someone explain to me in relatively >>simple terms, exactly what mandates that this energy must be returned? > >{ Heisenbergs uncertainty relation when applied to Energy and Time. KJR} > > >>Please do not invoke the law of conservation of mass-energy, as it is >>precisely this which I am trying to expand into a law of conservation >>of mass-energy-zero-point-energy. >>Regards, >> >>Robin van Spaandonk >>-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* >>Man is the creature that comes into this world knowing everything, >>Learns all his life, >>And leaves knowing nothing. >>-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-* >> > >If you borrow out of the quantum vacuum , you have to put it back right away or violate >the uncertainty principle. > >Which leaves the nagging question, well where did the mass of the universe come from >if not from the quantum vacuum in some great cosmic burp. Certainly with all the energy >in the universe, by the above argument it would have been over before it started {figuratively}. > According to a cosmological theory, no: because the negative potential of gravity exactly matches the mass-energy contect of the universe, the great cosmic burp (sic) would -not- violate the uncertainty principle, and thus the universe could literally have been created at "no cost" (whatever that means in cosmology). > > > Kevin Romero > Frank Ieromnimon, ierof@essex.ac.uk cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenierof cudfnIeromnimon cudlnF cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Richard Blue / Re: Off the deep end Originally-From: blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Off the deep end Date: Mon, 4 Sep 1995 14:10:25 GMT Organization: Sci.physics.fusion/Mail Gateway If my ramblings concerning the Cravens demo are to be elevated to the status of "theory" then perhaps I should attempt to defend that theory. The point at issue seems to be whether at any point in the external loop the temperature of the electrolyte exceeds the temperature in the reaction cell. It would be nice if we could resolve that question by reference to actual experimental data, but that does not seem to be the case so we are left with freedom to speculate. My argument is as follows: If we assume that the circulation path is such that the electrolyte leaves the cell and then passes through the pump (and filter) before it cools appreciably, it then seems obvious to me that the temperature of the electrolyte is higher after the pump than when it excited the reaction cell. I can think of no reason to assume that it cools enough to offset the heating that must occur at the pump (and filter). Now it may well be true that the mechanical work done by the pump is not sufficient to account for the temperature differential across the reaction cell, but we should not neglect the thermal transfer from the pump motor to the electrolyte. The fact that the flow rate for the electrolyte is quite slow is simply an indication that the claimed rate of energy production is relatively low. In fact the power level is such that incidental power sources such as heat exchange with ambient surroundings may be making significant contributions. My original point was that the data offered by the Cravens demo was inadequate to address such questions. All those scientists who thought they were seeing a convincing demonstration of cold fusion simply weren't thinking very critically about the demonstration. Perhaps the fact that the Cravens demo is still receiving this much attention tells us something about the attendees at ICCF that is more significant for an understanding of the cold fusion phenomenon than was the demo itself. Dick Blue cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenblue cudfnRichard cudlnBlue cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Horace Heffner / Re: Marshall Dudley Hypothesis revisited Originally-From: hheffner@matsu.ak.net (Horace Heffner) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Marshall Dudley Hypothesis revisited Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 06:21:09 -0900 Organization: none In article <42dk75$ige@morgoth.sfu.ca>, David Naugler wrote: > 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) wrote: > > > >***{Your description does not seem to apply to an electrolysis > >experiment--not while the current is turned on, at any rate. In > >electrolysis experiments, hydrogen ions are attracted to the negative > >terminal (the cathode), which implies that their charge is positive. (If > >they were negatively charged, they would move in the opposite direction.) > >Moreover, in the Pons-Fleischmann setup (which is being discussed here), > >the cathode is made of palladium, which would make the palladium negative > >by definition. Further, I can't see how your description would apply to a > >loaded palladium cathode even after the current was turned off. I would > >expect that the H ions within the lattice (i.e., the protons and > >deuterons), due to their positive charges, would slowly migrate to the > >surface of the metal, pick up stray electrons, form H2 molecules, and > >bleed off into the atmosphere. A loaded palladium cathode, when the > >current was turned off, would thus retain a sizable positive charge for > >some time, due very explicitly to the presence of the protons and > >deuterons. Does anyone know if this description fits the facts? --Mitchell > >Jones}*** > > > > This is an electrolysis, in which deuterium gas, D2 is evolved at the negative cathode and O2 is > evolved at the anode. > > At the cathode the only species which can undergo reduction in oxidation state are the deuterons > (cations) which are initially attracted to the cathode by the electrostatics described above. One > mechanism by which reduction of deuterons at the conductive palladium surface can be achieved is by > one electron transfer to produce reactive neutral deuterium atoms. These may reactive together to > release D2 to the atmosphere, or they may react with the metal surface to produce known compounds > of palladium. The known deuterides of palladium are as I have described them before. Palladium in > turn has a high potential for the adsorption of molecular hydrogen or deuterium gas. The net effect > of electolytic loading will be to prepare the metal surface so that there exists a concentration of > deuterium and palladium deuterides within a reactive layer a couple of hundred Angstroms thick. If you are again saying PdD2 and PdD4 is forming at the surface, with D being a -1 hydride, and the Pd being in the +2 or +4 state, could you please explain how this could be so? Given that a Pd +2 ion has a diameter of .8 A and Pd+4 has a diameter of .65 A, how are those big D -1 ions, at 1.54 A, going to fit into that lattice? If this is only a surface effect, then it seems that D atoms, molecules, or ions would be quickly blocked from further entry to the lattice, or are you saying these Pd + and D - ions are going into solution. If the Pd + and D - ions are going into solution, it seems this effect would be immaterial to the loading or status of the internal lattice. Also, if D molecules can enter the lattice and permiate it, wouldn't they dissociate and form ionic bonds? Besides, there does not seem to be room for two D atoms (i.e. a D2 molecule) in the Pd lattice. The diffusion rate would be nil. Is there some way to account for this discrepancy? Further, when loading approaches 1.0, (i.e. 1 atom D to 1 atom of Pd - a loading ratio of 1) starting around .8 if I recall correctly, the Pd expands. This can not be accounted for by a surface effect. *Something* must be going on deep inside the lattice, a volume effect. If this effect were from molecular diffusion, it seems like the Pd expansion would be a linear effect across the loading ratio interval of 0.0 to 1.0, and beyond. Is there some chemistry that can account for this? Regards, Horace > > It is interesting to note that deuterides of metals even up to uranium have been prepared. In any > metal deuteride, whether lithium deuteride or uranium deuteride, deuterium exists "formally" in > the -1 oxidation state while the metal exists in a positive oxidation state. Compounds which form > covalent bonds with hydrogen/deuterium are not called metals, they are called nonmetals. These are > some of the defining characteristics of the period table of elements. This is the language of > chemistry. > > In the original Pons-Fleischmann setup lithium hydroxide was used as the supporting electrolyte. > However, their choice of electrolyte was, I think, based on guesswork. In the recent MIT CF patent > a more conventional K2CO3 is used. The implication of this is that the supporting electrolyte plays > no role in the 'cold fusion' phenomenon. > > David Naugler > Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy Laboratory > Institute of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry > Simon Fraser University -- Horace Heffner 907-746-0820 PO Box 325 Palmer, AK 99645 cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenhheffner cudfnHorace cudlnHeffner cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszL cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / C Harrison / Periodic Post: Cold Fusion online at sunsite.unc.edu Originally-From: harr@netcom.com (Charles (Chuck) Harrison) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Periodic Post: Cold Fusion online at sunsite.unc.edu Date: Sun, 3 Sep 1995 15:43:44 GMT Organization: Fitful This message is posted periodically to inform readers about on-line data sources related to "cold fusion" which are located at the University of North Carolina SunSITE server. Two public WAIS (Wide Area Information Server) sources are online: (1) Dieter Britz's Bibliography (periodically updated), and (2) A sci.physics.fusion archive (1989 to present). WAIS provides for multiple keyword searches in these databases. It does _not_ support boolean logic in the searching :-(. 1. If you are directly connected to Internet, you can log onto a public WAIS server at the University of North Carolina: %telnet sunsite.unc.edu ... login: swais ... TERM = (unknown) vt100 It takes a minute to load ... < or use /fusion to locate the fusion-digest source> 2. If you have a "gopher" client, you can use it for WAIS access. Many university campuses provide gopher as a public information service. 2a. On most systems, you first select an option labeled "Other Systems", then from that menu select "WAIS based information". Since each gopher site creates its own menus, I can't tell you exactly where to go from there. 2b. If you can gopher to SunSITE, at UNC, navigate the menus down thru SunSITE archives..All archives..Academic..Physics..Cold-fusion. You will find the searchable databases (typically marked ), as well as the primary-literature files discussed below. 2c. If you can 'telnet' but not 'gopher', you may telnet to sunsite.unc.edu and login as 'gopher'. Then follow 2a or 2b above. 3. If you have World Wide Web (WWW) browser, such as Mosaic, Cello, or Lynx, you may use the following URL's: wais://sunsite.unc.edu/cold-fusion Britz bibliography wais://sunsite.unc.edu/fusion-digest newsgroup archive gopher://sunsite.unc.edu/11/../.pub/academic/physics/Cold-fusion 4. If you have a WAIS client on your system (the most common ones are "swais" -- character-based, and "xwais" -- for X-Windows), use it. The Britz source is called "cold-fusion" and it is listed in the directory-of-servers. If you _want_ a WAIS client program to run on your system, several are available in the public domain. Try ftp-ing to one of these sites: sunsite.unc.edu think.com There are several additional files archived at sunsite (e.g. Bollinger's Twist of Ribbon, preprints of the Fleischmann&Pons 1989 paper), which are accessible by anonymous ftp. %ftp sunsite.unc.edu . . . >cd pub/academic/physics/Cold-fusion >dir The collection (mostly primary papers) maintained by vince cate has been copied over to pub/academic/physics/Cold-fusion/vince-cate. Additional contributions are welcome; e-mail cfh@sunsite.unc.edu. cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenharr cudfnCharles cudlnHarrison cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Horace Heffner / Re: How To Spend the $700 Originally-From: hheffner@matsu.ak.net (Horace Heffner) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: How To Spend the $700 Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 09:11:39 -0900 Organization: none In article <42b7c0$jj3@sake.wwa.com>, Tom Droege wrote: > > The money was collected at about $20-30 a crack to send me to Rome (GA) > to investigate the Griggs device. Which we did. The problem is that I > am going to do something with it before December, 31 or I will have an > income tax problem. I tried to give it to Scott Little to help the > work on the Potapov device. So far, I have not been able to get him > to accept it. > > After the trip, several of the contributors proposed that I give it to > my favorite charity. At the moment this is The Amateur Sky Survey. I apologize. I didn't know this. If you made the trip and had $700 left over, it sounds like *you* more than earned it. To give it to a charity of your choice is magnanimous. Since I'm not a contributor, this is none of my buisiness anyway, so I'll hush up. > > OK, the contributors (only contributors have a vote in this matter) have > until early December to tell me what to do. BTW, I do construe the money > as a "gift". Otherwise there would be a tax problem. I still want to > do something before the end of the year to eliminate any question. > > Tom Droege -- Horace Heffner 907-746-0820 PO Box 325 Palmer, AK 99645 cudkeys: cuddy03 cudenhheffner cudfnHorace cudlnHeffner cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / ZoltanCCC / Re: How To Spend the $700 Originally-From: zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: How To Spend the $700 Date: 3 Sep 1995 16:53:16 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) I have not yet contributed money but I have an oppinion. First of all 700 dollars is not a lot of money, but it could serve as a seed for a larger amount to be collected over some time. I am a man of action but of course words are useful to make sure that when you act you are doing the right thing. What I have in mind is that we should collect money and simultaneously brainstorm on how to build a working nuclear reactor. Once we have enough money and we have developed the concept to maturity we build it and publish our results here. I would also be willing to construct the device since I have the means and some prerequisite knowledge. Perhaps if the money is spent on supplies there would not be a tax problem. For example we could buy deuterium or some metal like titanium or lithium it would be a good start. I also think we need some process control electronics like a processor board and some i/o hardware. Zoltan Szakaly cudkeys: cuddy3 cudenzoltanccc cudlnZoltanCCC cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Bill Rowe / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 15:05:11 -0700 Organization: AltNet - $5/month uncensored news - http://www.alt.net In article , jedrothwell@delphi.com wrote: >I wrote that CF experiments yield data that appears to contradict the >prevailing expertise in physics. browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) responds: > > "Actually, I don't disagree with your rewrite of the sentence. In fact, > I would emphasize the word "appears" in your rewrite. To me that > emphasizes the data may not be all that is desired." > >Anyone can see I did not use the word "appears" in that sense. This is a silly >word game. Rowe has deliberately substituted his sense of the word for mine, >to make it look as if I am conceding a point. This introduces confusion into >the debate. Well most people use the word "appear" to indicate the possibility that it might be something else. >I meant, of course, that some physicists say the data contradicts theory, >while others say it does not. The data itself is quite solid, because the >signal to noise ratio is high. It is all that is desired, and under normal >circumstances it would instantly convince any scientist. The data does not >convince "skeptics" because they refuse to look at it, and because they are >irrational. Most CF reactions generate a watt or two excess power, and some >generate 200 to 300 watts. [skipped] The issue isn't whether or not several watts of power have been detected. The issue is what produces that heat. >This discussion began with the assertion that CF electrochemists might be >making a mistake in performing nuclear measurements. That is true, but the >proof that CF is not chemical lies in calorimetry, which is not a nuclear >measurement at all. Electrochemists are as qualified as anyone to measure >heat. Knowledge of nuclear physics, techniques and tools (like neutron >measuring) have no bearing on this. > >The calorimetry proves that CF is not chemical, but of course it does not >prove CF *is nuclear*. Actually, the calorimetry shows more heat than can be explained by known chemistry. This isn't the same as proving the source of CF is not chemical. >That is proved by the tritium, helium and neutrons. >Tritium is easy to detect with confidence, even by an electrochemist. Helium >and neutrons require advanced techniques that an electrochemists might well >botch (just as a physicist might botch an electrochemical experiment). >Fortunately however, many of the best CF helium measurements have been made at >Rockwell International, by physicists. This is the best facility in the world >for helium, and these people are the best qualified. So there is no question >the helium is being measured correctly and it too must be real. The issue raised about helium measurements isn't that measurements aren't "real" . The issue is the source of the helium. It has been pointed out several times helium diffuses readily through a variety of materials and contamination is apparently much easier than many think. I do not claim to be an expert in the possibility of helium contamination. However, this issue has been repeatedly raised by knowledgeable people and I have yet to see an adequate answer. As far as tritium being easily detected, it depends on how you go about it. For example, if a mass spectrometer is used it is fairly easy to get tritium and helium confused. > > > "Uncertainty in the data and interpretation of the meaning of the data > are some of the biggest problems. > >There is no uncertainty it the data whatsoever. The interpretation is the >problem. If Rowe disagrees with this statement, he should point out exactly >where, why and how there is room for uncertainty in the results published by >McKubre, Kunimatsu, Arata, Miles, Pons and Fleischmann, Cravens, Oriani, or >the groups at Hitachi, Toshiba, Canon, Shell Oil or Amoco. "Skeptics" like >Rowe often assert that the data is uncertain, but they never actually give any >reason, so I do not think they have one in mind. The only specific details >that "skeptics" have ever raised have been with regard to Pons and >Fleischmann's static calorimetry, and the objections had raised had no >scientific merit. [skipped] By "uncertainty in the data" I meant the error bars in the data. No data from any real experiment is infinitely precise. All data has some uncertainty. It may well be the uncertainty is insignificant but it does exist nonetheless. One of the issues is a detailed error analysis has been lacking in many of the experiments. I don't doubt the data which shows heat production in amounts greater than can be easily explained using chemistry. That is what maintains my interest in CF. However, this data isn't sufficient to convince me that there is a fusion reaction taking place. > > "Finally, from your previous posts it is apparent you and I disagree as > to the meaning of the term "replicated experiment". As others have > stated, CF really hasn't accomplished much in the way of replicated > experiments." > >This is incorrect. We agree on these definitions. By any reasonable scientific >standard, Kunimatsu closely replicated McKubre. Taking into account the >controlling parameters, the 1989 excess heat seen by Miles, P&F, Harwell, MIT >and Cal Tech match closely. Matching heat output is not evidence of experimental replication. Also, heat is not the only signature of some of these experiments. A replicated experiment means one in which very similar apparatus is used and very similar results are obtained. Differences in results need to be associated unambiguously with experimental conditions or techniques. Experimental claims for CF seem to have only one thing in common, more heat than can be explained via known chemistry. In addition, there are claims of helium. tritium and neutron production in some experiments. Other experiments fail to detect either tritium, helium or neutrons. In addition, there are significant variations in electrode material and electrolyte. No, I don't see these experiments as replications of one another. -- "Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain" cudkeys: cuddy03 cudenbrowe cudfnBill cudlnRowe cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszL cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Martin Sevior / Re:Kasagi; D-beam into Ti Originally-From: msevior@axnd02.cern.ch (Martin Sevior) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re:Kasagi; D-beam into Ti Date: Mon, 4 Sep 1995 00:52:36 GMT Organization: CERN European Lab for Particle Physics >In article <1995Aug21.164345.2367@plasma.byu.edu>, jonesse@plasma.byu.edu says... >> >>2. I am intrigued (on the other hand) by a recent paper by J. Kasagi et al. >>of Tohoku University which shows results from a 150-keV deuteron beam >>impinging on titanium deuteride. >>J. Phys. Soc. Japan, 64 (1995) 777-783. >> >> Their work is clearly not "cold fusion," >>since the beam energy is 150-keV. But the results do seem to show anomalous >>production of protons of energies up to 17 MeV and alphas up to 6.5 MeV. >>If a few readers (please e-mail fax number) would be interested in reviewing >>the J. Phys. Soc. Japan paper, I will send copies by fax. I'd appreciate >>comments as it looks, well, anomalous yet rather convincing. The numbers of >>high-energy protons and alphas are 10^-6 of the number of p's from d-d-fusion, >>so this is not an "excess heat" or power producer. But there may be some >>interesting physics here, I think. > These results are easily explained with conventional Physics. What happens is that recoiling 3He nuclei from the reaction d + d=> 3He + p initiate the reaction: 3He + d => p + 4He. This second reaction releases 18 MeV and is the source of the high energy protons and Helium. The d + d => 3He + P reaction occurs with an energy release of about 4 MeV. The 3He comes off with 1 MeV and the proton with 3 MeV due to their different masses. The 3He travels about 1 micron in the deuterium loaded lattice. This means each 3He nucleus sees an effective deuterium target of around 5*10^18 deuterons per cm^2. The cross section for the reaction 3He + d => p + 4He is about 6 barns above the coulomb barrier, averaging over the energy loss of the 3He as it slows down, let's assume a cross section of 1 barn. Then the number of 3He + d => p + 4He reactions intiated by the recoiling 3He's is: 5*10^18 * 1*10^-24 = 5*10^-6. More than enough to explain the observed 10^-6 anomalus events. The tails of alpha's and protons that extend to 6 MeV and 19 MeV are pile-up events of protons from the primary dd reactions on top of these secondary reaction products. Nothing magic here, unlike the Patterson Cell. Martin Sevior cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenmsevior cudfnMartin cudlnSevior cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Bob Sullivan / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: bsulliva@sky.net (Bob Sullivan) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Mon, 04 Sep 95 13:52:35 GMT Organization: SkyNET Corporation In article <21cenlogic-0309952108250001@austin-2-8.i-link.net>, 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) wrote: >***{Bob, let me see if I can clear this up. Here is the gist of the >dialogue so far: > >-------------------------------------------------------- >(Beginning of Dialogue) > >Matt Austern said: >>>The vast majority of people who >>>run electrochemical cells see no excess heat at all; it's only a small >>>minority of people who do. > >Jed said: >>That's absurd. You just made that up out of the clear blue, didn't you? >>I can just imagine what it would be like going to ICCF5 according to your >>version of events. There would 200 people and 4 days of lectures, and >>every one of them would stand up in front of the crowd and say "We have been >>doing this for 6 years, but we have no results so far." > >You (Bob Sullivan) said: >>Doggoneit, Jed, which horse are you going to ride? You can't have it both >>ways. Sometimes, you say that most people can't reproduce the cf experiments >>because they don't have the special expertise that it requires. Now you want >>to argue that anybody and his dog can do it. Mebbe you ought to keep notes on >>the positions you have taken. > >Jed said: > >You statement is absurd. The scientists who attend cold fusion conferences > >are experts. Most of them are in their 60s, and they have done > >electrochemistry for 40 years. They have the special expertise required to > >replicate the work. At the conferences they spend days talking about the > >nitty gritty detail. That is what the conferences are for! > > > >Look here, think about a conference on brain surgery or medieval Japanese > >literature. Pretend that you have spent the last four days listening to > >lectures and looking a slides of the latest techniques in these fields. > >Okay, does that make you an expert, ready to walk into any operating room > >and take over? If the professor of ancient Japanese literature is out of > >town are you prepared to take over her class for the day? Are you some kind > >of 5 day wonder who can master a new language in a few days and read a few > >hundred books? I doubt it. By the same token, if you were to throw together > >an electrochemical experiment in CF, or in any other form of surface > >catalysis, you will make DOZENS of stupid mistakes. For that matter, if you > >tried to take care of 200 chickens for a monthy you would kill a lot of them, > >and if you tried to fix transmission in my car you would probably botch it. > >Most jobs require experience, practice and skill. Even jobs that most people > >think are easy. If you think that electrochemistry is easy, then you know > >nothing about it. Try spending a few hours at a CF conference and you will > >realize how little you know. > >You said: >> I know enough to realize that the argument you make above is in total >> contradiction to the argument you made in the message I was responding to. > >(End of Dialogue) >-------------------------------------------------------- > >Bob, the way it looks to me is that Jed thinks most of the CF research has >been conducted by experts--i.e., by people who really know what they are >doing. Thus he can deny Matt Austern's statement that most of those who do >this research don't get excess heat, and he can also deny your claim that, >by denying Austern's statement, he implies that expertise is not required >to do this research. No contradiction is required. > >To summarize: I believe Jed is saying that (a) the vastly disproportionate >majority of the results have been positive, because most of the work has >been done by experts who know their electrochemistry, and (b) when >negative results have been obtained, they have for the most part been >obtained by people who don't really have a good grasp of what they are >doing. (If you want a concrete example of the kind of murky thinking that >leads to false negatives, I would refer you to Steve Jones' post, which I >dissect in the thread entitled Re: Hello again / Solar stove.) --Mitchell >Jones}*** > >=========================================================== My point was that Jed has too many irons in the fire and he tends to repond with whatever happens to pop into his head at the time -- even if it contradicts what he said earlier. Jed could be much more effective if he would realize that not every assertion needs to be rebutted. cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenbsulliva cudfnBob cudlnSullivan cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Richard Blue / Re: 27,458 skeptics Originally-From: blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: 27,458 skeptics Date: Mon, 4 Sep 1995 15:10:22 GMT Organization: Sci.physics.fusion/Mail Gateway Jed, Surely you do not mean to say that the 27,458 skeptics have not published any papers to make the case against cold fusion. I have noted that your bibliography tends to be one-sided, but I always assumed that you knew there really is plenty of material out there that refutes the cold fusion argument. Dick Blue cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenblue cudfnRichard cudlnBlue cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszS cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / dwark@vax.oxfo / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: dwark@vax.oxford.ac.uk Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: 4 Sep 95 17:06:10 GMT Organization: Oxford University VAX 6620 In article <21cenlogic-0109951054220001@austin-1-5.i-link.net>, 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) writes: > In article <1995Aug31.110105@oxvaxd>, dwark@vax.oxford.ac.uk wrote: > [much snippery] >> >> I was waiting for someone else to point this out, but no one has, so I >> guess I will. Such devices are in fact quite common and are commercially >> available. They consist of a tube with an electrostatic accelerator and a >> target with deuterium or tritium. They are used to produce neutrons for well >> logging. They do not by any stretch of the imagination produce net energy >> gain, however. >> >> Dave Wark > > An intriguing post! Very puzzling. What, exactly, do you mean by "well > logging?" Surely such a device is not lowered into bore holes! My best > guess is that it is used in the examination of the core samples that are > brought up from oil and gas drilling, or, perhaps more likely, from test > boring in mineral deposits. A neutron beam, in such a situation, might > detect the presence of heavy metals such as gold, silver, lead, or > uranium. This is a pure guess, however. Am I in the ball park at all? > > --Mitchell Jones > Well, I am not a petroleum geologist, so I am not absolutely sure how these gadgets are used. They are, in fact, lowered into bore holes. The one I know about was about 8 cm. in diameter and ~3 meters long. It was built to be lowered into a hole drilled for oil exploration. It then produced hot neutrons by d+t fusion which were then used in some unknown way to analyze the surrounding rock (I thought by n,gamma; but somebody else thought it was by neutron backscattering). We were interested in these things solely as neutron sources, so I didn't get detailed info on how they were normally used by geologists. Dave Wark cudkeys: cuddy4 cudendwark cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / jedrothwell@de / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Mon, 4 Sep 95 12:44:38 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) writes: "The issue isn't whether or not several watts of power have been detected. The issue is what produces that heat." No, the issue is that the heat exceeds the limits of chemistry, and that power density and I/O ratio is very high in some cases. Whatever produces it must be an important scientific mystery, and a potentially vital technology. What matters is the fact that the heat exists, not what causes it. "The issue raised about helium measurements isn't that measurements aren't "real" . The issue is the source of the helium. It has been pointed out several times helium diffuses readily through a variety of materials and contamination is apparently much easier than many think. I do not claim to be an expert in the possibility of helium contamination. However, this issue has been repeatedly raised by knowledgeable people and I have yet to see an adequate answer." You have not yet seen an adequate answer because you refuse to read the literature. Miles, E-Quest and many others have addressed this issue. I know practically nothing about helium cantamination, but I have spoken to the world's leading experts on that subject at Rockwell and elsewhere, and I have read their reports. No skeptic has challenged these reports. No skeptic has shown an error in the methodology employed by Miles, Yamaguchi, or Stringham & George, even though the skeptics would dearly love to make these results go away. Therefore, I conclude the helium results are solid. "As far as tritium being easily detected, it depends on how you go about it. For example, if a mass spectrometer is used it is fairly easy to get tritium and helium confused." Tritium is usually detected by the radiation it produces, not by mass. Different methods have been used for this purpose: scintillation counts (which can measure the Beta energy spectrum), ionization chambers, and autoradiography (see Storms). Elaborate precautions have been taken by people like Will to make certain the radiation is not an artifact. Mass spectroscopy for tritium and its decay product helium-3 is also used. People do not "confuse" tritium and helium. With low resolution spectrometers, they would have difficulty detecting the difference, so they use high resolution instead. The atomic mass units are: 4He 4.00260, HT 5.02388, D2 4.02820. With high resolution quadropole mass spectroscopy these differences are easy to see. See Yamaguchi, ICCF3 Proc. p. 184 - 185. "One of the issues is a detailed error analysis has been lacking in many of the experiments." That is incorrect. Most of the experiments have better error analysis than run-of-the-mill experiments in other fields. The leading papers, from people like Will, McKubre, Miles and Pons and Fleischmann have far better error analysis than similar papers in other fields of science. Furthermore, when you do a serious analysis of CF and you find a paper that does discuss some aspect of the work in sufficient detail, you contact the researcher to ask for more information. Journals have limited space. "I don't doubt the data which shows heat production in amounts greater than can be easily explained using chemistry. That is what maintains my interest in CF. However, this data isn't sufficient to convince me that there is a fusion reaction taking place." It cannot convince anyone that a fusion reaction is taking place. That conclusion would be illogical and unscientific. Without commensurate nuclear ash, you cannot rule out exotic possibilities like ZPE or some source of energy unknown to science. The tritium, helium, neutrons and charged particles tell us that CF is at least partly nuclear. However this is a minor issue. Whether it is nuclear or nuclear plus something else does not matter. What matters is that present day science cannot explain it. What matters the most by far is that CF may save millions of lives and billions of dollars. Compared to the lives and money CF might save, and the pollution it might eliminate, physics are trivial. Consider the x-ray. The scientific aspects of that discovery were important to physicists, but for most of the human race, what matters about x-rays is that they save lives and reduce suffering in hospitals, and they let you keep your teeth your whole life. When CF lights your house, cooks your food, purifies your water, and powers your car, you will not give a damn whether it comes from fusion, ZPE, or some other source. "Matching heat output is not evidence of experimental replication." Of course it is!!! "Also, heat is not the only signature of some of these experiments. A replicated experiment means one in which very similar apparatus is used and very similar results are obtained." McKubre and Kunimatsu did not look for any other signature. Heat is the principal signature of the reaction, as Fleischmann says. It is the easiest signature to detect and the most decisive. "Differences in results need to be associated unambiguously with experimental conditions or techniques." Of course. That is the whole point of the experiments. "Experimental claims for CF seem to have only one thing in common, more heat than can be explained via known chemistry." That is incorrect. They have many other factors in common. People who say this know nothing about the literature. Rowe quotes Schiller: "Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain." Surely, a prime example of stupidity is a person who makes claim after claim about a scientific field without ever bothering to read the literature. Surely it is stupid to claim that tritium is detected by measuring mass, when a quick glance at the literature shows it is usually detected by looking for radiation, because that is much easier to do and it can be used to detect much lower levels of tritium with confidence. Anyone the least bit familiar with the CF literature would know that, and anyone who is not the least bit familiar with the literature should shut up and refrain from making comments about the field. The most brilliant and broadly educated scientist on earth will make stupid mistakes when he opens his yap and natters on about papers he has not read. The editors of Nature and Scientific American and the spokesmen at the APS have demonstrated that in spades. Their opinions about CF are not worth squat. Their statements about it are wildly in error. A well educated eighth-grade junior high school student who has read a few nonspecialist articles about CF written by people like Storms, Mallove and me can easily spot the mistakes made by Maddox et al. Perhaps I too contend in vain against stupidity when I try to persuade people like Rowe to read, learn, and think before he writes. - Jed cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenjedrothwell cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszL cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / jedrothwell@de / Re: 27,458 skeptics Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: 27,458 skeptics Date: Mon, 4 Sep 95 13:06:09 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) Richard A Blue writes: >Surely you do not mean to say that the 27,458 skeptics have not >published any papers to make the case against cold fusion. I >have noted that your bibliography tends to be one-sided, but I >always assumed that you knew there really is plenty of material >out there that refutes the cold fusion argument. The phrase "cold fusion argument" is meaningless. Which argument? CF is based upon experimental evidence, not argument or theory, unless you count elementary thermodynamics as theory. No sane scientist will argue that calorimetry does not work, or that the second law of thermodynamics is invalid. There is very little scientific material that refutes cold fusion experimental evidence. It is written by people like Huizenga, Taubes and Morrison, and it has no scientific merit. It is full of stupid mistakes and gross violations of elementary physics. It is scientific schlock. The contrast between this schlock and real science can be seen in debates between Morrison and Fleischmann, and Jones and Fleischmann. There is a large body of theoretical literature about hot fusion. Some experts say this conflicts with CF, while others say it does not. If it turns out this literature *does* conflict with CF, then CF will "refute" the literature. It cannot work the other way around, because theory can never overturn a widely replicated, high-sigma experimental result. - Jed cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenjedrothwell cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / MARSHALL DUDLEY / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: mdudley@brbbs.brbbs.com (MARSHALL DUDLEY) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 12:40 -0500 (EST) zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) writes: -> n + Li7 -> Li6 + n + n -> -> if there is a directional effect this could be utilized as a linear -> neutron amplifier. A two meter long rod that produces say 10^6 times the -> neutrons coming into it. Of course it does not have to be a rod, any old -> lump will do if it is not big enough to go boom. I guess you could call it a naser rod. :) One very important consideration is that if such a device were easily available, one might be able to put a number of them together and make a supercritical device. Needless to say, this would be undesirable. Interestingly, although this uses a very light isotope, it would not be a fusion device. It also would not be fission, as there are not two atoms generated upon disintegration. On the surface however, it appears that one could create a reactor with moderators and control rods just like a normal fission reactor. Interesting I have never seen anything on this prior to now. Marshall cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenmdudley cudfnMARSHALL cudlnDUDLEY cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / jedrothwell@de / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Mon, 4 Sep 95 13:20:55 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) Mitchell Jones <21cenlogic@i-link.net> writes: >Bob, the way it looks to me is that Jed thinks most of the CF research has >been conducted by experts--i.e., by people who really know what they are >doing. Thus he can deny Matt Austern's statement that most of those who do >this research don't get excess heat, and he can also deny your claim that, Strictly speaking, I meant that the majority of people who have performed experiments and published the results in the literature or in conferences have seen excess heat, tritium, neutrons, helium or some other evidence of CF. Whether they really know what they are doing or not is something that every person who reads the literature must judge for himself I suppose. People like Austern who have not read the literature cannot judge at all. There were many experiments peformed in 1989 in which people did not see any positive results, but they did not publish their work, so I do not count them. How can I? They are invisible. I have heard stories and rumors that "hundreds of people did CF experiments." I do not think this is true. Whenever I try to track these stories down, all of the "negative experiments" turn out to be the same three: Harwell, MIT, and Cal Tech. Since they were all positive, that reduces the grand total of negative 1989 experiments to zero. What happens is this: a fellow says, "oh yes, here at XYZ university, we tried CF. It did not work." I ask, who tried it, what did they do, where did they publish. The fellow says "I am not sure, it was over in the chemistry department. I heard someone ran it over there." Call the chemistry department and they say they heard it was over in the physics department. It turns out the physics people heard a rumor about an experiment over at another university, they did not actually try it. It turns out, in most cases, that this other university was Harwell, MIT or Cal Tech. There are few other documented cases of people who actually did rush to do a CF experiment, notably at Georgia Tech, but these experiments were slapped together, begun and finished in less time than it takes a real CF scientist to finish calibrating a calorimeter, so I do not think these "rush job replications" mean anything. Some of them were marred by gross errors like filth and dead insects in the electrolyte. - Jed cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenjedrothwell cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / ZoltanCCC / Re: 27,458 skeptics Originally-From: zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: 27,458 skeptics Date: 4 Sep 1995 13:26:16 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) If you guys are telling me that there are say 100 publications out there that describe various experiments in which the authors have positively identified cold fusion effects and you also say that there are 10,000 publications of failures then I think the 100 in this case outweigh the 10,000. I would be much more interested in reading about experiments wich were succesful than the failures. I do have some interest in failed experiments but only to a very limited extent. I developed a new product for my company, a force sensor. I started with a perfectly good concept and a significant amount of knowledge and it took me two years and over a hundred thousand dollars to build a real good one. I am sure in CF experiments there are factors that the experimenters are not aware of and so they tend to fail. The publications of failures probably do not even describe such details for example cathode preparation, surface conditions, outgassing. A success for example could be caused by the material the building's roof is made of (cosmic radiation particles may cause energetic muon emission showers (just a thought)). Zoltan Szakaly cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenzoltanccc cudlnZoltanCCC cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / ZoltanCCC / Re: Kasagi et al, D beam into Ti Originally-From: zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Kasagi et al, D beam into Ti Date: 4 Sep 1995 13:26:38 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In article , msevior@axnd02.cern.ch (Martin Sevior) writes: > >These results are easily explained with conventional Physics. What happens >is that recoiling 3He nuclei from the reaction d + d=> 3He + p >initiate the reaction: > >3He + d => p + 4He. This second reaction releases 18 MeV and is the source of >the high energy protons and Helium. > >The d + d => 3He + P reaction occurs with an energy release of about 4 MeV. > > There is no such reaction. The d + d -> He3 + n is what you might have in mind. The tail of the spectrum is not adequately explained because the pileups were excluded by the use of an aluminum foil barrier. (200um thick) Zoltan Szakaly cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenzoltanccc cudlnZoltanCCC cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / ZoltanCCC / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: 4 Sep 1995 15:11:48 -0400 Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) In the meantime I thought more about the neutron amplifier. It seems that the emitted neutrons go in all directions so the neutron amplifier would either not work, or it would annihilate itself. If we could keep the emitted neutrons directional we could really make such an amplifier and it could be the basis of a homemade nuclear reactor. Perhaps magnetic fields or some form of confinement could have the effect of keeping the neutron emissions directional. Of course neutrons are not charged so confining or directing them is tough. The only thing that comes to my mind is a cone shaped piece of LiD. The neutrons emitted within the cone angle would be amplified the rest would leave the cone. Neutrons emitted backwards would tend to fly out of the cone and not cause reactions. Once we have a neutron amplifier we can use a neutron source like the one described above to control the reaction rate. We would not have to worry about runaway reactions. Regharding the risk of somebody buying the LiD and building a nuclear bomb it is already possible and we can do nothing but pray. Anybody could go and buy Lithium as well deuterium, the Li does not even have to be enriched. The Lithium deuteride reactor would be a fusion-fission reactor because the bulk of the energy is produced by fusion, the neutron amplification is caused by fission. Based on this thread the reactions are: d + d -> He3 + n Partly from the initiator device Li7 + n -> Li6 + n + n Neutron amplification n + Li6 -> T + He4 T + d -> He4 + n d + Li6 -> He4 + He4 These are a beautiful bunch of reactions, it seems that the only problem is that they cannot be controlled by any other means than the conventional fission reactors if at all. We already have a bunch of different designs of fission reactors, many are superior to the ones in commercial use. These reactors take a while to go through the development - commercialization cycle I guess. So to summarize, I propose a cone shaped Lithium deuteride device that produces heat when exposed to neutrons from a gas discharge electric neutron source. I would like comments on this. Of course this would be a dirty fusion reactor, it would produce radioactivity, fast neutrons, alphas and so on. It would not be our ideal clean cold fusion reactor it would be a hot fusion reactor but at least it could be built in somebody's garage. Zoltan Szakaly cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenzoltanccc cudlnZoltanCCC cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / jedrothwell@de / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Mon, 4 Sep 95 16:05:41 -0500 Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice) bsulliva@sky.net (Bob Sullivan) writes: "My point was that Jed has too many irons in the fire and he tends to respond with whatever happens to pop into his head at the time -- even if it contradicts what he said earlier. Jed could be much more effective if he would realize that not every assertion needs to be rebutted." Wrong on all counts. I never respond with whatever happens to pop into my head. My arguments are carefully worked out, internally logical, and backed by careful reading of the literature. There is no contradiction between my statements that it takes an expert to replicate CF and the statement that most CF experiments work. It takes an expert to fly an airplane too, but most flights land safely because only experts fly airplanes. I could never, in a million years, rebut every "skeptical" assertion about CF. I ignore most of them. I do not attempt to rebut arguments about nuclear physics because most are over my head, especially discussions about theory and neutron detection. For all I know, the skeptical theorists are correct, and Schwinger and Hagelstein are wrong. I do not attempt to rebut crackpot skeptic theories, like Morrison's "cigarette lighter" or Dick Blue's magical stored heat. I may poke fun at them but I cannot rebut them in any scientific sense, because they have no scientific content. It would be like trying to rebut numerology. I see Dick has posted a new opus. Oops! He still has not learned the Second Law of thermodynamics, and he still has no notion of how a laboratory pump works. You cannot refute Dick Blue because he makes up new laws of physics as he goes along, and new confabulations about lab pumps that run at 10 ml/minute and cavitate. Or do they tap into crystal healing energy? The other day Dick Blue claimed you cannot detect heat beyond chemistry by by measuring body temperature and mass. He permanently rebutted himself. Anyone can see he is a flake. I chose to rebut Austern's claims because they mean something in the real world, unlike Dick Blue's illiterate gibberish. There is actual content here. I can cite matters of fact to prove Austern is wrong. His is a widespread mistake, and it is serious enough to warrant a response. I will not beat it to death. I know perfectly well that Austern himself will ignore me, and continue to go around repeating this false information. But I hope that some readers take the time to read the literature, where they will find he is wrong. - Jed cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenjedrothwell cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Horace Heffner / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: hheffner@matsu.ak.net (Horace Heffner) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 12:37:02 -0900 Organization: none In article , mdudley@brbbs.brbbs.com wrote: > zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) writes: > > -> n + Li7 -> Li6 + n + n > -> > -> if there is a directional effect this could be utilized as a linear > -> neutron amplifier. A two meter long rod that produces say 10^6 times the > -> neutrons coming into it. Of course it does not have to be a rod, any old > -> lump will do if it is not big enough to go boom. > > I guess you could call it a naser rod. :) One very important consideration is > that if such a device were easily available, one might be able to put a number > of them together and make a supercritical device. Needless to say, this would > be undesirable. > > Interestingly, although this uses a very light isotope, it would not be a > fusion device. It also would not be fission, as there are not two atoms > generated upon disintegration. On the surface however, it appears that one > could create a reactor with moderators and control rods just like a normal > fission reactor. Interesting I have never seen anything on this prior to now. > > > Marshall Looking superficially at this, we have atomic masses: Li6 = 6.015121 n = 1.008665 -------- + = 7.023786 Li7 = 7.016003 - = 0.007783 There is a net gain of mass from the reaction. This is a reaction that converts fast neutrons in to slow neutrons, and consumes vast amounts of energy in so doing. It doesn't seem useful for generating energy, but it sure would "hide" in the form of excess mass a lot of excess energy generated by other fast neutron producing reactions. Perhaps there is some similar mechanism where the signature radiation of cold fusion could also be hidden in mass. Regards, Horace -- Horace Heffner 907-746-0820 PO Box 325 Palmer, AK 99645 cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenhheffner cudfnHorace cudlnHeffner cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Bill Rowe / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 13:40:58 -0700 Organization: AltNet - $5/month uncensored news - http://www.alt.net In article , jedrothwell@delphi.com wrote: >browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) writes: > > "The issue isn't whether or not several watts of power have been > detected. The issue is what produces that heat." > >No, the issue is that the heat exceeds the limits of chemistry, and that power >density and I/O ratio is very high in some cases. Whatever produces it must be >an important scientific mystery, and a potentially vital technology. What >matters is the fact that the heat exists, not what causes it. From a business perspective, I agree that it might not matter where the heat comes from. However, from a scientific perspective the origin of the heat and mechanism is the issue. It would be utterly ridiculous for a scientist to ignore the origin of the heat an mechanism of its production. Also, I would point out we don't know how to explain the heat with chemistry. This isn't sufficient in of itself to rule out chemistry. Perhaps there are aspects of chemistry we don't yet understand. [ skipped ] > > > "Matching heat output is not evidence of experimental replication." > >Of course it is!!! Let me understand what you are saying. If two experiments match in heat output I can claim experimental replication. Suppose I remove the electrodes from the cell and replace them with an ordinary resistive heat element. Clearly, I can chose the resistive element to duplicate the heat signature. Equally obvious is this is not evidence of experimental replication. [skipped] > "Experimental claims for CF seem to have only one thing in common, more > heat than can be explained via known chemistry." > >That is incorrect. They have many other factors in common. People who say this >know nothing about the literature. > >Rowe quotes Schiller: "Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in >vain." Surely, a prime example of stupidity is a person who makes claim after >claim about a scientific field without ever bothering to read the literature. >Surely it is stupid to claim that tritium is detected by measuring mass, when >a quick glance at the literature shows it is usually detected by looking for >radiation, because that is much easier to do and it can be used to detect much >lower levels of tritium with confidence. A couple of comments. First, note the word "seems" in my comment as in appears. That doesn't rule out the possiblity of something else. I agree a more logical way to look for tritium is using its radioactivity rather than mass. My only point is if you don't use the right techinque it may not be so easy to detect tritium. Finally, I am glad you like the quote. I first saw it the novel "The Gods Themselves" written by Isaac Asimov. The preface to the novel explains the qoute much better than I ever could. -- "Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain" cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenbrowe cudfnBill cudlnRowe cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Bill Rowe / Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 13:56:10 -0700 Organization: AltNet - $5/month uncensored news - http://www.alt.net In article <21cenlogic-0309952104580001@austin-2-8.i-link.net>, 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) wrote: >In article , >matt@physics.berkeley.edu wrote: > >> If all of the "cold fusion" results are correct, then producing more >> electricity than you put in is impossible. > >***{Based on this statement, I would say you are the one who is assuming >something "pretty weird." If a steam turbine and generator setup having an >overall efficienty of .33 were driven by steam from a Griggs device, the >overall COP would be .33 x 1.6 = .528 *right now!* Granting, as you did, >that the present results are valid, this would mean we have a new energy >source, and thus it would be reasonable to expect further research to >yield improvements in the COP's of such devices, to 1.8, to 2.4, to 3.5, >etc. It is hard to say where this process would end, but it is *not* hard >to see that when the COP passes 3, the overall device--reactor, steam >turbine, and generator combined--goes over unity, and begins to produce >more output power than is input. Even assuming all of the data for the Griggs device represents a new source of energy resulting in a COP of 1.6, it is a major jump to believe this can be improved significantly. The only real evidence of the Griggs device having a COP greater than unity is the calorimetry. Certainly, the energy isn't created from nothing. Something must be acting as the fuel while something else acts to "burn" that fuel. How can anyone hope to scale the COP to say a factor of 3 when neither the fuel nor the mechanism for "burning" that fuel have been identified? Frankly, the lack of a credible hypothesis of where the energy comes from as well as experiments to test such a hypothesis is the single biggest reason for doubting the Griggs device will amount to anything significant. -- "Against stupidity, the Gods themselves contend in vain" cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenbrowe cudfnBill cudlnRowe cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Horace Heffner / Re: The Farce of Physics Originally-From: hheffner@matsu.ak.net (Horace Heffner) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: The Farce of Physics Date: Mon, 04 Sep 1995 15:27:02 -0900 Organization: none In article <42fj1k$gqc@newsbf02.news.aol.com>, zoltanccc@aol.com (ZoltanCCC) wrote: > In the meantime I thought more about the neutron amplifier. > > It seems that the emitted neutrons go in all directions so the neutron > amplifier would either not work, or it would annihilate itself. If we > could keep the emitted neutrons directional we could really make such an > amplifier and it could be the basis of a homemade nuclear reactor. Perhaps > magnetic fields or some form of confinement could have the effect of > keeping the neutron emissions directional. Of course neutrons are not > charged so confining or directing them is tough. The only thing that comes > to my mind is a cone shaped piece of LiD. The neutrons emitted within the > cone angle would be amplified the rest would leave the cone. Neutrons > emitted backwards would tend to fly out of the cone and not cause > reactions. Once we have a neutron amplifier we can use a neutron source > like the one described above to control the reaction rate. We would not > have to worry about runaway reactions. > > Regharding the risk of somebody buying the LiD and building a nuclear bomb > it is already possible and we can do nothing but pray. Anybody could go > and buy Lithium as well deuterium, the Li does not even have to be > enriched. > > The Lithium deuteride reactor would be a fusion-fission reactor because > the bulk of the energy is produced by fusion, the neutron amplification is > caused by fission. Based on this thread the reactions are: > > d + d -> He3 + n Partly from the initiator device > > Li7 + n -> Li6 + n + n Neutron amplification There is a significant energy loss here. From a previous post, we have atomic masses: Li6 = 6.015121 n = 1.008665 -------- + = 7.023786 Li7 = 7.016003 - = 0.007783 There is a net gain of mass from the reaction. This is a reaction that consumes large amounts of energy. There can be no "chain". You might be able to soup things up by adding layers of, or creating mixtures with, materials fissionable with slow neutrons, like U235, U233 or Pu239. This would give the advantage of a non-critical mass reactor directly throttleable with the current input. But that would make things really dirty! Regards, Horace > > n + Li6 -> T + He4 > > T + d -> He4 + n > > d + Li6 -> He4 + He4 > > > These are a beautiful bunch of reactions, it seems that the only problem > is that they cannot be controlled by any other means than the conventional > fission reactors if at all. We already have a bunch of different designs > of fission reactors, many are superior to the ones in commercial use. > These reactors take a while to go through the development - > commercialization cycle I guess. > > So to summarize, I propose a cone shaped Lithium deuteride device that > produces heat when exposed to neutrons from a gas discharge electric > neutron source. I would like comments on this. Of course this would be a > dirty fusion reactor, it would produce radioactivity, fast neutrons, > alphas and so on. It would not be our ideal clean cold fusion reactor it > would be a hot fusion reactor but at least it could be built in somebody's > garage. > > > Zoltan Szakaly -- Horace Heffner 907-746-0820 PO Box 325 Palmer, AK 99645 cudkeys: cuddy04 cudenhheffner cudfnHorace cudlnHeffner cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.01 / Martin Sevior / Re: Kasagi; D-beam into Ti Originally-From: Martin Sevior Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Kasagi; D-beam into Ti Date: 1 Sep 1995 02:03:47 GMT Organization: School of Physics, University of Melbourne. >In article <1995Aug21.164345.2367@plasma.byu.edu>, jonesse@plasma.byu.edu says... >> >>2. I am intrigued (on the other hand) by a recent paper by J. Kasagi et al. >>of Tohoku University which shows results from a 150-keV deuteron beam >>impinging on titanium deuteride. >>J. Phys. Soc. Japan, 64 (1995) 777-783. >> >> Their work is clearly not "cold fusion," >>since the beam energy is 150-keV. But the results do seem to show anomalous >>production of protons of energies up to 17 MeV and alphas up to 6.5 MeV. >>If a few readers (please e-mail fax number) would be interested in reviewing >>the J. Phys. Soc. Japan paper, I will send copies by fax. I'd appreciate >>comments as it looks, well, anomalous yet rather convincing. The numbers of >>high-energy protons and alphas are 10^-6 of the number of p's from d-d-fusion, >>so this is not an "excess heat" or power producer. But there may be some >>interesting physics here, I think. > These results are easily explained with conventional Physics. What happens is that recoiling 3He nuclei from the reaction d + d=> 3He + p initiate the reaction: 3He + d => p + 4He. This second reaction releases 18 MeV and is the source of the high energy protons and Helium. The d + d => 3He + P reaction occurs with an energy release of about 4 MeV. The 3He comes off with 1 MeV and the proton with 3 MeV due to their different masses. The 3He travels about 1 micron in the deuterium loaded lattice. This means each 3He nucleus sees an effective deuterium target of around 5*10^18 deuterons per cm^2. The cross section for the reaction 3He + d => p + 4He is about 6 barns above the coulomb barrier, averaging over the energy loss of the 3He as it slows down, let's assume a cross section of 1 barn. Then the number of 3He + d => p + 4He reactions intiated by the recoiling 3He's is: 5*10^18 * 1*10^-24 = 5*10^-6. More than enough to explain the observed 10^-6 anomalus events. The tails of alpha's and protons that extend to 6 MeV and 19 MeV are pile-up events of protons from the primary dd reactions on top of these secondary reaction products. Nothing magic here, unlike the Patterson Cell. Martin Sevior cudkeys: cuddy1 cudenmsevior cudfnMartin cudlnSevior cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / David Naugler / Re: Marshall Dudley Hypothesis revisited Originally-From: David Naugler Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Marshall Dudley Hypothesis revisited Date: 4 Sep 1995 01:19:33 GMT Organization: Simon Fraser University 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) wrote: > >***{Your description does not seem to apply to an electrolysis >experiment--not while the current is turned on, at any rate. In >electrolysis experiments, hydrogen ions are attracted to the negative >terminal (the cathode), which implies that their charge is positive. (If >they were negatively charged, they would move in the opposite direction.) >Moreover, in the Pons-Fleischmann setup (which is being discussed here), >the cathode is made of palladium, which would make the palladium negative >by definition. Further, I can't see how your description would apply to a >loaded palladium cathode even after the current was turned off. I would >expect that the H ions within the lattice (i.e., the protons and >deuterons), due to their positive charges, would slowly migrate to the >surface of the metal, pick up stray electrons, form H2 molecules, and >bleed off into the atmosphere. A loaded palladium cathode, when the >current was turned off, would thus retain a sizable positive charge for >some time, due very explicitly to the presence of the protons and >deuterons. Does anyone know if this description fits the facts? --Mitchell >Jones}*** > This is an electrolysis, in which deuterium gas, D2 is evolved at the negative cathode and O2 is evolved at the anode. At the cathode the only species which can undergo reduction in oxidation state are the deuterons (cations) which are initially attracted to the cathode by the electrosta ics described above. One mechanism by which reduction of deuterons at the conductive palladium surface can be achieved is by one electron transfer to produce reactive neutral deuterium atoms. These may reactive together to release D2 to the atmosphere, or they may react with the metal surface to produce known compounds of palladium. The known deuterides of palladium are as I have described them before. Palladium in turn has a high potential for the adsorption of molecular hydrogen or deuterium gas. The net effect of electolytic loading will be to prepare the metal surface so that there exists a concentration of deuterium and palladium deuterides within a reactive layer a couple of hundred Angstroms thick. It is interesting to note that deuterides of metals even up to uranium have been prepared. In any metal deuteride, whether lithium deuteride or uranium deuteride, deuterium exists "formally" in the -1 oxidation state while the metal exists in a positive oxidation state. Compounds which form covalent bonds with hydrogen/deuterium are not called metals, they are called nonmetals. These are some of the defining characteristics of the period table of elements. This is the language of chemistry. In the original Pons-Fleischmann setup lithium hydroxide was used as the supporting electrolyte. However, their choice of electrolyte was, I think, based on guesswork. In the recent MIT CF patent a more conventional K2CO3 is used. The implication of this is that the supporting electrolyte plays no role in the 'cold fusion' phenomenon. David Naugler Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy Laboratory Institute of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry Simon Fraser University cudkeys: cuddy4 cudendnaugler cudfnDavid cudlnNaugler cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.04 / Martin Sevior / Re: Dick Blue's theory (was Re: Off the deep end) Originally-From: msevior@axnd02.cern.ch (Martin Sevior) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Dick Blue's theory (was Re: Off the deep end) Date: Mon, 4 Sep 1995 01:24:11 GMT Organization: CERN European Lab for Particle Physics >With such an electrolyte there are ways that the atoms can be rearranged >to store far more than 4 calories per gram. >There may be cavitation in the pump, which could cause the chemical change, >storing energy. The large catalytic surface area of the packed bed cathode >could then catalyze the release of the stored energy. This is a plausible >theory, and it would explain the experimental results without new physics. The real problem with Dick's theory is it's failure to observe the second law of thermodynamics. To get a temperature increase in the cell, some point along the electrolyte circuit must be at a temperature above that of the Cell. Given that the the electrolyte circulate at only 10 ml/min (less than 1 drop per second!) neither the mechanical energy of the pump nor the effect of friction in the filter is sufficient to achieve this temperature rise. Cavitation seems very unlikely. Martin Sevior cudkeys: cuddy4 cudenmsevior cudfnMartin cudlnSevior cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszS cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Mitchell Jones / Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Originally-From: 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 21:01:49 -0500 Organization: 21st Century Logic In article <1995Aug31.144051.9451@ttinews.tti.com>, jackson@soldev.tti.com (Dick Jackson) wrote: > Mitchell Jones writes: > > > >Many large corporations--e.g., the electrical utilities--have a capital > >investment which CF would put in jeopardy, were it to come online > >quickly--especially if small home power generation units were mass > >marketed. In that case, millions of homes would disconnect from the power > >grids, and the capital base of the utilities, including even the nuclear > >power plants, would eventually be sold for scrap prices at bankruptcy > >auctions. The affected companies, clearly, would struggle with every means > > Could you please summarise your line of thought which takes even the best > "cold fusion" results publised to date to the production of several > kilowatts of electricity. What are you assuming? > > Dick Jackson Dick, I am assuming simply that the "cold fusion" results indicate the presence of a new concentrated power source comparable to nuclear power, but devoid of radiation risks and pollution. With no requirement for bulky shielding and containment structures, smokestacks, "scrubbers" to remove pollutants, etc., the continued improvement of the existing devices and techniques can be expected to yield devices similar in size to the existing experimental models, but with much larger ratios of output to input power. Result: a revolutionary transformation of the existing system for the production and distribution of energy, as I described in the post to which you responded. --Mitchell Jones =========================================================== cudkeys: cuddy03 cuden21cenlogic cudfnMitchell cudlnJones cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Mitchell Jones / Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Originally-From: 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: Is Griggs Experiment Hot Water Simplicity Incarnate? Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 21:04:58 -0500 Organization: 21st Century Logic In article , matt@physics.berkeley.edu wrote: > In article <1995Aug31.144051.9451@ttinews.tti.com> jackson@soldev.tti.com (Dick Jackson) writes: > > > Could you please summarise your line of thought which takes even the best > > "cold fusion" results publised to date to the production of several > > kilowatts of electricity. What are you assuming? > > He must be assuming something pretty weird. Even if you assume that > all of the "cold fusion" results are correct, nobody has ever claimed > that "cold fusion" can produce electricity---just heat. (And no, > producing heat isn't a sufficient condition for producing > electricity.) ***{Actually, it is, based on the assumed validity of presently known "cold fusion" results. Consider the Griggs device, for example. In the steam runs, the measured COP was about 1.6. The steam output from the device could, right now, be used to drive a steam turbine, which would turn a generator, producing electricity. --Mitchell Jones}*** > > If all of the "cold fusion" results are correct, then producing more > electricity than you put in is impossible. ***{Based on this statement, I would say you are the one who is assuming something "pretty weird." If a steam turbine and generator setup having an overall efficienty of .33 were driven by steam from a Griggs device, the overall COP would be .33 x 1.6 = .528 *right now!* Granting, as you did, that the present results are valid, this would mean we have a new energy source, and thus it would be reasonable to expect further research to yield improvements in the COP's of such devices, to 1.8, to 2.4, to 3.5, etc. It is hard to say where this process would end, but it is *not* hard to see that when the COP passes 3, the overall device--reactor, steam turbine, and generator combined--goes over unity, and begins to produce more output power than is input. Of course, such a setup would never *truly* be over unity, because the over unity result would disappear as soon as the new fuel was understood well enough to be figured into the energy balance. However, that would not alter the fundamental fact that the new fuel would be *water,* and water is cheaper than dirt: it covers most of the Earth's surface. Bottom line: if we assume the validity of the Griggs result and make the reasonable projection that the COP's of such devices will improve in the future, a massive threat to the capital investment of the electric utilities, to their suppliers, to OPEC, and to the oil, gas, and coal industries becomes immediately apparent. --Mitchell Jones}*** I'd say the electric > utilities have nothing to worry about. But then, there's no evidence > that they actually are worrying. They aren't trying to suppress > "cold fusion": it's simply beneath their threshold of attention. ***{How true. Like CEO's in the buggy and typewriter industries, most of these guys will wake up just in time to go out of business! As always, the profits will go to those who can tell the difference between visionaries and crackpots, and the losses will go to those who cannot! --Mitchell Jones}*** > -- > Matt Austern He showed his lower teeth. "We > matt@physics.berkeley.edu all have flaws," he said, "and > http://dogbert.lbl.gov/~matt mine is being wicked." =========================================================== cudkeys: cuddy03 cuden21cenlogic cudfnMitchell cudlnJones cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ 1995.09.03 / Mitchell Jones / Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Originally-From: 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion Subject: Re: CF is reproducible but not very predictable Date: Sun, 03 Sep 1995 21:08:25 -0500 Organization: 21st Century Logic ***{Bob, let me see if I can clear this up. Here is the gist of the dialogue so far: ------------------------------------------------------- (Beginning of Dialogue) Matt Austern said: >>The vast majority of people who >>run electrochemical cells see no excess heat at all; it's only a small >>minority of people who do. Jed said: >That's absurd. You just made that up out of the clear blue, didn't you? >I can just imagine what it would be like going to ICCF5 according to your >version of events. There would 200 people and 4 days of lectures, and >every one of them would stand up in front of the crowd and say "We have been >doing this for 6 years, but we have no results so far." You (Bob Sullivan) said: >Doggoneit, Jed, which horse are you going to ride? You can't have it both >ways. Sometimes, you say that most people can't reproduce the cf experiments >because they don't have the special expertise that it requires. Now you want >to argue that anybody and his dog can do it. Mebbe you ought to keep notes on >the positions you have taken. Jed said: >You statement is absurd. The scientists who attend cold fusion conferences >are experts. Most of them are in their 60s, and they have done >electrochemistry for 40 years. They have the special expertise required to >replicate the work. At the conferences they spend days talking about the >nitty gritty detail. That is what the conferences are for! > >Look here, think about a conference on brain surgery or medieval Japanese >literature. Pretend that you have spent the last four days listening to >lectures and looking a slides of the latest techniques in these fields. >Okay, does that make you an expert, ready to walk into any operating room >and take over? If the professor of ancient Japanese literature is out of >town are you prepared to take over her class for the day? Are you some kind >of 5 day wonder who can master a new language in a few days and read a few >hundred books? I doubt it. By the same token, if you were to throw together >an electrochemical experiment in CF, or in any other form of surface >catalysis, you will make DOZENS of stupid mistakes. For that matter, if you >tried to take care of 200 chickens for a monthy you would kill a lot of them, >and if you tried to fix transmission in my car you would probably botch it. >Most jobs require experience, practice and skill. Even jobs that most people >think are easy. If you think that electrochemistry is easy, then you know >nothing about it. Try spending a few hours at a CF conference and you will >realize how little you know. You said: > I know enough to realize that the argument you make above is in total > contradiction to the argument you made in the message I was responding to. (End of Dialogue) ------------------------------------------------------- Bob, the way it looks to me is that Jed thinks most of the CF research has been conducted by experts--i.e., by people who really know what they are doing. Thus he can deny Matt Austern's statement that most of those who do this research don't get excess heat, and he can also deny your claim that, by denying Austern's statement, he implies that expertise is not required to do this research. No contradiction is required. To summarize: I believe Jed is saying that (a) the vastly disproportionate majority of the results have been positive, because most of the work has been done by experts who know their electrochemistry, and (b) when negative results have been obtained, they have for the most part been obtained by people who don't really have a good grasp of what they are doing. (If you want a concrete example of the kind of murky thinking that leads to false negatives, I would refer you to Steve Jones' post, which I dissect in the thread entitled Re: Hello again / Solar stove.) --Mitchell Jones}*** =========================================================== cudkeys: cuddy03 cuden21cenlogic cudfnMitchell cudlnJones cudmo9 cudqt3 cudszM cudyr1995 ------------------------------ processed by cud.pl ver. 0.5 Tue Sep 5 04:37:13 EDT 1995 ------------------------------