Wednesday, October 22, 2014

PREPARING FOR A DIALOGUE WITH THE AUTHORS OF THE ROSSI REPORT.



INTRODUCTION

Dear Readers,

The publication of the new Rossi report is an important event for our scientific-technical field. My expectations from this research project were:
 a) the proof of massive excess heat and
b) scientific data usable for the building of the new paradigm of LENR (or what it actually is) – implicitly for the necessary replacement of the old paradigm that does not work neither toward understanding, nor toward a new source of energy.

The Report supports both expectations however not completely. The reason is that I am not a know-it-all; I do not understand some principles, subtleties and details of the Report. This is a problem and problems must be solved. The most straightforward solution is to initiate a productive high quality dialogue with the Authors. Clearly this has to be a multi-staged dialogue going from the essentials to the details, however not by-passing the critical issues, if any.
I make an appeal to the empathy of the Authors: remember that “It is the question that illuminates, not the answer” (Eugene Ionesco) Their task is easier, they know the answers while we have to create quality questions able to pass all the natural barriers and to stimulate the positive attitude of those who have made this great work.

EMPATHY FOR THE AUTHORS.

On our turn, we have to feel sincere empathy for all the Authors who took great risks by supporting an idea that is oppressed and an individual who is demonized by merci- and shame-less critics and bravos who all have made a passion and credo for attacking everything connected to Rossi. The authors have received tons of insults, offenses, are ridiculed both by dogmatic professionals and sadistic amateurs. It is no exaggeration in this, I have read all those personal attacks; they are personal because almost all the trolls have high degrees of technical and scientific illiteracy and have not written a single research report in their lives. The Authors are right to avoid any contact with ill-willed ignorance, dominant arrogance, incurable prejudices and loquacious incompetence. Lack of respect for the work and the authors are not excusable.
We have to demonstrate them that we are different, we sincerely and professionally motivated want to understand how the process works, how this experiment was organized – and what open problems- if any- are left. We are in the same boat as they.

THE AIM IS: ASKING ANSWERABLE QUESTIONS

I have watched the Internet for long years and I have to say that very rarely I have seen a dialogue that wasn’t actually a set of parallel monologs- we have to try very hard now. We have to practice the high art of asking answerable questions in the most consistent logically way. Obviously this will be a multi-stage – process- and within the stages – going step by step.
It will help, I hope, the authors to write the promised updates to the Report here: http://www.elforsk.se/LENR-matrapport-publicerad/

If we want a bad example, how to NOT ask here is a horrible one, venomous:

Which kind of questions to NOT ask:
1-     idiotic inquisitorial question as in the document above;
2-     “I know you don’t know” arrogant questions
3-     curious kibitz questions style “I am just asking”
4-     obviously ill-willed, you will fall in my trap questions
5-     unprofessional, badly formulated unclear questions
6-     mixed questions- combining more incompatible ideas
7-     more questions jumping from on idea to other
8-     any questions linked to Rossi +IH’s industrial secrets, however we have to let the authors to decide which ones belong to this category.  

 Which kind of questions to be asked:
1-     short, condensed, clearly formulated, generative questions
2-     "first-things- first questions
3-     MAXIMUM 10-12 essential questions in the first stage

Sources for questions- are many: forums as Vortex- a lot of threads, some abandoned, some still open, E-Cat World – for good questions.
There are some 50 unanswered questions at the LENR Forum, unfortunately this did not worked- no wonder it is an olla podrida of very different questions- no taxonomy there.
But we have to use the most natural one.
When I have had the task to analyze hundreds of patents for the technologies of OLTCHIM, the natural order was: chronologically (in time), logically (type of technical solution) and technologically (according to the owner company, grouped as solutions) – so it was possible to use the patents to get the visions of technologies (obviously in combination with book, papers, grey literature and many other sources)
For the Report- the basis is chronological: before, during and after the Test, design, execution, interpretation.

In this case we have an excellent model-in-principle for questions (implicit ones) - the prompt analysis of Mike McKubre:

I am asking for your help – for the best choice and presentation
of the (say) First Dozen of questions. See, but take only as preliminary- my choices- what I consider as prioritary.

THE TAXONOMY OF THE QUESTIONS

Research strategy, working hypothesis in the Test
- how have you contributed to the design of the cell?

The structure and functionality of the E-cat
- thermal, optical properties of alumina vessel?
- internal structure and materials dynamics in the cell?
- have you used EM or other form of stimulation?
- in which extent the cell tolerates presence of air and water?

Heat measurement balance details problems
- remove please any doubts re 1400 C!?
- how do you explain Ni nanostructures survival at 1400C?
- is the device calorimetrable- effect of cooling?

Analytical problems
- progress in understanding reactions in Hot Cat?
- is there a complete set of analyses for foundation of Theory?

Conclusions for present and future
- with whom from you can we discuss New Paradigm (theory)?
- your attitude toward replication of the test, new test?

Each question can be explained and its motivation will be presented.

Peter


23 comments:

  1. Peter, Thankyou for your notably mature and reasoned approach to dealing with matters that are, and should be, of global importance. You remind us how rabidly immature some among us can behave when we don't master our ego. McKubre also shines as a pillar of careful encouragement in contrast to some of the blatantly unhelpful challenges often dumpted on the testers who deserve to be treated as the sincere and highly experenced professionals they are. The often repeated tactic of shooting the messenger, is the worst kind of input. Those doing it must know this too!.

    Thanks DSM.

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  2. Hi Peter.

    I wish someone would ask the experimenters for their heat transfer calculations. If the source of heat within the hot cat is three times as energetic as the heater, what does the temperature of that source have to be to yield the heat flux the experimenters reported? (Hint: it has to be way above the melting point of nickel or any known nickel alloy). How does that work?

    How is it that a reactor which makes three times the power of the heater still needs the heater to be active in order to run?

    Why, after being shown how the input power could be wrong because of the clamp on ammeters did you still use those ammeters? Why not simply use your own power supply to limit the power available to the hot cat?

    Those are the simple questions I would ask.

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    1. do you know subcritical fission reactor ?

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    2. No. I've never had the pleasure of meeting one.

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  3. Hi DSM. How's Defkalion doing these days? Any idea?

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    1. 30 years back known as GuruOctober 22, 2014 at 12:02 PM

      It is public secret: DGT is secretly working on secret project for secret authority (Pentagram). They signed for grant from them. So next few years no public info will allowed.

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  4. My question would be how did the testers agree to or plan to measure all the electrical energy both DC and AC that entered the wires connected to the device. Were they totally satisfied with the way the energy in was measured ?. Do any of them have concerns about 'secret' energy being fed to the device in ways they were not able to measure.

    Thanks. DSM

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  5. The question was asked, "How is it that a reactor which makes three times the power of the heater still needs the heater to be active in order to run?"

    I am not supporting the findings of the test, there are, so far, too many unresolved questions and problems, but I can answer this question, assuming that this device and prior ones actually worked.

    For whatever reason, Rossi relies upon the temperature response of the reaction to control the level of heat. If the device is allowed to go into self-powered mode, it can be predicted that it will run away unless there is an independent method of controlling reaction rate.

    The operating assumption and apparent finding is that the reaction rate increases with temperature (this is generally true for LENR). Below a critical temperature, if heating is removed, the system will cool down. Above that temperature, thermal runaway will continue to increase the temperature with no input power. Control has been lost.

    In an early test, it was reported, the reaction started to fun away and to prevent this, the device was flooded with nitrogen. To avoid this problem, a different method of controlling reaction rate would be needed, such as controlling the fuel supply. In the simple device tested, the only control is heat, apparently. Contrary to some conclusions or statements in the report, though, the reactor was operating close to maximum power, because any higher temperature would have melted critical components of the reactor and especially nickel material.

    In this case, rather obviously, the critical temperature is far higher than what Rossi has used before with the regular E-cats. So, by design, this Hot Cat could not run away. It probably did not contain enough fuel for that. The fuel mixture, I'd expect, was controlled to produce the outcome observed.

    This is quite inefficient, greatly limiting COP and preventing self-power.

    My comments on how this control would work assume that the effect is real. I do not know that.

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    1. The correct answer is that you can not prevent thermal runaway with a small heater. If, for example, the reactor runs away while making 4 kW, removing a 1kW heater source will not prevent it. The proper way to control an exothermic reaction is with controlled, forced cooling. Rossi hot cat eschews that in favor of completely uncontrolled passive radiant and convective cooling.

      Nor can a heater be necessary to run. If the reaction can be started by a 1kW heater and then makes 3kW in exactly the same spot, stopping the heater makes no difference.

      Finally, Rossi's original ecat had the largest heater warming the cooling water! How does that work exactly?

      The best conclusion is that Rossi is lying and that the heater is what provides all the apparent thermal output. That has been true since the beginning and Rossi has used differing tricks from one experiment to another to hide it from the scientists. It didn't work on SC Technical Research Institute of Sweden. They detected his measuring error and called him on it. This cost Hydrofusion a 10 million $ contract.

      http://www.nyteknik.se/nyheter/energi_miljo/energi/article3535258.ece

      That's in Swedish but there is an English version somewhere or use Google translate.

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    2. Suppose that the reaction is "calmed" by the rotating 3-phase EM field such that the heaters are as much a field generating device as they are heat producing elements.

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    3. Sure you can control the reaction with a small heater. Not difficult at all. This is because the output is "energy from E-Cat reaction" +
      "energy from small heater", which is precisely balanced by the COOLING of the reactor by air flow, water flow, radiation and any others. If the temperature begins to increase and the supply of heat from the small heater is removed, and the cooling remains the same, the reaction WILL COOL.

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    4. There is no air or water flow in the present reactor. That alone makes it absurd. It's cooled only by passive radiation and convection-- no forced cooling at all. Forced cooling is the way to control temperature and prevent runaway.

      Your suggestion of allowing the reactor to cool by decreasing the power to the heater will not prevent runaway. Thermal runaway (for example look up the time temperature curves for lithium batteries) is virtually instantaneous. NOBODY controls a highly energetic exothermic reaction with a heater.

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    5. a strongly negative temperature coefficient resistance may do that ... and guess what, it seems to be the case.

      note also that you don't know the behavior of the reaction.

      you can follow the model of Edmund storms which explain that LENR camr from few factors.

      one is bringing the fuel... it may be influenced by temperature, or by pumping via temperature change or gradient.
      one is creating the NAE, which may depend on a precise temperature, or be created by temporal change...
      one is exciting the NAE, which typically is done by temperature, (in Rossi's design)...

      so simply, giving conclusion while you don't know what happen is more than hubris.

      what I know is that there is much more chance than a nuclear physicist be wrong in theory inside condensed matter, than you can fool two PCE830 helped by DC voltmeter and oscilloscope...

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  6. A general comment. There has been conclusive, direct, reproducible and confirmed evidence of LENR in existence for over 20 years. There is a peer-reviewed review of the field [Storms, Status of cold fusion (2010)], published in a major multidisciplinary journal of high reputation, uncontroverted, one of about 16 reviews published in mainstream journals since about 2005. Yet this has not penetrated the fog.

    Obviously, a commercial device would do so. But Rossi has not produced a commercial device. The "independent report" is only a single anecdote, unconfirmed, and not repeatable. It was not produced by experts familiar with LENR. The authors were amazed by the routine for LENR (no radiation or radioactive products) and naive about the specifics, and especially about the very high standards to which any such report will be subject. Crucial details, reported as fact by the researchers, were under Rossi's control and not actually confirmed. (Such as the amount of fuel. At least one author saw Rossi insert about 1 gram of "fuel." Because the device was not operated without the fuel, except below 500 C, there is no independent evidence at all that there was no other fuel. As a result of this and many other aspects of the report, the impression created is one of gullibility, of the "independent professors" being dupes. That Rossi took the "ash" sample is utterly amazing to anyone hoping for independent confirmation. There is no evidence that the ash and fuel were the same material, nor that any of it was actually fuel. If there is, it's completely missing from the report.)

    The latest issue I've seen raised is that if 1 gram of fuel was producing the reported power, it would be far hotter than the reported temperature of the alumina cylinder and would surely melt, destroying the nanostructures considered necessary for the reaction. If molten fuel can produce power, then a controllable device would be relatively simple. Nobody expects that.

    There is a way around this, though. Perhaps the "fuel" only generates hydrogen gas, the actual reaction may be taking place in far larger nickel structures incorporated into the device in that mysterious, proprietary, secret interior. If so, then, the fuel analysis and "ash" sampling was a complete red herring. Which the authors fell for.

    Regardless, the authors are certainly not LENR "experts." There are people with years of experience with LENR calorimetry. Their offers of assistance have been rejected. I consider this very clear: Rossi does not want a true independent test of his devices. All of which does not mean that he's a fraud, he's an entrepreneur, not a scientist, and such are allowed even to lie. It is meaningless, unless an actual investor is intentionally misled.

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    1. Very well stated. Esp the recognition that Rossi is an entrepreneur and not a research scientist seeking eternal human glory (IMHO he probably hopes to achieve such but well packed in a house of gold).

      Rossi is and has been filing papers and documents every few months, to the EPO after he filed a request that they overturn the patent granted to Piantelli for a LENR device. That grant to Piantelli was end of 2012. One can do an educated guess that thus recent report will be sent to the EPO even though the hot cat does not resemble the patent Rossi had filed with the EPO for the 1st ecat. Rossi has a pending rejection outstanding in the 1st eCat.

      There are certainly activities that could explain some behavior ( by Rossi) that are ongoing out of our sight.

      Cheers DSM

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    2. There is no way around it at all. If the small fuel volume generates several kilowatts, it must be far hotter than the surface of the reactor vessel in order for the sizable heat transfer the scientists recorded to take place. That would melt any form of nickel easily. So Rossi, again, is lying. The heater is the only source of thermal energy in any ecat. It's all fake. Simple heat transfer physics guarantees it.

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    3. 30 years back known as GuruOctober 23, 2014 at 3:08 AM

      There is way: A plasma layer or layer around body of wires or fuel of whole body. Something like corona around Sun.

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    4. 30 years back known as GuruOctober 23, 2014 at 3:09 AM

      layer or layers

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  7. Will the raw data collected be released? If yes, when, if not, why not?
    Do you think the ash sample could have been tampered with by Rossi?
    Do you have more details about the ash? Pictures of the removal?
    Is it too late to address the issue of the lack of dummy run to 1400C?
    For instance, can you run ~900 watts into a similar conduction and/or resistive heaters heating a similar tube?
    Were more pictures taken, and if so, will they be released?
    Given the enormity of the " world energy problem" would you be willing to work with any open source replication efforts, such as the MFMP?
    What are your plans for the future?

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  8. The actual test has two very distinct aspects to it that in some respects stand alone.

    Aspectc1 is accurate measurement of energy in vs energy out. This is the most critical aspect as without it nothing else really maters. Also, once this ratio is over unity it becomes a very interesting phenomenon.

    Aspect 2 is the fuel and ash. It is illogical to ignore aspect one or trash aspect 1's success, over arguments about lack of clarity or questionable handling of aspect two. It is painfully obvious that all if us want to know what the actual fuel is and the effects found in the ash if aspect 1 was over unity. Flowing from aspect 2 comes the information that mightcenable scientists to reverse engineer a theory as well as a replication. It is not at all impossible to believe Rossi will obfuscate as much as he can this aspect 2 data whilst he has no patent protection. It is a reality that Rossi has *no* plans to give away a successful formula. N-o-n-e, but many among us believe he should - why ? - because that information us what *we* want and some among us consider Rossi 'owes' this to us and the world. Is that reasonable? - the answer to that relates to your expectations and demands (which may not coincide with Rossi's).

    DSM

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  9. Gluck, since you really endorsed Defkalion I think you have an obligation to speak out about what is happening with them? And if you also are convinced (now?) that it was all fraud and nothing else?

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    1. Who Are you to teach anybody about his/her obligations?
      I am endorsing them now too plus i have told here cleraly you will hera about/from them when their generator wil be ready for commercialization. Neither I, nor they will discuss with trolls- it is waste of time. If you have lost money by investing in them, you have to go the way of the Law.
      Peter

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