10KW LENR Demonstrator?

[Skipjack]

Am I the only one wondering whether the same amount of water that went in, actually came out?
I cant see whether that was checked anywhere.

[Giorgio]

@chrismb

you have a point there.

Am I the only one wondering whether the same amount of water that went in, actually came out?
I cant see whether that was checked anywhere.

It wasn't. This was a direct question that I asked on their blog and supposedly the data should have been present here. According their calculations they are giving for granted that the full input of water is transformed in steam.
How they get to this conclusion is really not something clear.
168gr/45secs means about 13.5 ltr of water. Most of it (if it does not transform into steam) can easily fit inside the reactor itself.
A balance of IN/OUT mass and reactor weight PRE/POST operation (like Chrismb suggested) is essential to validate the energy calculations.
This is a missing point of fundamental importance.

[Skipjack]

A balance of IN/OUT mass and reactor weight PRE/POST operation (like Chrismb suggested) is essential to validate the energy calculations.
This is a missing point of fundamental importance.

Yupp...

[Nik]

There are so many glaring gaps in their demo's protocol that it is becoming embarrassing...

"Remember N-Rays !!"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N_ray

[parallel]

Giorgio,

I was surprised you didn’t find Dr. Levi’s preliminary report of more interest.
http://22passi.blogspot.com/2011/01/rep ... della.html

It included details of the run in December and casually mentioned that the reaction continued with no input at all, either electrical or H2, for 15 minutes before they terminated the experiment.

As the consumption of H2 was <0.1 gm, I don’t suppose the experimenters were particularly interested or even able to detect that weight difference while water was passing through the device. Now chrismb is suggesting a far stronger conventional exothermic hydride reaction than has ever been reported in the literature, but this is enough to deride the experiment?

[cgray45]

It's enough to raise some pretty seroius question, not just about the expiriment, but about those conducting it. It is so incredibly sloppy that even presuming full honesty on their part, you have to wonder if they're actually seeing what they want to see, rather than what is happening.

[Giorgio]

Giorgio,

I was surprised you didn’t find Dr. Levi’s preliminary report of more interest.
http://22passi.blogspot.com/2011/01/rep ... della.html

It included details of the run in December and casually mentioned that the reaction continued with no input at all, either electrical or H2, for 15 minutes before they terminated the experiment.

As the consumption of H2 was <0.1 gm, I don’t suppose the experimenters were particularly interested or even able to detect that weight difference while water was passing through the device. Now chrismb is suggesting a far stronger conventional exothermic hydride reaction than has ever been reported in the literature, but this is enough to deride the experiment?

The details are all very interesting, but if you do not correctly account for mass in/mass out than all the calculations are not anymore based on experimental evidences but on hypothetical evidences.

I just posted a suggestion to them for the next pubblic demonstration (if they will make another one) to place a simple digital balance under the apparatus to monitor the weight change of the reactor (if any) during time.
A weight increase will indicate that part of the water is accumulating inside the apparatus and not leaving as steam.
As you can understand this will greatly modify the power output extimations.

Any other issue comes after. If they didn't do a correct mass balance of the experiment than there is really nothing to talk about.

This does not mean that I am "deriding" their experiment. They might have something or they might not have it, I am not even questioning this.
What I question is that if they want pubblic scrutiny they need to make their homework correctly, otherwise is a useless loss of time for them and for everyone else.

[tomclarke]

Giorgio,

This does not mean that I am "deriding" their experiment. They might have something or they might not have it, I am not even questioning this.
What I question is that if they want pubblic scrutiny they need to make their homework correctly, otherwise is a useless loss of time for them and for everyone else.

The thing is, they may not be competent to do really good experiments. Few people are. But all they have to do is allow other truly independent & skeptical experimentalists to set the experimental protocol. This need involve no revelation of the insides of the black box - it is clear that with care a black box experiment could prove non-chemical energy production - though you need quite a lot of it since the box could have highly reactive materials inside of course.

If it was me, no matter that I originally thought my experiments conclusive, I would want to check for any possible extraneous effect. And there are a few LENR researchers who are similarly careful - though they end up with inconclusive results.

Best wishes, Tom

[Giorgio]

Ing. Rossi replyed that the volume of the reactor is 1 lt.
If this is true we can skip the mass balance issue. Even if there is 1 full lt of water inside at the end of the experiment it will not make more than 10% diference on the final result.

Yet I will not feel confident with their claims until a proper test is done.

[tomclarke]

Reading the latest report - it does seem extraordinary - and raises my suspicions - that they go to such lengths to check the H2 intake (essentially zero) without checking the weight before & after of the reactor. Of course even then it could contain meterial that reacted where the products stayed in the vessel.

If it is important to check no H2 is burning to within 0.1g - surely it is equally important to check nothing in the reactor is burning? But this cannot be done!

[parallel]

I’m faintly amused by the critics who clearly have so little understanding of what Dr. Levi was trying to do or the difficulties of doing what they suggest.

cgray45 writes: “It is so incredibly sloppy that even presuming full honesty on their part.’ Just what was “incredibly sloppy”?

Others go on about weighing the device during the operation. Have you ever tried weighing an apparatus connected by tubes and wires to the bench, while water is flowing through it? Sure, the armchair critics will kid themselves that they get something meaningful to <0.1 gm. Reminds me of the idiots who think we know global temperatures to 0.1C.

Let’s completely ignore that the volume of the apparatus does not allow the generation of that much heat by conventional chemistry without that being obvious to the various professors and other scientists who witnessed the event.
Let’s just see who can make the wittiest snide comment about the criminal, fraudulent idiots who are so dumb compared to us.

[nferguso]

Angel's advocate:
Assuming no jiggery or pokery, the volume of water in the device before vs. after the experiment shouldn't matter. Water comes out of the device until it starts to boil. Then the steam forces the level of the water below the exhaust port, and liquid water stops coming out of the device. The liquid water inside will remain at or below the exhaust port only if the heat produced can boil the water at the rate of water entering. Otherwise the level rises to the port and comes out the exhaust again.
Devil's advocate:
That's why the experimenter fiddles with the heater setting, and it's why he terminates the experiment so quickly.
The devil also makes me mention an argument made at another website. He concludes that most of the water going in comes out of the exhaust as water droplets. The commenter claims that the device confirming "dry" steam measures volume rather than mass; the exhaust could have a very low volume of liquid water, but still be mostly liquid by mass. So the water in the device could be boiling at a much slower rate than suggested by the water input rate. His second point is that, given the apparent diameter of the exhaust tube, the volume of "dry" steam necessarily produced by the device would exit at a rate of several hundred miles per hour, producing a deafening howl.

[Giorgio]

Others go on about weighing the device during the operation. Have you ever tried weighing an apparatus connected by tubes and wires to the bench, while water is flowing through it?

I used to do it daily while working in chemical industry.
Not so diffucult as you can think.

[CherryPick]

There are so many glaring gaps in their demo's protocol that it is becoming embarrassing...

It is a pity that there are so many naive customers and investors out there that scams are profitable. In this case everyone is very suspicious. World "knows" that cold fusion is a hoax. Is there money to be made if this is not real? If I buy a boiler to my house, a have to pay it about month after its installation. If it is not working I owe nothing. Additionally I should get a guarantee several years ahead. How could this be different?

The demo itself proves nothing. There are lots of ways to do it without real stuff starting from editing the video to hiding a fuel tank inside the cover. Wikipedia tells that e.g. gasoline contains 35 MJ/l (13 kWh/kg) which comparable to the energy released in the demo. An obvious reason to arrange a test like this is that the target customers have seen the apparatus and are convinced that it is working as they say. But still, I would like more respect to scientific method including solid measurements.

Many important claims are thrown but not proven. I understand secrecy but it makes patenting the invention and peer reviewed publishing impossible. Because there is a good comment about patenting in WUWT, I skip that now. AGW is not the only area of science where peer review process is flawed. It is really hard to get innovative new stuff approved while press releases spam us with low quality mainstream research.

[tomclarke]

I’m faintly amused by the critics who clearly have so little understanding of what Dr. Levi was trying to do or the difficulties of doing what they suggest.

cgray45 writes: “It is so incredibly sloppy that even presuming full honesty on their part.’ Just what was “incredibly sloppy”?

Others go on about weighing the device during the operation. Have you ever tried weighing an apparatus connected by tubes and wires to the bench, while water is flowing through it? Sure, the armchair critics will kid themselves that they get something meaningful to <0.1 gm. Reminds me of the idiots who think we know global temperatures to 0.1C.

Let’s completely ignore that the volume of the apparatus does not allow the generation of that much heat by conventional chemistry without that being obvious to the various professors and other scientists who witnessed the event.
Let’s just see who can make the wittiest snide comment about the criminal, fraudulent idiots who are so dumb compared to us.

We were talking about weighing the device before & after operation. But in reality that proves nothing. The reactor (10kg?) could contain reactants that make an exothermic reaction with products remaining in reactor. The required energy of reaction is (if equivalent 100g H2) not difficult to obtain from 10kg of reactant.

In fact not weighing the reactor at all is a serious defect. It could be 100kg!

Best wishes, Tom