nickel and hydrogen " cold fusion" ???????

[Shifteh]

http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory: ... _Generator
http://pesn.com/2011/04/07/9501805_Ross ... s_Society/

was reading up on some interesting research some guys had been into,

doesant look like general run of the mill snake oil

worth building a test setup???

Patents
Application: WO/2009/125444

* METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR CARRYING OUT NICKEL AND HYDROGEN EXOTHERMAL REACTIONS; pub. Date: 15.10.2009

Abstract
A method and apparatus for carrying out highly efficient exothermal reaction between nickel and hydrogen atoms in a tube, preferably, though not necessary, a metal tube filled by a nickel powder and heated to a high temperature, preferably, though not necessary, from 150 to 5000C are herein disclosed. In the inventive apparatus, hydrogen is injected into the metal tube containing a highly pressurized nickel powder having a pressure, preferably though not necessarily, from 2 to 20 bars.

[Chris Bradley]

Premium snake oil?!

[Carl Willis]

This particular cold-fusion effort actually gets regular mention on our forums.

I have been using my powers as administrator to steer the discussions back toward our contributors' own bona-fide, well-documented projects, rather than play host to continued speculation and armchair discussion about this and other sensational commercial energy "research" projects.

My personal opinion is that there is nothing to distinguish this effort from classic quackery. The principals publish their research in a non-peer-reviewed, zero-impact-factor journal that appears to be set up solely or mostly as a vehicle for their cause and that disingenuously postures as a peer-reviewed publication. They have resorted to video "demonstrations" and Internet publicity, abetted by a very noisy sycophancy camp, in lieu of offering comprehensive and credible papers in recognized journals. So we pretty much end up where quack claims always end up: Either a vast worldwide conspiracy of mainstream scientists and mainstream media has colluded to suppress a revolutionary discovery that has the potential to save the world....or a couple dudes in Italy are peddling baloney. Take your pick.

-Carl

[Frank Sanns]

I am with Carl on this one. I smell quakery in all of this.

In thermodynamics ALL sources of heat (energy) need to be accounted for. Heating up the nickel up to thousands of degrees for some period of time before putting into the chamber has to be put into the equation. Were there some phase change, some temporary higher energy state, any one of a number of factors could account for the energy.

An example is diphenyl ether. You will see it on many chemistry shelves. On a cool day you can pick up the bottle and see the liquid inside and walk around with all day but give it a shake and it gets hot in an instant. Right up to 26 C no matter what the starting temperature is (within reason). If you look, the liquid has become solid since 26 C is the fusion (melting) temperature. If you did not know that, this bottle of liquid would look like it were over unity as heat came out of no chemical or nuclear reaction. It came from a phase change and the energy had to be put in to make it a liquid in the first place. When reading these cold fusion reports, how the materials are handled long before they are even put into "reactors or cells" has to be taken into account on the energy balance.

Frank Sanns

[Shifteh]

well my thinking was they were just sprouting "fusion" as wank,

has a nickel - hydrogen thermal reaction ever been noted?

[Jeroen Vriesman]

When you liquefy hydrogen, after some time, it will spontaneously heat up a bit and become vapour again, even in perfect thermal isolation.
This energy comes from the transition of orthohydrogen to parahydrogen (proton spin aligned or in opposite directions).
An ortho-para catalyst (lots of metals will catalyze this) will release this energy for H2 gas or H2 in the metal, this is the energy anomaly called "cold fusion".
For most believers this reasoning is known as "cold shower".

[Shifteh]

so this reaction could actually not be premium snake oil,,,,

this rossi guy says he heats up his "reactor",,, pipe with a resister wound around it then injects hydrogen gas, resulting in it reacting with the nickel powder and somehow generates +breakeven


The hydrogen autoignition temperature, the temperature of spontaneous ignition in air, is 500 °C (932 °F).

"a metal tube filled by a nickel powder and heated to a high temperature, preferably, though not necessary, from 150 to 5000C are herein disclosed"

so im guessing this rossi guy likes to keep his "pipe" under 500C or it will become a firework lol,, but then,,,

im thinking out loud here
this device supposibly creates 12,000w from 400w of "HEAT" energy
so if we had 12,000w of energy, turning to heat, what would the temprature be???

[Frank Sanns]

Look up Enthalpy of Solution and Gibbs Free Energy if you want more of changes that would have to ruled out long before ever turning on his device or any other CF device.

Also what is a watt in the context of his paper? That alone is bad reporting. If a discrete release of energy it should be joules. If power then it should be Kwh. Is this a one shot deal or continuous for 20 years.

I consider "snake oil" representing something you know has been left out OR are too ignorant of it because of your own limited knowledge that you should have if working in a field, as fact. Whether this is premium snake oil or regular run of the mill snake oil is more effort to determine than I am willing to put into it.

Frank Sanns

[Dustin]

I've been following this with skeptical interest,
Here is some more recent speculation,
http://nextbigfuture.com/2011/04/how-ca ... actor.html
Steve.

[Chris Trent]

I looked at that site for about 3 minutes, and noted a presumed decay chain involving 5 fusions, and 4 electron captures.

Ow, my head....

[Chris Bradley]

...and the strange thing about it is that the isotope Rossi has chosen to demonstrate this new 'fusion process' is none other than Ni-62... which just happens to be *the* isotope with the highest binding energy of all isotopes! So how you make nuclear energy out of that, I am at a loss to imagine.... Above Ni-62 fission is exothermic and fusion is exothermic below it. Ni-62 is the bottom most point of that nuclear-binding 'free-energy' curve.

[Dan Tibbets]

CB, I think you meant fusion beyond Ni62 is endothermic as opposed to exothermic for fission.
Of course one might argue that it is the hydrogen that is undergoing fusion, and the nickel is only the catalyst/ intermediate, but then why the claimed copper isotopes?

The normal endothermic neucleosynthesis that occurs occur in supernovas occur by adding small components like neutrons, protons, etc. so how the process is described is the same as this. I'm not how sure how the energy balance sheet works out, except as I said, generally you need excess energy to drive the process. I don't know If there is any wiggle room for special situations.

Dan Tibbets

[Frank Sanns]

And 37 Mev annihilation energy that magically stays in the atom and turns to kinetic energy of a copper atom that just warms it a bit. So, in addition to all kind of new mechanics, there are also new physics as the atoms formed do things that no other atoms on the can planet do. Ok, my vote goes to "premium snake oil".

[Sawtoothfusion]

Hi,

The problem with these cold fusion claims is the difficulty in accurate calorimetry to find where the heat is coming from and where it is going, not to mention the accuracy of all recording and measuring devices.

First question is whether the steam is 'wet' or 'dry' steam. There is a big difference in actual heat production depending on which, as we all know phase transitions do not cause a change in temperature and if we are counting 'wet' non-gas phase H2O as part of the energy production assumed, we are looking at a glaringly major problem.

I assume raney nickel or something similar is being used as a catalyst and it is a great one with much work being done in this area.

One point I remember one of the observers present stating, hand-picked of course, was that the
gamma levels detected by the monitoring device brought in, provided by the Rossi team of course(not a good sign of fraud-free science) was that the gamma levels would rise and fall. This was said to be proof that the device was legitimate and a nuclear reaction was going on as such a change would be difficult to fake. I don't need to tell you how easy such results could be faked. Take a gamma source and by a shield that moves and exposes the gamma rays for escape from the device and then re-shields them to cause the changing flux would be one simple way to accomplish such an effect, so I see no sign of this as absolute evidence of a nuclear reaction occurring.

Second, did they look closely at recombination of hydrogen and oxygen or other exothermic events that would lead to anomalous results as to power production. If so, let's see the proof.

If they indeed have a patent and are ready for production as they have said, they could at least
have an independent team of scientists enter into a non-disclosure contract or not, to confirm or disconfirm the results. Until peer review and dependable repeatable results are achieved I will wait on any judgment as will all others in the science community. By the way, how can we confirm that the energy they say they were putting into the apparatus is what they claim? The simple answer is that at this point, we can't.

There is good reason this device did not make the front page of Time and Newsweek as the Utah team did in 1989. Evidence does seem to show something is occurring with these LENR experiments, especially with the more traditional palladium-deuterium based setups, but until dependable, repeatable results are obtained we won't be seeing these devices for sale by GE any time soon.

Lastly, Rossi does not have the greatest record for honesty if you look at his checkered past. Focardi as far as I know is a respected scientist, which may leave room for more information to come forward before I go from 99% cynicism in response to the results I've seen so far to 100%, but
I won't be holding my breath. I always keep an open mind, but I also always weigh that open mind against a healthy level of skepticism.

The last thing I have to say as mentioned the last time I remember this subject popping up on the boards is that both the Blacklight Power people and the Rossi-Focardi team are both hypothesizing of an extra low energy state for the hydrogen atom, or a hydrino as it is sometimes referred to. It seems as I said before, that this idea is catching on, and it is an interesting subject to think about,
whether it holds any truth whatsoever.

That's my two cents, for what it's worth.

-James

The Rossi-Focardi team controlled all variables, and that is not a good sign.

[Richard Hull]

James told it like it is. Rossi has a bad track record.

Final word on both hot and cold fusion........Believe nothing! Believe no articles in the finest or the poorest of journals by the most credentialed or totally non-credentialed authors until something comes on the market that you can buy or that the electrical industry swings about like the giant battle wagon it is and steams directly at it at flank speed. All is fluff and bluff 'til then.

Don't be fooled as we have been for the past 75 years by the hot fusion boys when their slick front-men trained in beguiling governments and legislatures out of billions make pronouncements, just as when some cold fusioneer has his sealed new energy source on a table apparently kickin' out more energy than is put in.

The only thing that is for sure and for certain is that someone will win at some point with some system at some future date, as yet unforeseen and unknowable.

Do not watch the science! Watch only the bean counters, the electrical industry and K-mart. They are the serious indicators of what is to be and what really works in the real world. Science is there to figure out what just happened at some future date, engineering will show it is viable. Industry and K-Mart will only move after the engineering is done and the Chi-Coms make it to sell cheap if it is a cold fusion pocket warmer, a closet based CF home power system or a 10 acre hot fusion power plant.

Richard Hull