One might get really good results chilling the nickel down with liq N2. Brittle things grind better. They even grind tires and plastic this way.
Date: Fri, 6 May 2011 13:50:06 -0400 From: [email protected] Subject: RE: EXTERNAL: RE: [Vo]:cheap ball mill / glove box alternative to Bell jar? To: [email protected] Jones,Ok that may apply to the major surface area and a vacuum may be necessary to degass but Stremmenos’ point about absorbing an enormous quantity of hydrogen after heat + vacuum purifying his powder suggests that the nano pores and defects of his micro particles as delivered remain oxidized. Perhaps we are describing “clean” at 2 different scales and again tripping over the difference between normal surface area / volume between particles and the more extreme Casimir geometry where I posit the relativistic volume is magnitudes larger than the spatial volume appears from our perspective …… MAYBE Rossi’s secret ingredient is a chemical that enhances the Casimir effect by either cleaning or backfilling the existing cavities such that more hydrogen is translated to extreme fractional values up to 1/137.RegardsFran [snip] Anyhow, this is very important, because I observed it and then told Sergio. If we degassed (nickel powder, at this point) at an extremely low pressure, i.e.. 10-6, which is one-millionth of atmospheric pressure, for one week at a temperature of 500° [Celsius], so that all the oxides on the surface of the micro-particles of nickel were eliminated (this means all of the oxides that have formed, because we are surrounded by an oxygen atmosphere) ... well, upon charging it, it sucked up, how can I put it, an enormous quantity of hydrogen (I was using hydrogen). And the temperature, which had been 500°, began to rise considerably, and got higher and higher, over the 1000° mark. I got scared, and shut everything down [laughs], because, I said to myself, “This is going to blow up”! The temperature went up very fast. Probably there was chemical reaction too ... specifically, hydrides were being formed, which are... I didn’t have the patience to wait until it reached a steady level, but the previous experiments which … as far as exothermic emission from nickel is concerned … this excess [of heat] went on even for six months, so it did … but it wasn’t absorbing all that much hydrogen ... so I understood that the trick was purifying the nickel as much as possible... Talking out all the gases it absorbs … plus the oxides formed on the surface of the nickel micro-particles.[/snip] From: Jones Beene [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Friday, May 06, 2011 11:33 AM To: [email protected] Subject: EXTERNAL: RE: [Vo]:cheap ball mill / glove box alternative to Bell jar? You do not need to flush the ball mill with helium. Nickel resists oxidation at ambient very well, and any surface oxide remaining will be reduced on the first contact with hydrogen. If this is un-activated Raney-type nickel you are milling, of course you know to activate after ball milling, NOT before. From: Roarty, Francis X Would ball milling nickel in a glove box of helium produce a similar oxygen free powder without the need for a bell jar to out gas?
