On Oct 10, 2011, at 4:57 PM, OrionWorks - Steven Vincent Johnson wrote:
Ed Storms said it was ok for me to post the following analysis he
made:
* * * * * *
A careful examination of the attached graph reveals an interesting
conclusion. The Pout (power out) and the Eout (Energy out) appear
to describe the net excess, not the total as everyone seems to assume.
Power is applied to the internal heater, showed by the red dots,
until extra power starts to increase starting at 140 min. The
power to the heater is turned off for a short time at 160 min
because the excess power starts to rise. This interruption of
applied power and the resulting reduced temperature of the Ni
caused the excess to decrease and excess power production is again
brought under control. Applied power is interrupted several more
times to test the stability of the power-producing reaction.
Finally, applied power was turned off at 280 min whereupon the
extra power increased and reached a relatively stable value. The
variations in excess power production after 280 min are expected as
the nuclear reaction responds to variations in local temperature in
the Ni. The nuclear reaction slowly decayed away and the test was
terminated before it stopped all together.
I make two conclusions from this behavior.
1. The amount of energy produced was far in excess of any possible
chemical source.
2. The energy-producing reaction is unstable and difficult to
control. It also slowly becomes less productive unless the
temperature is increased by an external source of power that can
increase the temperature of the Ni, thereby causing a greater
output of energy. This means the energy-producing reaction has a
limited life-time, which is what Rossi has indicated.
If the Pout and E out are interpreted as net excess, the graph
makes perfect sense and is consistent with how such a device must
behave.
Ed
I provided two spreadsheets from which the graphs were produced:
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/Rossi6Oct2011.pdf
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/Rossi6Oct2011noBias.pdf
The latter one uses the raw data, the former has an 0.8°C bias
applied to Delta T to compensate for probable thermocouple error, as
noted in the "DISCUSSION OF GRAPH 4" section of the review:
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/Rossi6Oct2011Review.pdf
The graphs were taken from the spread sheet with the bias. The above
seems to refer to Graph 1, which is in the review, but also in higher
resolution here:
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/RossiGraph.png
Graph 2 in high resolution is here:
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/RossiT2Pout.png
Graph 3 in high resolution is here:
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/RossiT2Pout.png
I do not see how Pout and Eout can be "interpreted as net excess". I
am possibly missing the intended meaning of this phrase.
Delta Eout is the thermal energy detected by the heat exchanger for
the time period of a given row. Pout and Eout are created from this
number. Pout is determined by a ratio of Delta Eout to the time
period. Eout is just a sum of all the Delta Eout values to the end
of the individual time periods each row represents. These numbers
represent the thermal output.
The net output, i.e. output energy - input energy, is not in the
graph. It is in the spread sheet column "Net E".
One way to interpret Ed's phrase "net excess" is to consider the
thermal energy still stored in the E-cat as part of the total thermal
energy generated. That which has escaped and been measured by the
heat exchanger is the net of total thermal energy generated minus the
still stored energy. However, this interpretation does not seem to
add anything to understanding discussion.
When cold water is run through the E-cat sufficiently long that it
cools, and if there is no nuclear energy generated, and the
calorimetry works well, then "Net E" should be zero at the end of the
run, and COP should be 1. No energy is then left stored in the E-cat
at the end. This is how a control run should be evaluated, and a live
test done.
The power Pin applied to the heater in Graph 1 is indeed the red
line. In Graph 2 it is the brown line.
I think Graphs 2 and 3 have much to say about how well controlled the
reaction is, if there indeed is one. In Graph 2 we can see the E-cat
temperature is very well controlled. In the time 220 - 280 the red
line T2 is fairly flat. There is no sign of any runaway reaction -
even though the power was applied for a long period. T2 even looks
fairly flat for the period 200-280. The output power Pout detected
at the heat exchanger, however, is anything but flat. This variation
looks to me to be likely due to periods of water slugs moving through
the exchanger, not variations from the nuclear reaction output.
The most interesting relationship, however, I think is shown in Graph
3. The blue line shows a scaled version of the E-cat temperature T2.
The red line is the power applied to the blue box and RF generator.
Assuming the power to the blue box is constant at this point, it is
the change in power that is of interest. A change in input power of
a mere 25 W has a large effect on the T2 decline. T2 is located
inside the E-cat, in the midst of a very large thermal mass. Yet it
appears to respond immediately to the mere 25 W increase in Pin.
Between times 450 and 470 a response to a mere 3 W change can be
seen. This is a reactor under the finest imaginable control!
However, when we look a Graph 2, we see the heat exchanger view of
this is very different. The blue Pout line varies wildly. After
about time 340 on the graph the trend of the blue Pout line
(represented roughly by the yellow Pout exponential moving average
line) begins to mimic to some degree the T2 line.
It appears the variability of the blue line in Graph 2 is not due to
reaction rate changes, but to calorimeter transients. However, if
the major Pout increase upon cut off of electric power is not all due
to calorimetry error due to thermocouple placement, but possibly is
due to the application of the RF signal, the yellow line has much
significance with regard to actual reaction power generation, and
Ed's conclusion 1 is valid. The tail off of the yellow curve along
with the tail-off of the T2 temperature do indicate a limited time of
reaction, as note in Ed's conclusion 2. It appears to me the
reaction, if real, is not nearly as difficult to control as the Pout
lines would indicate.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
