Regarding the Feb. 10 test, I pooh-poohed the notion that the cell was actually producing 4 kW, raising the water temperature 1 deg C, and the other 3 dec C came from some path other than the water, for example by conduction through the body of the machine to the outlet thermocouple.
To be sure, McKubre and others have pointed out that the outlet thermocouple position is not ideal, and it might be picking up some heat from another path. This may be happening to some extent. It might even be measurable. But it can be shown that other paths are minor compared to the flow of water. It is certain that the inside of the cell is considerably hotter than 100 deg C. You could not heat water or make steam if the inside were barely above boiling temperature. If there is a significant heat path, it will conduct temperatures well above 100 deg C. Take a boiling pot of water. The sides of the pot above the water level will be much hotter than 100 deg C. So, if there was a lot of heat being conducted to the outlet thermocouple, that thermocouple would not have settled at boiling temperature just above 100 deg C. It would have gone measurably well above that. Steam does not conduct heat as well as water does. Furthermore, 0.3 L of water per minute does not conduct anywhere near as much heat as 60 L per minute. That is a large flow of water. Even supposing the steam was quite wet, the mixture of steam and water would still have been close to 100 deg C. Water goes right up to the phase transition temperature before there is any steam at all. It would not have been, let us say, 80 deg C, with the extra 20 deg C sneaking in from conduction or radiation directly from the cell to that thermocouple location. At 80 deg C there would have been no indication of steam -- no sound, no bubbles at the end of the pipe -- nothing. - Jed
