Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Robin van Spaandonk wrote: If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. When I read this I was very concerned that this is what I had been saying, so why the need here to say it again? Did I not post something? However, between preparing stuff for the web site, private exchanges, and posting some thoughts as they developed, I can see that it is not at all clear exactly what I have been saying. At any rate, a hopefully more coherent exposition can be found at: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/GlowExper.pdf Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
In reply to Horace Heffner's message of Tue, 27 Dec 2005 00:58:02 -0900: Hi Horace, [snip] After Bill's post, and before mine, you posted two messages. In the first, you wrote:- -- My opinion is the glow is probably caused by recombination and some other effects noted in the above pdf. Could of course be quite wrong. Could be a hole-electron annihilation at the surface of a film deposited on the electrode for example. It could be hole conducting metals, e.g. Zn, would need no film at all. Could also be the mechanism for CaO or phosphate electrolytes differs from the above too. I did not follow up on this to pin it down. I diverted my attention to some exiting inertial drive projects for a long time and had to interrupt even that for personal reasons for many months. I terribly miss doing scientific things. and referred to http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf. In the second you wrote:- As food for thought, you might also check out: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf Even though the blue glow is an anode effect, proton involvement is highly likely. There are some notes in the above pdf about proton tunneling that may be relevant. A wild speculation is that free protons are stripped of electrons at the anode, probably have the highest concentration there, and may in rarely and briefly existing pairs have the ability to tunnel as pairs into seed locations, like free electrons. I didn't initially read all of the document at the link which you posted, primarily because it starts off talking about your Atomic Expansion Hypothesis, which I don't believe. Therefore, at first glance neither of your posts appeared to mention what I suspected was the cause of the blue glow, hence I posted it to the list in a succinct form. Now, upon a closer (yet still incomplete) reading of your reference document I come across the sentence:- Similarly, in a sufficiently high gradient, electrons may be stripped off of OH- radicals leaving OH molecules. The electrons so removed then, in the high electrostatic field, blast through the water until hitting H3O+ radicals and then freeing the hydrogen, causing atomic expansion. ..which is almost what I said in my post. I'm afraid this is more a case of great minds thinking alike than plagiarism. ;) On Dec 19, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Robin van Spaandonk wrote: If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. When I read this I was very concerned that this is what I had been saying, so why the need here to say it again? Did I not post something? However, between preparing stuff for the web site, private exchanges, and posting some thoughts as they developed, I can see that it is not at all clear exactly what I have been saying. At any rate, a hopefully more coherent exposition can be found at: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/GlowExper.pdf Horace Heffner Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://users.bigpond.net.au/rvanspaa/ Competition provides the motivation, Cooperation provides the means.
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? Brian WhatcottAltus OKEureka! I just noticed in the above page Nyle Steiner writes: The aluminum becomes the cathode after a forming process of applying some ac current through the rectifier. ... It seems that aluminum is necessary for the cathode, but the anode can be just about anything that conducts electricity. This seems to me to be wrong. Aluminum becomes the anode. The diode effect is at the aluminum-electrolyte interface. Also, only when used as an anode does the aluminum have the weird glow. The following is extracted from an experiment report in: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf Warmed up cell by running at about 100 mA (variac at 10 then up to to 20 %) for about 5 minutes. Glow clearly visible in dark but noise not yet started. Put some dummy diode pairs (P1 and P2)rated at 15kV Peak V, 100 mA, into circuit like so: P1 and P2 both look like: -||--- || ---|| Circuit: V1T1--A1---P1--o |||| V1T1---P2--o V1 - variac T1 - HV transformer A1 - mA meter Pi - dummy diode pairs Continued to run as before about 5 minutes. Both electrode glowed as before. This verifies that 2 pairs of these particular type of diodes work OK in circuit. Tried geiger counter within about 1 of electrodes. Got no increased counts. Switched off variac when current was at 70 mA, leaving voltage setting alone. Then inserted full bridge B1 made of same type of diodes: Circuit: V1T1--A1B1--o + |||||| V1T1B1--o - V1 - variac T1 - HV transformer A1 - mA meter B1 - full rectifier bridge Switched on variac and noted: (1) only one electrode lit, the other was totally dark (2) it was not nearly as bright as before (3) noticeably more gas evolved at the dark electrode when DC used (4) same current (about 70 mA). (5) unexpectedly, it was the anode that lit. (6) the full surface of the anode lit, as before Swapped + and - leads and the other electrode lit. Glow went with the + pole. Just to check my understanding, the diodes are marked with a stripe at the end: P N ---||--- stripe at this end of diode indicates diode cathode i - conventional current moves this way --- e- electrons move this way only - end + end If circuit is like below then electrode marked + is anode of cell: V1T1--A1||-o + |||| V1T1||-o - It is the anode of the cell, the electrode closest to the bar on the diode that glows. Anything wrong here? Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Robin van Spaandonk wrote: In reply to William Beaty's message of Mon, 19 Dec 2005 10:50:46 -0800 (PST): Hi, [snip] Mix 1 tablespoon baking soda in 1 pint water. Cut two electrodes from an aluminum pie dish Place the elctrodes on opposite sides of a jam-jar. Connect the electrolytic cell in series with a 75 watt lamp to a 120 volt AC line supply - or better, through a 1:1 isolation transformer. Care! The light quickly dims. In a dark room, the electrodes glow. See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? [snip] If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk Did you read my recent posts in this thread?? Summarizing: At this point it seems reasonable that the stripping of the electron possibly occurs with great frequency when the hydroxyl radical is separated from the anode by the first atomic layer of the anode interface. This effect could only happen in the presence of a screening layer that prevents current flowing from the anode to the electrolyte via positively charged metal ions. Such an ion current would reduce the voltage drop across the interface to a few volts. With the ion screen in place, only electron motion can make the current flow. Given a voltage drop across the interface of 120 V, and a thickness of the nonconducting layer near the anode as 4 angstroms, the electrostatic field would be 3x10^11 V/m, or over 30 V/(hydrogen atomic radius). This should be plenty strong enough to strip an electron from the OH- and drive it as a free electron through the water molecules of the interface. Such an ionizing influence would have the power to disassociate water, and subsequently cause the recombining of the products. Therefore, recombination may well be the cause of the blue- green glow. This would explain why the color of the glow on Al and Zr anodes is the same color. It seems this set of assumptions explains the known results, other than my recollection of a reduced Faradaic efficiency, a recollection which may well be flawed. I would add, however, that 30 eV per atom is not high energy in the conventional sense, but of course plenty high enough to make blue photons. There is no direct explanation for high energy beta production, if that should exist, or LENR, for example. The field strength is astronomical, but only over a short distance, so there is no conventional reason to expect particle energies much over the cell operating voltage. I've provided here a number of (lunatic fringe) reasons to expect high energy events though. It is not clear to me the exact reaction that produces the weird glow, however. At this point I don't think it is aluminum (or zirconium) oxidation, for example, because they should produce differing colors. I suspect it is an oxygen, carbon, or silicon related reaction, possibly involving some means of converting ultraviolet to the visible spectrum due to electrolyte contents. I think acetic acid (pure distilled vinegar) electrolyte produces an especially green glow, and some electrolyte/electrode combinations produce a more blue-green glow - but this is highly subjective and needs substantiation via spectrometry. Michael Foster wrote: If you add a fluorescent dye to the electrolyte you get a much brighter display. And of course, you can choose the color you want. Fluorescein or rhodamine 6G work nicely. I don't know if this is first hand experimental knowledge, but if so then a large part of the photon energy created must be UV. In addition to stripping electrons from OH- radicals, the high field gradient can strip protons from water molecules: H2O --- OH- + H+ (occurs normally due to Boltzman tail, but highly enhanced by gradient) H2O + H+ --- H3O+(normal immediate hydronium creation follows) and there are lots of reactions involving variants of hydrogen peroxide as well. The ion free zone created just in front of the anode by the high field gradient would be expected to spontaneously and continuously ionize just by normal thermal means, and this would be accomplished by use of ambient heat. This might be manipulated to demonstrate 2nd law violations upon calorimetry. It is notable that the layer forming on the anode does conduct electrons (i.e. in forward bias mode) but not ions. It is not actually a diode layer per say, but requires the electrolyte to create the diode effect, specifically an electrolyte with anions like OH- which are blocked by the insulating layer, and an electrolyte which is
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
At Sandia Labs in 1960-61 I made instant Hard Anodized Aluminum (6061T6) rods and strips by dipping them into a weak acid solution such as Molybdic with lots of dry ice in the solution using a brass plate as the cathode. A 250 D.C. power supply 500 Ma and one hand in pocket as the Al touched the surface made a smooth, insulating grayish anodized coating as the material was immersed in the electrolyte, that took over 3 kV to get breakdown using a scribe.lots of arcing-sparking but we got the parts we needed. There weren't any pharisees at hand. Baking Soda NaHCO3 undergoes Hydrolysis of HCO3- to form OH - anions too. Fred [Original Message] From: Horace Heffner [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: vortex-l@eskimo.com Date: 12/26/2005 5:30:01 PM Subject: Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution On Dec 19, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Robin van Spaandonk wrote: In reply to William Beaty's message of Mon, 19 Dec 2005 10:50:46 -0800 (PST): Hi, [snip] Mix 1 tablespoon baking soda in 1 pint water. Cut two electrodes from an aluminum pie dish Place the elctrodes on opposite sides of a jam-jar. Connect the electrolytic cell in series with a 75 watt lamp to a 120 volt AC line supply - or better, through a 1:1 isolation transformer. Care! The light quickly dims. In a dark room, the electrodes glow. See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? [snip] If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk Did you read my recent posts in this thread?? Summarizing: At this point it seems reasonable that the stripping of the electron possibly occurs with great frequency when the hydroxyl radical is separated from the anode by the first atomic layer of the anode interface. This effect could only happen in the presence of a screening layer that prevents current flowing from the anode to the electrolyte via positively charged metal ions. Such an ion current would reduce the voltage drop across the interface to a few volts. With the ion screen in place, only electron motion can make the current flow. Given a voltage drop across the interface of 120 V, and a thickness of the nonconducting layer near the anode as 4 angstroms, the electrostatic field would be 3x10^11 V/m, or over 30 V/(hydrogen atomic radius). This should be plenty strong enough to strip an electron from the OH- and drive it as a free electron through the water molecules of the interface. Such an ionizing influence would have the power to disassociate water, and subsequently cause the recombining of the products. Therefore, recombination may well be the cause of the blue- green glow. This would explain why the color of the glow on Al and Zr anodes is the same color. It seems this set of assumptions explains the known results, other than my recollection of a reduced Faradaic efficiency, a recollection which may well be flawed. I would add, however, that 30 eV per atom is not high energy in the conventional sense, but of course plenty high enough to make blue photons. There is no direct explanation for high energy beta production, if that should exist, or LENR, for example. The field strength is astronomical, but only over a short distance, so there is no conventional reason to expect particle energies much over the cell operating voltage. I've provided here a number of (lunatic fringe) reasons to expect high energy events though. It is not clear to me the exact reaction that produces the weird glow, however. At this point I don't think it is aluminum (or zirconium) oxidation, for example, because they should produce differing colors. I suspect it is an oxygen, carbon, or silicon related reaction, possibly involving some means of converting ultraviolet to the visible spectrum due to electrolyte contents. I think acetic acid (pure distilled vinegar) electrolyte produces an especially green glow, and some electrolyte/electrode combinations produce a more blue-green glow - but this is highly subjective and needs substantiation via spectrometry. Michael Foster wrote: If you add a fluorescent dye to the electrolyte you get a much brighter display. And of course, you can choose the color you want. Fluorescein or rhodamine 6G work nicely. I don't know if this is first hand experimental knowledge, but if so then a large part of the photon energy created must be UV. In addition to stripping electrons from OH- radicals, the high field gradient can strip protons from water molecules: H2O --- OH- + H+ (occurs normally due
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 26, 2005, at 5:09 PM, Frederick Sparber wrote: At Sandia Labs in 1960-61 I made instant Hard Anodized Aluminum (6061T6) rods and strips by dipping them into a weak acid solution such as Molybdic with lots of dry ice in the solution using a brass plate as the cathode. A 250 D.C. power supply 500 Ma and one hand in pocket as the Al touched the surface made a smooth, insulating grayish anodized coating as the material was immersed in the electrolyte, that took over 3 kV to get breakdown using a scribe.lots of arcing- sparking but we got the parts we needed. There weren't any pharisees at hand. Baking Soda NaHCO3 undergoes Hydrolysis of HCO3- to form OH - anions too. Fred Yes, you have posted this here before. Interesting about the dry ice. Was that for cooling purposes only or do you think the carbon played a role in the coating formation? A critical factor in creating the weird glow and diode effect is maintaining electron conduction even though anions are screened. It may be reasonable to expect carbon provides some electron conduction, though given the breakdown voltage of your coating was 3 kV then probably not much carbon in the coating. Maybe more carbon goes into a film created using baking soda or vinegar electrolytes.
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
Another variation on electrospark: http://www.earthtech.org/experiments/sparkly/report.html No excess energy, but uses AC, LiOH electrolyte, 6061 alloy Al rods, and is way up in the electrospark regime at 400 V. Nice photos and description. Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 12:33 PM, Robin van Spaandonk wrote: If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, The electrodes do indeed form diodes with high breakdown voltages, depending on the metal and electrolyte used. For example, Al and Zr, can glow, Mg and Pb produce no glow. It takes while for the diode layer to form, and that time varies significantly depending on the electrolyte used. Saturated CaO got very quick results, Na2SiO3 at 0.1 g/l took about 15 min. in one case. Al apparently forms a very thin layer, while Zr forms a thick white layer in saturated CaO electrolyte. The glow can be formed in NaOH or acetic acid electrolytes. My impression was that the glow could be suppressed by use of old electrolyte that had significant Al in it due to electrosparking. Similarly, the glow can be suppressed by use of alum for the electolyte. I did not investigate this aspect thoroughly and it could be wrong, but it *was* in my notes. Some forms (alloys) of aluminum apparently do not achieve blue glow. I had a type of aluminum wire that did not produce a blue glow even in the same electrolyte in which foil worked. That wire also formed a sludge at the bottom of the cell. However, it may be that the glow did not form in that case because electrosparks form easily on thin wires and electrosparks short out electron paths through the oxide layer. This too offers some support for your assertion below. When the electrode is conditioned and the glow is formed, the i vs V curve looks like Fig 1. (Use Courier font to view.) /| / / --/ / / /-/ / / |/ Fig 1. - i vs V curve The i vs T curve looks like Fig. 2. /\ / \ --\ /\ /..\.. \ / \ / ---/ \ / \/ Fig. 2 - i vs T for blue glow. The diode effect can be seen by replacing a conditioned electrode with a fresh electrode. One half of the trace indicates and ordinary linear ohm's law relation, while the conditioned electrode's phase shift and breakdown voltage remains evident. and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The glow forms when the electrode is the anode. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. Fig. 1 and 2 do in fact indicate a breakdown at a threshold voltage level, which is consistent with this hypothesis. Further, when using a variac to sweep the peak voltage, the blue glow onset begins at the breakdown voltage and increases as the voltage is increased from there. It appears to be proportional to the breakdown current. This is also supportive of your hypothesis. One thing that bothers me a bit about your hypothesis though, is that the glow is the same color regardless of whether Zr or Al is used. It is the same for a Zr electrode with a very thick coating as it is for Al with a very thin coating. Additionally, If two ohmmeter probes are placed across an aluminum electrode after the experiment, they indicate nearly zero resistance. There seems to be some (instantaneous) interaction between the coating and the electrolyte that produces the large breakdown voltage. The breakdown voltage for a previously conditioned Zr electrode used in a 0.5 g/l Na2SiO3 electrolyte starts at about 320 V and drops to about 280 V as the experiment progresses. I don't think this voltage fall-off is due to temperature, because cells pre-heated to 100 Deg. C were used. I don't know what causes this. This absolute voltage I think as also a function of the electrolyte resistance, but that should *increase* as electrolyte boils off. It is of interest that, provided the electrospark regime is avoided, and appropriate electrolyte is used, the blue glow can go on almost indefinitely without destroying the electrodes. I think the glow requires suppression of the plating type reactions, e.g.: Al+++ + 3e- --- Al (at cathode) Al - 3e- -- Al+++ (at anode) I think the oxide layer, at some thickness, must prevent this. This also supports your hypothesis, in that the Al can not be oxidized. The only thing likely to be oxidized at the anode is OH-, producing OH, or HOOH, which then provides some support for recombination reactions as the source of the blue glow. This would explain why both Zr and Al produce the same color. The oxidation reaction may come from OH or HOOH produced at the anode and then diffusing and coming into contact with H3O+
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 20, 2005, at 8:50 AM, I wrote: The diode effect then essentially comes from the difference in mobility of protons vs OH- through the anode interface layer. That should say: The diode effect then essentially comes from the difference in mobility of protons through the cathode interface layer vs OH- through the anode interface layer. Continuing this line of thought, if neutral OH is indeed created at the anode then OH- is a principle charge carrier of the cell (no surprise). However, this leaves the problem of why there is the lack of hydrogen creation at the cathode. The hydrogen creating cathode reaction 2 H3O+ + 2 e- --- H2 + 2 H2O must be suppressed. This means H3O+ radicals must be suppressed. Additionally, for each charge carried to the anode there must be a similar charge carried to the cathode, otherwise electrolyte neutrality is not maintained. Charge density everywhere in an electrolyte, except at the interface, is neutral. Here is another candidate reaction for glow creation: OH + H3O+ --- OH+ + H2O Another is: HOOH + H3O+ --- H2O + HOOH- There are also a number of other essentially neutral reactions involving OH, H2O, and HOOH that must have equilibrium points as well. However, the current is carried and there must be a cation reaction at the cathode involving that cation and that does not create hydrogen. A logical reaction is: OH+ + e- --- H2O Very strange. Is it possible that H2O double layer encapsulated OH+ and OH- ions migrate past each other in the electrolyte without annihilation? Perhaps another candidate for the blue glow is just OH- + OH+ = HOOH or OH- + OH+ = 2 OH This all seems a bit weird. However *something* must eliminate H3O+ from the cathode vicinity.
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
The diode effect must essentially come from the difference in mobility of protons through the cathode interface layer vs OH- through the anode interface layer. Continuing this line of thought, and the bumbling and stumbling around, if neutral OH is indeed created at the anode then OH- is a principle charge carrier of the cell, but possibly only in the close proximity to the anode. The standard (net) oxygen creating anode reaction, hydronium reduction, is: 4 OH- --- 2 H2O + O2 + 4 e- (anode) The (net) hydrogen creating cathode reaction is 2 H3O+ + 2 e- --- H2 + 2 H2O (cathode) I have run a cell using full wave rectified DC and having a aluminum anode preconditioned with AC in a 0.1 M Na2SiO3 electrolyte. The anode glow was sustained on the anode and no glow was present on the cathode. Gas production was less than similar DC between two Pb electrodes, for similar current, if I recall correctly. I don't see any sensible way the gas generated per amp-second could be changed, so I have to question my recollection on this. There is no clear reason for a change in Faradaic efficiency, especially a *reduction* in Faradaic efficiency. The only means I can see for this would be a conduction path for electrons, and no substantial path for electrons apparently exists. It *does* still seem reasonable that a barrier to ions between the cathode surface and the electrolyte would force the anode current to mostly involve: OH- --- OH + e- and this reaction would offhand seem to require substantial penetration of the anode interface layer by the hydroxyl radical OH-. Other anions would seem to be less likely to make the exchange due to large size. At this point it seems reasonable that the stripping of the electron possibly occurs with great frequency when the hydroxyl radical is separated from the anode by the first atomic layer of the anode interface. This effect could only happen in the presence of a screening layer that prevents current flowing from the anode to the electrolyte via positively charged metal ions. Such an ion current would reduce the voltage drop across the interface to a few volts. With the ion screen in place, only electron motion can make the current flow. Given a voltage drop across the interface of 200 V, and a thickness of the nonconducting layer near the anode as 20 angstroms, the electrostatic field would be 2x10^12 V/m. This should be plenty strong enough to strip an electron from the OH- and drive it as a free electron through the water molecules of the interface. Such an ionizing influence would have the power to disassociate water, and subsequently cause the recombining of the products. Therefore, recombination may well be the cause of the blue-green glow. This would explain why the color of the glow on Al and Zr anodes is the same color. It seems this set of assumptions explains the known results, other than my recollection of a reduced Faradaic efficiency, a recollection which may well be flawed. This free electron regime may possibly facilitate electron catalyzed fusion. Have we been paying attention to the wrong electrode?
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 20, 2005, at 3:33 PM, I wrote: Given a voltage drop across the interface of 200 V, and a thickness of the nonconducting layer near the anode as 20 angstroms, the electrostatic field would be 2x10^12 V/m. This should have said: Given a voltage drop across the interface of 120 V, and a thickness of the nonconducting layer near the anode as 4 angstroms, the electrostatic field would be 3x10^11 V/m, or over 30 V/ (hydrogen atomic radius). OK, so there is a short version of this answer. On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: In a dark room, the electrodes glow. See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? An aluminum oxide layer grows on the surface of the electrodes to a thickness which prevent ion flow to or from the electrode. This layer passes electrons however, either through conduction or through tunneling. The effect of this layer is to create a zone free of ions, and having a very strong electric field, about 300 trillion volts per meter. Current to the anode is conveyed by electrons stripped from negative ions in the electrolyte and which accelerate and disrupt water molecules in the ion free zone on their way to the anode. The products of this disruption, various forms of hydrogen and oxygen, then recombine to form water, and in the process of recombination emit the characteristic blue-green glow of this recombination. Hopefully this is a correct answer. However, as a response from an unqualified and doddering old amateur, it is not to be trusted! 8^)
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
Sometimes I can't get anything right! Sorry. One more time ... On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: In a dark room, the electrodes glow. See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? An aluminum oxide layer grows on the surface of the electrodes to a thickness which prevent ion flow to or from the electrode. This layer passes electrons however, either through conduction or through tunneling. The effect of this layer is to create a zone free of ions, and having a very strong electric field, about 300 billion volts per meter. Current to the anode is conveyed by electrons stripped from negative ions in the electrolyte and which accelerate and disrupt water molecules in the ion free zone on their way to the anode. The products of this disruption, various forms of hydrogen and oxygen, then recombine to form water, and in the process of recombination emit the characteristic blue-green glow of this recombination. The ion free layer, the anode interface, creates a diode effect. The diode effect comes from the difference in the high mobility of protons through the cathode interface layer vs the low mobility of big negative ions through the anode interface layer. Hopefully this is a correct answer. However, as a response from an unqualified and doddering old amateur, it is not to be trusted! 8^) Regards, Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Tue, 20 Dec 2005, Michael Foster wrote: I don't think its accurate to refer to this as electroluminescence. It's more like electro-scintillation. If you look at the electrode under about 40X magnification, it resembles a swarm of fireflies. Anodized aluminum has a VERY weird structure; columnar holes like a bee's honeycomb. I wonder if any aluminum parts would have this structure, or if the structure is created during the experiment? See an SEM photo: http://www.caswellplating.com/kits/aluminum.htm I could see how gas pockets could easily develop inside those tubes, while with other metals convection might operate to carry away the gas-loaded solution before bubbles would start to grow. Does only aluminum produce the light, or are there other metals too? Also... whenever electrochemistry is concerned, I always wonder if hyperthermophilic nanobacteria have involved themselves. They specialize in feeding off a variety of chemical reactions, and they're so small that they don't show up in most SEM photos. Also, everything in our world is infected by the things, and they can't be killed by autoclaves, etc. (but certain chemical sterilization techniques work.) So, if all the materials involved in this experiment could be guaranteed to be free of nanobacterial contamination, would the experiment still produce light? Heh. For that matter, do palladium cathodes require unnoticed cavity-dwelling nanobacteria colonies in order to produce excess heat? :) Most of the light given off is apparently in the UV. If you add a fluorescent dye to the electrolyte you get a much brighter display. HA! I was wondering if that would happen. If a jet of dyed water was sprayed across the plate, the fluorescence might brightly show off the fluid flow patterns in the boundary layer. And of course, you can choose the color you want. Fluorescein or rhodamine 6G work nicely. I wonder if the UV output is nitrogen emission lines (or argon lines as happens with sonoluminescence.) (( ( ( ( ((O)) ) ) ) ))) William J. BeatySCIENCE HOBBYIST website billb at amasci com http://amasci.com EE/programmer/sci-exhibits amateur science, hobby projects, sci fair Seattle, WA 206-789-0775unusual phenomena, tesla coils, weird sci
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 8:48 PM, Michael Foster wrote: I don't think its accurate to refer to this as electroluminescence. It's more like electro-scintillation. If you look at the electrode under about 40X magnification, it resembles a swarm of fireflies. Most of the light given off is apparently in the UV. If you add a fluorescent dye to the electrolyte you get a much brighter display. And of course, you can choose the color you want. Fluorescein or rhodamine 6G work nicely. It just dawned on me that the above nicely describes the *electrospark* regime. When you push the voltage way beyond the initial blue glow stage, you get the blue glow punctuated with little flashes that dance all around the electrode. Noise can be heard in the cell too. If the regime is pushed even higher the spots can fix on the electrodes and really dig into it, reducing in apparent quantity, reducing the blue glow, and making sludge in the bottom of the cell. When the electrospark regime begins the V vs T oscilloscope trace changes significantly. Lots of tiny spikes appear superimposed over the trace. It is as if the trace develops little hairs. My impression is the spikes are due to sparks penetrating the insulating oxide. In the initial stages the spark loci heal immediately, so the sparks dance all around. I don't know that they would dance all around if highly regulated DC were used, however. I used AC and half or full wave rectified DC. I also experimented with a bypass capacitor to enhance the spark initiated oscillations. It may be of side interest that a strong magnetic field seemed on occasion to make the fixed spots more intense and dig in too, and even caused spots to form on the back side of the electrode where they normally did not form. My impression is the blue glow is reduced when strong fixed spots appear. The electrospark regime is destructive to electrodes long term. The blue glow regime can be run indefinitely. Regards, Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
first thought, id have to do it to match, but the color of the glow is similar to burning baking soda. it could simply be the layer on the alluminum valence jumping. On 12/19/05, William Beaty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: See below!-- Forwarded message --Date: Sun, 18 Dec 2005 22:35:07 -0600 From: Brian Whatcott betwys1@Reply-To: Forum for Physics Educators [EMAIL PROTECTED]To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Electroluminescence DemoMix 1 tablespoon baking soda in 1 pint water.Cut two electrodes from an aluminum pie dishPlace the elctrodes on opposite sides of a jam-jar.Connect the electrolytic cell in series with a 75 watt lamp to a 120 volt AC line supply - or better, through a 1:1isolation transformer.Care!The light quickly dims.In a dark room, the electrodes glow.See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htmWhat is the mechanism?Brian WhatcottAltus OKEureka!-- Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to writeVoltaire
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? This was discussed here in 2004 and prior years. For some background see: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf My opinion is the glow is probably caused by recombination and some other effects noted in the above pdf. Could of course be quite wrong. Could be a hole-electron annihilation at the surface of a film deposited on the electrode for example. It could be hole conducting metals, e.g. Zn, would need no film at all. Could also be the mechanism for CaO or phosphate electrolytes differs from the above too. I did not follow up on this to pin it down. I diverted my attention to some exiting inertial drive projects for a long time and had to interrupt even that for personal reasons for many months. I terribly miss doing scientific things. Regards, Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? As food for thought, you might also check out: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf Even though the blue glow is an anode effect, proton involvement is highly likely. There are some notes in the above pdf about proton tunneling that may be relevant. A wild speculation is that free protons are stripped of electrons at the anode, probably have the highest concentration there, and may in rarely and briefly existing pairs have the ability to tunnel as pairs into seed locations, like free electrons.
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
In reply to William Beaty's message of Mon, 19 Dec 2005 10:50:46 -0800 (PST): Hi, [snip] Mix 1 tablespoon baking soda in 1 pint water. Cut two electrodes from an aluminum pie dish Place the elctrodes on opposite sides of a jam-jar. Connect the electrolytic cell in series with a 75 watt lamp to a 120 volt AC line supply - or better, through a 1:1 isolation transformer. Care! The light quickly dims. In a dark room, the electrodes glow. See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? [snip] If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://users.bigpond.net.au/rvanspaa/ Competition provides the motivation, Cooperation provides the means.
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
i go with that. especially, as i said, the color matches when you burn it. therefore it makes sense that we have electrons jumping to higher valence energy levels, and emitting when they drop. On 12/19/05, Robin van Spaandonk [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: In reply toWilliam Beaty's message of Mon, 19 Dec 2005 10:50:46-0800 (PST):Hi,[snip]Mix 1 tablespoon baking soda in 1 pint water. Cut two electrodes from an aluminum pie dishPlace the elctrodes on opposite sides of a jam-jar.Connect the electrolytic cell in series with a 75 watt lampto a 120 volt AC line supply - or better, through a 1:1 isolation transformer.Care!The light quickly dims.In a dark room, the electrodes glow.Seehttp://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism?[snip]If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occursduring reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls acrossa very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable ofexciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms.Regards,Robin van Spaandonk http://users.bigpond.net.au/rvanspaa/Competition provides the motivation,Cooperation provides the means.-- Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to writeVoltaire
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
On Dec 19, 2005, at 9:50 AM, William Beaty wrote: See http://home.earthlink.net/~lenyr/borax.htm What is the mechanism? I wrote: As food for thought, you might also check out: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/BlueAEH.pdf Messing up things as usual! That should have said:As food for thought, you might also check out: http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/SpotsPairs.pdff Even though the blue glow is an anode effect, proton involvement is highly likely. There are some notes in the above pdf about proton tunneling that may be relevant. A wild speculation is that free protons are stripped of electrons at the anode, probably have the highest concentration there, and may in rarely and briefly existing pairs have the ability to tunnel as pairs into seed locations, like free electrons. I should also have mentioned AEH background info at: http://mtaonline.net/~hheffner/AtomicExpansion.pdf Regards, Horace Heffner
Re: weird glow from aluminum in baking soda solution
Robin wrote: If the electrodes do indeed form diodes, and the glow occurs during reverse bias, then that is when a high voltage falls across a very thin chemical layer. The electron leakage current could be sufficiently accelerated to produce energetic electrons capable of exciting high energy (i.e. blue) transitions within the atoms. I may be the only Vort having extensive practical experience with this phenomenon. Yes, the electrodes really form diodes. This is hundred-year-old stuff. If you use lead or stainless steel for one of the electrodes it makes a serviceable rectifier, although the voltage drop is about five volts, as opposed to a silicon rectifier at about .6 volt. I don't think its accurate to refer to this as electroluminescence. It's more like electro-scintillation. If you look at the electrode under about 40X magnification, it resembles a swarm of fireflies. Most of the light given off is apparently in the UV. If you add a fluorescent dye to the electrolyte you get a much brighter display. And of course, you can choose the color you want. Fluorescein or rhodamine 6G work nicely. Given the appearance of the electrodes under magnification, I'm not sure if Robin's hypothesis would explain the phenomenon. Wouldn't electron leakage current produce a more uniform light intensity? Alternate explanations might be simple arcing on a microscopic scale, or maybe oxygen bubble formation and subsequent collapse, thereby producing sonoluminescence. Incidentally, you can still form the semiconductor layer at lower voltage, around 15V, but no light is given off. I'm not sure what the voltage threshold is for the glow. M. ___ Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com The most personalized portal on the Web!
