Stephen,
There is simply not enough reliable information to answer your
objections. Fortunately, several replication attempts on the basic
concept are underway, but using differing approaches.
Is it possible he suspected that the results with the batteries were
directly related to the consumption of the batteries themselves, rather
than an over-unity process in the system? Batteries make very expensive
fuel, after all.
Yes, of course - if they were really consummed. Palladium even more so.
But that misses the point.
The net energy extracted in the old reports, if the data can be
believed, is way, way above any possibility for chemical reaction; and
the batteries reportedly failed in, or near, a fully charged state anyway.
If there is even a small chance that the lead-acid battery, with slight
redesign, can serve the same function as an LENR cell (a variety not
involving fusion but beta-decay, or faux-beta decay), then the effort to
look deeper is worthwhile.
There is more than a cursory similarity between the lead-acid battery
presumed functionality and the SPAWAR functionality (Widom/Larsen
hypothesis) - assuming that some kind of enhanced or stimulated
beta-decay is at work in either case. Don't forget that the SPAWAR
(apparent) beta decay tracks occurred with plain hydrogen, as well as
deuterium.
A modified "Hydrex hypothesis" fits very nicely within the parameters of
these lead-acid cell reports.
For whatever reason, many experts seem to be marginalizing the Dufour
(Spence) ideas, which are ironically based on mainstream underpinning
(QED) when nothing else in LENR is based on such a firm theoretical
footing.
Jones
