I wrote:
That was not a blind test as far as I know. Hoffman knew perfectly
well that the samples produced heat, but he did not want to talk
about for political reasons.
I just uploaded some of the Morrey paper. For the samples from F&P,
it was double-blind during the helium measurement phase but before
the paper was published Hoffman and the others knew that one rod
produced a little heat. The tests were inconclusive.
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
He was allied with Jones and Schneider of the anti-heat brigades.
Yeah, you've said this many times. I'd say it's dangerous
mind-reading, but you might know directly.
SRI sure knew. That's why they threatened a lawsuit, and got that
sheet inserted. Hoffman was implying that they did not follow through
on their contract obligations. That is, he implies they did not
report their heat results to EPRI (either positive or negative results).
What Hoffman reports was reported as a blind test, as I recall, and
I've seen some independent confirmation of that, I think.
Okay. He describes a variety of helium tests in Appendix D.
His first test was with Morrey ea al., double blind test of FP rods.
University of Utah, July 1989, Table D1. p. 160, 161. Inconclusive.
EPRI, December 1989. p. 162, Table D.3. No helium above background.
It doesn't say if it is blind or not. This is the one I recall
hearing may have had some but it probably leaked out.
ETEC's Leadville Experiment. Nothing to write home about.
University of Nebraska. Ditto. Why is there not even a paper on this?
U. Hawaii (molten salts). Small amounts of helium. These experiments
produced a ton of heat, so I suppose the helium was in the gas.
Lutch Institute, Moscow
Small amounts of helium from areas that were irradiated, none
outside. Could be implantation?
China Lake. Gas in flasks, and also Pd samples. See Miles
description. Hoffman: could be diffusion. ". . . helium levels of
~10^14 atoms are several orders of magnitude higher than that
measured by China Lake in many of their test flasks stored for
similar periods of time, bringing into question the accuracy of their
mass spectrometric analysis data." This was a problem with the first
set of glass flasks they used but Miles later used steel flasks.
I believe all China Lake flask tests were single blind; i.e. Miles
knew the history of the cells he sent out, but he did not tell the
people doing the tests until later. This book indicates that Hoffman
did know the history of the Pd sample, since they discussed with
China Lake people where to look for helium. (In a double blind test,
Miles would hand off a sample to a third person. The third person
would assign a secret random code and, in random order, would send
the samples to labs that measured helium. Neither Miles and Hoffman
would not know which sample was sent where until after the tests were
completed.)
Anyway, no significant amount of helium was found in the Pd. That's
the pattern throughout. These are samples sent from other labs. When
McKubre left samples in the cell, in situ, and used various methods
of driving out the helium, he did sometimes find it. Therefore -- as
I recall -- people concluded that most helium comes out in the gas.
There is sometimes helium in the Pd but it is close to the surface,
or trapped by surface layers of other materials on top of the Pd, and
rather easily lost, probably before the samples get to Hoffman.
There are other tests from Osaka U. and elsewhere. The only one that
seems definitive to me, with helium correlated with heat is E-Quest
Sciences, cavitation, done at Los Alamos, p. 190, 191. That's Russ
George doing a Stringham experiment. EPRI paid for the analysis.
Some increase in helium in the metal was observed. In the gas, for a
heat producing experiment, helium was 7,483 X 10^14 atoms, compared
to 4.6 X 10^14 atoms in the control (Table D.17).
The description is short and confusing compared to the others. Russ
George was unhappy with it. Let me quote it in full. Please ignore OCR errors:
E-Questsciences Cavitation Experiments
Helium measurements on ten palladium, four titanium, and five gas
samples collected in all metal systems were run. Two of the palladium
samples, one of the titanium samples, and two of the gas samples were
labeled as standards (controls). Helium-4 levels observed in the eight
"test" palladium samples ranged from 0.2 to 8.3 X lo9 atoms above
system background, with an average value of 3.3 X lo9 atoms. Helium-4
levels observed in the two palladium control samples were 4.0 and 3.1
X lo9 atoms, respectively, very close to the test sample average. No
measurable 3He was observed in the palladium or titanium samples.
Helium-4 levels in the three test titanium samples were indistinguishable
from system background. However, significant 4He was observed in
the titanium control sample labeled "Ti SRI Standard." Three separate
specimens from this sample were analyzed, with an average result of
1.10 k 0.07 x 10" atoms/mg, or approximately 0.9 appb.
Nominal helium concentrations in the five gas samples ranged from
approximately 0.1 to 550 ppm. The three test samples gave measured values
of 0.475, 2.55, and 552 ppm, respectively. The argon and deuterium
standards gave values of 272 and 0.114 ppm, respectively. Average
reproducibility
between the replicate gas analyses was approximately 1 %.
One of the test gas samples also had a small but measurable 3He content,
averaging approximately 4 X 10" atoms (around 3 appb). The 4He/
3He ratio for this sample averaged around 182. Natural helium isotopic
ratio in the atmosphere is around 8 X lo5. Helium-3 values for the other
four samples were at or below the sensitivity limit for this
particular analysis
series of 2 x 10'' atoms, consistent with the natural isotopic ratio.
Note: The E-Quest Sciences (Palo Alto, CA) results of experiments using
ultrasound induced transient cavitation on Pd and Ti metal targets in a heavy
water system are provided by the company. Reactions in the system are
characterized by the production of heat, 3He, and 4He. The aim of
demonstration experiments conducted at Los Alamos National Laboratories
(LANL) during Oct. 1993 and in April 1994 was to show the reproducibility
of the heat and helium producing methods in what E-Quest calls a Mark I1
research device. Independent measurement of 3He and 4He was performed at
the Rocketdyne supported by funding from EPRI (Palo Alto).
Rocketdyne reported up to - 10'' - 10l8 atoms of 4He (adjusted for total
reaction volume) produced in the LANL experiments which were in good
agreement with measurements of - lOI7 atoms of helium from similar
experiments made over a period of three years based on independent helium
analysis at the U.S. Bureau of Mines Helium Field Laboratory (Amarillo,
TX) and at SRI International (Menlo Park, CA.). Monitoring of the
experiments at LANL for energetic emissions with 3He neutron detectors,
liquid Nt germanium gamma detectors, and Geiger-Mueller detectors revealed
no signals above background.
Table D.17
Helium Analysis Results for E-Quest Sciences Gas Samples
~p Reactor Measured 3Hep Measured 'He 4He in Cylinder He Conc
Gas # (10'~at oms) (10'~a toms) (10'~at oms) (ppm)
Pd -20 hrs <O 0002 0 2506 4 632 0 471*
f 0.008
Ti <20 hrs 0.0042 0.7696 31.31 2.548*
f 0.01
Pd-20 hrs <0.0002 188.2 7483 553.5*
+I
Argon NM <0.475**
Air NM 5.22"'
* data is one of 3 sets of data ** avg. of He in sample 1 *** published value
Confusion with the report from Rocketdyne has arisen over a sample of argon gas
labeled as argon standard showing a concentration of He of 272 ppm. Only high
purity Argon (under lppm He) has ever been used in any E-Quest experiments
where helium analysis was conducted. The high helium content found in the
"argon standard' ruled out this inexpensive source of argon for
experiments where
measurements of helium are made.
Rocketdyne also conducted analysis for helium in control and target metal
samples. The maximum helium found in Pd metal (extrapolated to target mass
-3gm) was 2.2 x 10'' atoms, for Ti metal (extrapolated to target mass -1gm) was
1.1 x 1013 atoms.
(It is handy having all these books scanned on disk. A shame I cannot
upload them.)
He also mentioned Russ George in Chapter 9, in the only paragraph of
the book in which he mentioned a specific heat producing experiment.
This did not satisfy Russ, and I wouldn't have been happy with it
either, if I were him:
YS: Any other interesting experiments?
OM Russ George is putting sonic energy into heavy water and is
cavitating bubbles against either titanium or palladium surfaces.
Analyses of gas in an all-metal system have indicated significant
helium appearing in the system. All three types of experiments
mentioned here should be expanded in the future. I'm sure there are
other experiments with no apparent artifacts.
Oh yeah, he's sure, but he just doesn't feel like mentioning any. Or
listing any.
By the way, people who claim that Russ George made no important
contributions to this field are full of it.
All this should really be nailed down, because heat/helium is
very, very important . . .
And complicated.
Quoting Hoffman:
YS: Any phenomenon that is not reproducible at will is most likely not real.
OM: People in the San Fernando valley, Japanese, Columbians, et
al., will be glad to hear that earthquakes are not real.
YS: Ouch. I deserved that. My comment was stupid.
OM: A large number of people who should know better have parroted
that inane statement. There are, however, many artifacts that can
indicate a false period of heat production, as we have discussed.
No there are not many artifacts. None of the artifacts he discusses
in the book apply to the experiments in question, as I showed in my
review. He artfully gave the impression that the question is still
open when in fact it was closed. He carefully avoided quoting any
actual power level or net energy, and he did not discuss a single
paper in his book about heat, for crying out loud. That's why SRI
demanded he list their paper in the addendum. The Bibliography has
dozens of papers in every chapter, but not one in Chapter 5, on heat.
It does list 6 papers on heat in other chapters, but he never
mentions them. Chapter 5 includes only this cute evasion:
"Note: Listed bibliography concentrates solely on artifact
considerations, not on the numerous studies of heat generation in
deuterium/solid systems."
Okay, he says there are numerous studies. And we all know that heat
is central to cold fusion, being the principal signature of the
reaction. When he published the book there were well over 100 heat
replications in the peer-reviewed literature. And he has a whole
chapter about bogus reasons to doubt the heat. But for some
inexplicable reason he did not mention a single paper about heat, and
he writes not one about specifics such as watts or joules actually
measured -- no graphs, no summaries, nothing.
Okay he does mention that the heat exceed the limits of chemistry.
That's better than Huizenga or Taubes, but not by much.
Hoffman:
The question of whether heat is being produced is still open . . .
McKubre and many others strongly disagreed, and told Hoffman, before
and after he wrote the book.
Hoffman, writing chapter 10, shows no awareness of the heat/helium
correlation . . .
He pretends to have no awareness. He does not discuss this paper:
Miles, M., et al., Correlation of excess power and helium production
during D2O and H2O electrolysis using palladium cathodes. J.
Electroanal. Chem., 1993. 346: p. 99.
http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/MilesMcorrelatio.pdf
He might have disagreed with it. Who knows? To his credit, he does at
least list that paper in Bibliography for the Helium chapter, p. 214.
. . . and he clearly understood that it would be very significant.
He explicitly denies that it has been found, which would have held
true, pretty much, before 1993 (except for truly sporadic reports,
to my knowledge). The rest of his comments are reasonable for the
state of the science in 1993.
Not even!
- Jed
