On Sep 14, 2011, at 11:26 PM, Colin Hercus wrote:
Hi,
I haven't posted here before, I've just been lurking.
Thank you for posting!
A few months ago I wrote a simple finite element simulation for the
eCat, it's a simple model based on two chambers each with a thermal
equivalent of water with cold water entering chamber 1, being
heated by the heater and reactor and then the same water flowing
into a second chamber and supplying heat to it. By adjusting the
thermal masses I could get this model to pretty accurately predict
the temperatures on the ECat during the warm up period and then I
needed to add excess heat beyond the electrical supply to get the
temperature charts from Rossi's experiments.
Each of your water chambers have metal thermal masses associated? It
is the metal thermal mass that is important to determining heat after
death energy flows.
I think a single water chamber (tube) is sufficient to get a rough
handle on the prior demonstration numbers. Water can proceed down
the tube from pre-heat to boiling to steam heat regimes. This need
not be simulated. Who knows what happens in the new E-cat, about
which little is known? It is just a black box.
It is important to understanding the prior demos that there is a
thermal resistance and mass between the band heater and chamber.
There is also a thermal resistance between the band heater and the
lead wrapped around it. Thirdly, when the entire thermal mass heats
the water after power off, the band heater represents an additional
thermal resistance between the outside lead thermal mass and the
water chamber, plus contributes its own thermal mass. Outside the
chamber there are three metal thermal storage masses involved and
three thermal resistances. In the earlier demo E-cats, there was a
water a pre-heater element inside the chamber. There were
independent electrical energy flows into the pre-heater, and into
the band heater thermal mass. It is the heat flow dynamics between
the three external thermal masses and the water compartment that is
essential to understand what is happening when input power is turned
off.
This pretty well convinced me that Rossi was onto something. I'll
paste a couple of charts from the simulation but I'm not sure if
they'll come through.
The simulation is not perfect but I think it's close enough. The
major issue is that as the reactor chamber heats above boiling we
have a mix of steam & water in it and moving into chamber 2. Rather
than simulate this I just model chamber 1 as water >100C with no
steam. That's why the red line goes over 100C, you can think of it
as the amount of heat going into the next chamber rather than
temperature.
Below is simulation from 16 Dec Test. It uses 900W input power with
increase to 1800W at 17:47 and two chamber model of thermal mass
0.7kg and 1.3kg. The model also has power dropping to 0 at 18:00,
Levi reported that the reaction self sustained for 15 minutes. An
interesting point is fast cool down of the real reactor at 18:15 vs
the slow cool down predicted by the model. This is 100 consistent
with Levi report that water flow was increased to stop the reaction.
And now the simulation from 14th Jan test. This first chart shows
simulated temperature based on zero excess power. The simulation is
overlaid over actual power and temperature charts from the report.
The interesting point is that the simulation fits the initial
temperature rise and the fall at the end of the experiment. The
only explanation for the actual temperature graph is excess heat.
These simulations, though not perfect, have convinced me there is
excess energy.
Now comes this new demo so I just entered all the data provided by
Mats, adjusted the thermal mass (33kg) to get the initial rise in
temperature to match the data, and ... The charts are pretty
consistent with there being no excess energy, the drop in
temperature after the power is off can be fully explained as
thermal inertia (with thermal mass equivalent of 33kg of water in
two chambers) BUT only if during this power off period there is not
much power being used to make steam!
Now the simulation didn't fit this eCat as well as earlier
experiments which I think is because we don't know the geometry of
the device or the exact placement of the thermometer.
The only evidence for excess heat is the one measurement of
overflowing water. Mat later calculates a "Worst Case Scenario" and
I think he messed up a bit, my "worst Case" is:
1) Under "Water Flow Inlet" he reports flow as 11.08 kg/hr during
boiling
2) At 21:50 he measures water overflow as 5.0 to 6.5 kg/hr
3) So "worst" estimate of steam is 11.08 -6.5 = 4.58 kg/hr
4) if this was 90% steam (distinctly possible for a boiler) then we
get about 4.1 kg/hr of steam
5) Times heat of vapourisation (628wh/kg) = 2600Watts
6) And heating 11.08 kg/hr to boiling = 11.08 * 81.3 = 900W
so as input power is close to 2600W we only have 900W excess
energy. Not very convincing for a module of a 1MW plant!
Yes, not convincing with regard to practicality. Also, only direct
total energy balance measurements for each test provide any degree of
credibility due to the highly dynamic nature of the black box
functioning. Power measurements are not meaningful in this case
because the thermal power through the various elements changed with
time.
I'd also like to address the fact that temperature rose after power
was turned off. This can be explained by thermal inertia if the
point where heat being applied was not the same point where
temperature was being measured. The point where heat was being
applied could be quite a bit hotter than 130C and even after power
was cut we could could continue to get output temperature rising.
Just imagine a steel bar and we heat one end and measure the
temperature at the other end, there is a lag as heat transfers
along the bar, turning off the heat and the the cool end of the bar
continues to increase in temperature for a while.
Yes indeed.
Of all the demos reported this new one is the least convincing and
is a major disappointment.
Yes.
Colin
On Thu, Sep 15, 2011 at 9:22 AM, Joe Catania <[email protected]>
wrote:
You're trying to be too exacting. I'm pointing out facts. Because
I'm not giving you a equation of everything dosen't mean thermal
inertia has been ruled out. Thus you've made a grave philosophical
error. It means its thermal inertia but I haven't given you the
equation. Thermal inertia is a first principle. It is accepted
without proof.
If I add 1 megajoule to a hunk of metal at room temp and its temp
goes up to 500C then it seems safe to assume that removing that 1MJ
will take the temp back down to room temp. I'll admit that you're
saying flow complicates this simple picture but its far from
certain that you've established that through proof or equations.
For instance in both cases cold water is imput at the same rate and
temperature so why should there be a difference?
----- Original Message -----
From: Finlay MacNab
To: [email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2011 8:49 PM
Subject: RE: [Vo]:E-cat news at Nyteknik
Excellent observation! If this was a closed system with no FLOWING
WATER EXITING THE SYSTEM you would have a point. As it is you have
only discredited your argument about thermal inertia.
Congratulations!
I find your hand waving arguments completely unconvincing. Please
describe in detail the geometry of the system you propose could
account for the observed changes in temperature taking into account
the well known rate of heat exchange between water and metals/other
materials and the heat capacities of the various materials. Also,
please account for the energy inputs and outputs to the device
during its operation.
5 minutes with a text book will convince anyone with half a brain
that what you describe is more improbable than cold fusion itself!
Please do everyone here a favor and give a rigorous explanation of
how "thermal inertia" can explain the rossi device. Please use
equations and data to back up your claims.
If you don't want to do this please stop spamming this message
board and distracting from more interesting discussion.
Well, at a setting of 9 you have the same temp rise in 35 minutes
as temperature fall in 35 minutes after power-off.
----- Original Message -----
From: Mark Iverson-ZeroPoint
To: [email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2011 4:55 PM
Subject: RE: [Vo]:E-cat news at Nyteknik
JC stated:
“(and note that this takes considerable time in the ramp up)”
Where he is referring to the long time it takes to ramp up the E-
Cat’s internal temperature on startup…
Mr. Catania, do you realize that the electrical power into the E-
Cat’s resistance heater was NOT started at 100%, it was started at
a setting of ‘5’ and RAMPED UP slowly over 40 minutes! Here is the
time progression for resistance heater power…
Timestamp PLC Setting DeltaTime (minutes)
--------- ----------- ----------
18:59 5 0
19:10 6 11
19:20 7 10
19:30 8 10
19:40 9 10
We know that the ‘Setting’ is referring to the duty cycle, but we
do not know exactly what the relationship is… since 9 is the
MAXimum setting, and Lewan states ‘power was at this point
constantly switched on’, then a setting of ‘9’ is presumably a 100%
duty cycle. (?)
Since the PLC’s are programmable, we cannot assume that a setting
of ‘5’ is 50% or 60%; it could even be programmed to be 10% duty
cycle. So no useful calculations OR conclusions can be made during
this ramp-up phase.
-Mark
From: Joe Catania [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2011 11:58 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Vo]:E-cat news at Nyteknik
I think it caused a rise. There is no rise. Its your imagination.
The temperature at power off is too low and must be discarded. If I
bring a piece of metal the size of an E-Cat to some temperature
(and note that this takes considerable time in the ramp up) and
then I cut the power, the temperature will not instantaneously
drop. It will stay at the same temperature and decline slowly.
There is much too much mass for what your talking about to happen.
I have to laugh at the fact that if you saw the temp drop even a
hundredth of a degree at power down you would have declared the
thermal inertia regime over and the CF regime to have begun.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
