I emailed a response to Henk Houkes over 4 hours ago, but I think the
bad subject line prevented acceptance by the server.
On Sep 23, 2011, at 1:02 PM, Henk Houkes wrote:
Horace,
Regarding the input power measurements you may want to re-read the
Nyteknik article athttp://www.nyteknik.se/nyheter/energi_miljo/
energi/article3144827.ece
It states: A phenomenon that Kullander and Essén noted was that the
curve for the water temperature at the output showed a steady
increase up to about 60 degrees centigrade, after which the
increase escalated.
“The curve then became steeper, it clearly had a new derivative. At
the same time there was no increase in power consumption, it rather
decreased when it got warmer,” said Essén.
This suggests that contrary to your assumptions, the input power
(actually the input current) was monitored and did not increase at
the moment of the bend.
My comments were a review of the article:
http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/EssenHexperiment.pdf
I do not find this remark in the article. However, the remark
clearly is quoted in the article you reference above however. In any
case I take the remark to mean there was momentary monitoring of the
current at that time, not continuous monitoring of the power. My
general point about all this is the casual nature of the study and
report, the very brief time spent with the device, do not bring the
study to a high level of credibility. The power measurement is only a
small part of the overall picture.
The noticed decrease of input current is consistent with a positive
temperature coefficient of the band heater resistor.
With a resistive load the powerfactor will be close to unity.
The current probe was not calibrated, it may have been off by 5%.
Another correction to be made to the stated inputpower is that the
actual mains voltage in Bologna is 230V i.s.o. 220V. That"s another
5%.
It all adds up to an inputpower of maximum 364 Watts, which is by
far not enough to boil the water.
So the main conclusion from E&K that the e-Cat generates extra heat
still stands.
It is not known with certainty what the thermometer measured. The
temperature curve makes no sense. The only thing known is it
measures the temperature somewhere inside an insulating jacket. It is
not known with certainty the total energy actually generated. It is
not known with certainty the actual input flow rate at all times. It
is not known with certainty the water overflow rate. It is not known
with certainty the output temperature, for either the liquid or gas
phase. You are right that some excess power is feasible if all is as
represented and assumed. The problem of credibility is in the
inconsistencies and lack of continual data recording or integrating.
It appears from evidence of inconsistencies that all is possibly not
as presented and assumed.
Of course you could argue that there must have been an additional
powersource, or the poor chaps did not clamp the current meter
around the right wire etc, but that seems unlikely.
The power source is not the only issue, though that seems to me not
credible without a kWh meter or continual data acquisition. Also, it
makes no sense to drive only the band heater when the auxiliary
heater is supposedly what heats the fuel and triggers the reaction.
Why was no mention made of this? The temperature curves do not make
sense, which brings into question the internal structure. For
example, there could be separate compartments, one capable of
generating steam, another through which water only flows and then
overflows. We don't even know for sure, from the report, that more
than 300 W thermal power was produced.
The main, and even underlined, conclusion of the report was that "Any
chemical process for producing 25 kWh from any fuel in a 50 cm3
container can be ruled out." This conclusion is not credible because
it is not credible all the water was converted to steam, unless
perhaps the hose was never attached during the steam generating
period. This means the 4.39 kW number is not credible, and thus the
25 kWh number is not credible, and thus 25 the kWh number is not
credible. Furthermore, unless the stainless steel container for the
Ni, plus any extended heat transfer means, was much larger than 50
ml, it is not credible that 4 kW or even 1 kW came from it.
There could have been energy generated, for sure. There are
tantalizing hints. What is lacking is credible evidence for excess
energy. It strikes me as nonsensical to devote so little time to
developing iron clad calorimetry. A month or two effort seems to me
highly justified, given billions of dollars might be at stake.
Alternatively, an organization like Earthtech International, which
has its own equipment and expertise, and which does this kind of
evaluation at no cost, could be used with little expenditure of time
or money.
regards
Henk
I think my conclusion regarding the report makes sense. Here it is
again:
CONCLUSION
The report has various inconsistencies which prevent any solid
conclusions from being drawn. The E-cat only has value if the total
energy out for a long operation is much greater than total energy
in. It is feasibly inexpensive and not complex to directly measure
total energy in vs total energy out for long runs of this sized
device, measuring only the electrical input and thermal output of the
device independent of the device itself. Such a long term total
energy balance measurement eliminates any need to know the internals
of the device or to account for the extreme complexities of thermal
dynamics to determine its energy generating capacity.
This report is not a scientific paper, but a travel report as stated
in the article. It is an excellent report of what happened. However,
for the conclusions of the report to be scientifically credible a
great deal more is required in the way of calorimetry and data
collection.
The standard of evaluation of this kind of device for commercial
purposes, which could entail the investment of millions or billions
of dollars, should rise to a much higher standard than requirements
for publishing a scientific paper. Further, because the field itself
has such a controversial history, and yet has a colossal potential to
do much good for billions of people, there is a duty to rise to the
highest possible standard of data acquisition to avoid the extensive
damage failure of such a highly visible public affair can have on
what little research is now funded, and to reach that high standard
as quickly as possible.
Best regards,
Horace Heffner
http://www.mtaonline.net/~hheffner/
