At 01:30 PM 7/19/2012, Jed Rothwell wrote:
Abd ul-Rahman Lomax <<mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]> wrote:
Do people here know that Pons and Fleischmann were seeing 100% of
their cells showing excess heat at the time that they announced?
I do not recall that every sample worked. Most of them did. It was
no mystery why. This was Pd developed by Johnson-Matthey for
hydrogen filters. Fleischmann explained that to anyone who asked,
and he gave out samples of the material. As he said: "When Uncle
Martin gives you palladium, it works. When you get some other
sample, it doesn't work. Think about that!"
He gave 4 samples to Mel Miles and they all worked. See Table 10:
<http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/MilesManomalousea.pdf>http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/MilesManomalousea.pdf
JM = Johnson Matthey. Most worked
F/P = JM material from Uncle Martin.
The hydrogen filter machines themselves produce strong cold fusion
effects with deuterium. As far as I know they have every time
someone tried one.
Read the Storms paper "How to Produce the Fleischmann-Pons Effect."
You will see that hydrogen filter material requires a set of
characteristics similar to cold fusion. The filters, so they do not
leak; cold fusion, so that it loads. See:
<http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/StormsEhowtoprodu.pdf>http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/StormsEhowtoprodu.pdf
That they had this success until they ran out of the original batch
of palladium; they had not even suspected that the effect might be
batch sensitive . . .
Nonsense. The first thing he ever told me was that the material is
critical, and you should ask Uncle Martin for some. By 1989 everyone
knew the material was critical.
Well, Jed, you may be right. However, when I wrote that Pons and
Fleischmann only had one out of six cells work -- I really don't
recall where I got that idea, and it might be from later work,
whatever -- I was immediately corrected with a claim from someone who
was active in the field at the time that they *all* worked, until
they ran out of the original material.
The truth may be somewhere south of "always." The claim that they
didn't understand that the effect was batch-specific might be a bit
different from what you apparently think. Consistent with both these
descriptions would be that they thought that Johnson-Matthey material
would be fine, that's what they were using, and other people were
failing with material from other sources.
Then they ran out of material, bought more from Johnson-Matthey, and
couldn't get the effect to show up!
The fact here, if we can ascertain it: did they use up the last of
the original Johnson-Matthey material, leaving none for analysis in
case a problem showed up? The report I read was very specific about
this, naming the assistant who actually used the material.
It was not merely supplier-specific, it was batch-specific. I've also
heard that Johnson-Matthey changed their process, which might explain
it. If I were being paid as a reporter, I'd be making lots of calls
and sending piles of emails, trying to dig up testimony.
, *so they didn't even keep any of the original material.* The rest
is history....
What history? They got more material and it worked fine, as far as I
know. When they were in France they ran 64 cells at a time, and all
64 worked. They were all pushed into a boil-off event followed by
heat after death. It as all J-M material, in a joint venture with
J-M and Toyota. The project came to an abrupt end when J-M and
Toyota got into a fight over intellectual property.
Years later Fleischmann and I tried to buy a kilogram of the stuff
but we could not raise the money. J-M no longer makes it by the old
technique but they offered to make some for us.
It seems likely that the material made with the newer process will
also work. The new process is cleaner and requires fewer toxic materials.
Jed, your account appears to conflict with what I've been told by
others whom I would *also* expect to know what they are talking
about. I'm interested in your personal account, because it may carry
more weight than something that was for others, even if they
confidently asserted it, who really just were transmitting rumors.
If you would describe the history, in detail, of your effort "years
later" in cooperation with Fleischmann, it would be valuable for the
history of this scientific fiasco.
(It *also* occurs that I misread and misremember what I've read. For
example, I wrote many times that Miles had such and such success,
showing excess heat in so many out of so many cells. That was based
on reports that actually didn't show that many "cells." They were
written about *samples*, many taken from the same cell, at different
times. The report itself did make it clear, but I'd read summaries of
Miles by others, that weren't *wrong*, but that were more easily
misinterpreted. What fascinates me, and somewhat horrifies me, is
that nobody corrected me on the idea that Miles had seen excess heat
in 21/33 cells. In other words, I can spout error in places where
many read it, including some who know what's real, and nobody says "Boo!")
Okay, NiH work wasn't previously the subject of such intense
investigation, and many people, I think, doubted that NiH even
worked. It probably does, but that's not at all the end of the question!
That is true. Mike McKubre said this at the recent conference. He
said they tried Ni-H at SRI, did not get a significant result, so he
abandoned it. He came hurrying back after Rossi made a splash. He
re-evaluated Piantelli and others. He now thinks it does work, after all.
At least I got something right.
