See my previous reply to Eric. Bare Ni will sinter together into a low porosity bulk at 500C. Coating the Ni particles with the Fe2O3 nanopowder before they ever get hot prevents large scale sintering. The "tubercles" that Rossi described during growth are micron-scale features. These are not active themselves, just a marker of the thermochemical processing. I have seen these myself. These do not melt like nanoscale features.
On Sat, Oct 18, 2014 at 1:51 PM, Axil Axil <[email protected]> wrote: > Bob Higgins: "Even these 4-10 micron scale nickel particles will sinter > into a porous mass by heating at 500-700C". > > Rossi uses micro particles in the 2 to 10 micron range. The nano > structured surface tubercles coating will melt at lower temperatures that > the sintering of the entire particle. This coat was seen to be intact in > photos of these micro-particles from the TPT. > > On Sat, Oct 18, 2014 at 3:37 PM, Bob Cook <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Bob-- >> >> Thanks for that clarification about the melting of small Ni particles. >> Are there any compounds or alloys of Ni that would not melt or sinter below >> say 1100 C? Since Rossi says he does not use Ni nano particles the fuel >> may be something else containing Ni that could be exposed to the Li at 1000 >> C in some reliable configuration. >> >> For example the following abstract suggests some possible substrates that >> would hold the Ni at temperature. >> >> Composite nano particles of Ni-TiC and Ni-TiN were prepared by an active >> plasma-metal reaction method. The structure and morphology were evaluated >> by X-ray diffraction and transmission electron microscopy observations. The >> morphology of the composite particles is dice-like or dumbbell-like, where >> the outer sides are metallic and the inner part of the rod (or dice)-like >> structure is TiC or TiN. The formation mechanism of the composite particles >> is considered by analogy to the VSL mechanism. *The thermal stability of >> the nanocomposite particles is vastly superior to that of the metal >> particle.* The excellent catalytic property of the Ni-TiN composite >> particle was confirmed when compared to the well-known Raney Ni particle >> and mixed particles of Ni and TiC. >> >> Note the increased thermal stability. >> >> Bob >> >> >>
