At 04:15 PM 7/3/2012, Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
The error is in the interpretation of the effects. The primary paper is
http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/SzpakStheeffecto.pdf
Okay, the mystery is probably solved. The effects were probably real
and probably incorrectly ascribed to the high voltage itself.
I wrote to Pamela Mosier-Boss about the issue, and received a prompt reply.
When this research was published in 2005, there was extensive
discussion among CMNS researchers and it was pointed out that "for
the electric field to couple into the cathode, there had to be an AC
component."
Abd slapped his forehead at this point. I'd even thought of the AC
component, but speculated that it would be causing ultrasound. Okay,
maybe, but the obvious effect would be AC current through the
capacitance of the acrylic walls. It goes to show that the obvious
can still hide in plain sight.
Since this issue had been raised, Pamela had asked for a measurement
of the AC component. She reports that it was 6%.
Bingo.
If this was measured as I understand it would be measured, this would
be peak to peak AC of 6% of 6 KV, this would be 360 V p-p. Assuming
sinusoidal waveform just to get some number, this would be about 130 VRMS.
I don't know the frequency. If, however, this was from a flyback
converter, the frequency is often 100 KHz.
The insulating walls are 1.6 mm of acrylic. I may assume plates of
roughly 650 mm^2. The dielectric constant of acrylic is about 3, AFAIK.
The capacitance of each wall should then be roughly 10 pF.
There are two such capacitors in series, the net effective series
capacitance is about 5 pF. I come up with an impedance at 100 KHz of 300 Kohm.
The AC current would then be about 400 microamps. Could this affect
the cathode? I don't see why not!
This particular protocol is described in the paper as starting with
1000 microamps per cm^2. The size of the cathode is not stated. In
another SPAWAR protocol, the Galilelo protocol, the plating phase of
the protocol starts at 100 microamps and increases to 500 microamps.
400 microamps could be quite significant in terms of subtle effects
on morphology. I'm not familiar with AC electrochemistry, though, and
the frequency here may be high.
This was a rough calculation and I haven't made these for years, I
might have made some gross error. But there are people who read the
vortex list who could check what I've done.
Bottom line, it is not impossible at all that the subject conditions
would affect the cathode morphology. Rich Murray was correct that a
pure DC field would not. The interpretation in the paper did not
consider a possible AC component, and seems to have assumed that a DC
external field would be effective. However, the paper was only
reporting an experimental result, the effect on cathode morphology
from placing the codeposition cell in the field. The discussion in
the paper remains puzzling.
A suggestion will be made that some clarification be issued that the
effect may have been from a substantial AC component, leading to
possible suspicion that the same effect could be produced with a
small AC current established in the electrolyte. This may be
complicated, though, by the shutting down of the SPAWAR group by the
Navy. That group is, unfortunately, no longer doing LENR research at
the SPAWAR lab.
