Run 8 was conducted this morning using the same cathode as Run 7, which was made from W material supplied by Dr. Mizuno. The used cathode from Run 7 was cleaned abrasively by blasting it with glass beads (in a glass bead blasting machine) and then it was rinsed with acetone.

Fresh electrolyte was prepared using a grocery-store product called "Purified Water", which is described as, "Prepared by deionization. Filtered through activated charcoal. Protected by ozonation." For the first time in this series the electrolyte concentration was changed....to 0.2 M K₂CO₃.

Results:

The color legend and vertical scales for this plot are as follows:

Pin (0-200 watts)

Pout (0-200 watts)

Tcell (0-100° C)

Vcell (0-200V)

Icell (0-5A)

Tin (39-41° C)

The horizontal scale covers 4 hours.

It was apparent during the warmup period that the cell was more conductive due to the higher K₂CO₃ concentration. A cell voltage of only 25 volts was sufficient to raise Pin to about 115 watts. Previously, with 0.1M K₂CO₃, about 35 volts was required. After raising the cell temperature above 70C, the voltage was raised quickly to about 145 volts and the cathode burst into bright orange incandescence. Pin was very high at first...over 200 watts...but rapidly declined to about 140 watts. At one point, marked by the large spikey dip in the Pin trace, the over-voltage protection circuit on the power supply tripped its circuit breaker. This is only supposed to happen when the supply voltage exceeds 150 volts, indicating that there are some spikes and transients on the voltage signal. We turned the voltage down to 140 volts and this problem did not recur.

We attempted to collect equilibrium Pout/Pin data at several voltage levels between 140 and the endpoint of the contact glow discharge electrolysis (CDGE) phenomena. We made it all the way down to 70 volts and were able to collect a data average there. Upon decreasing the voltage slightly from 70, the gas sheath collapsed and the cell current shot up to 3 or 4 amps. We turned off the electrolysis power at that time.

As you can see from the plot, the input power did not remain perfectly constant at each of the voltage plateaus. We have attempted a first order correction for the effects of this temperature slope on the Pout readings. The table below shows the results of averaging the data from the 6 intervals marked by horizontal white lines in the plot. The "dTdt" column shows the rate at which cell temperature was declining during each interval. The "Pcooliing" column shows the approximate power that had to be flowing out of the cell in order to cause that cooling rate (based upon an estimated total cell heat capacity of 600 joule/K). The fact that the cell is cooling off, makes the observed Pout too large. The column labeled "Pout cool" shows corrected Pout values with the the cooling power removed. The column labeled "Iavg" shows the average current drawn by the cell during each interval and the "excess" column shows the measured gas excess factor over the value expected from Faraday's law. The "Pgas" column is the caloric value of the escaping gas assuming that all of it is produced by dissociation of H₂O. The "Pout-total" column is the final Pout value corrected for both the cooling effect and the escaping gas. The last column is the final Pout divided by Pin.

As you can see from the last column, with these corrections, there remains an apparent excess of 1-2% relative. This could be a genuine excess heat signal but it is too small to be given any real significance. It is likely to be due to a combination of errors not yet considered, such as errors in the input power measurement.

Throughout this run, we kept close watch on the water flow rate, measuring it two or three times at each voltage plateau. It remained very steady at 4.72 gm/sec and this value was used for the Pout calculations.

...Here is the cathode at 140 volts. Note the orange-hot appearance.

  This is the cathode at 120 volts. It is distinctly cooler. The black dots are bubbles stuck to the vessel wall.

...Here's the cathode at 100 volts. The blackbody glow is gone...only the sparks remain.

...90 volts.

...80 volts

...and 70 volts. The cathode is still covered with faint white sparks.

This is the experimental setup just after turning off the electrolysis power. You can see where we are from the real-time results plot on the computer screen.

Can you feel the intense disappointment hanging heavily in the air?