"cavelamb himself" wrote in message
...
Ed Huntress wrote:
snip
If you believe that the system produces more energy than you put into it,
then yes, you are re-inventing the laws of thermodynamics.
I understand what you are saying and do not disagree.
OK, then you are chasing a perpetual-motion machine. You are accepting a
claim, or a possibility, that the laws of thermodynamics CAN be overturned.
And that's why I think somebody is having fun with somebody else here.
I have no idea yet about input power ves output.
And THAT is really all that matters.
But a lot of people said the same thing about Wally Mindo's Wheel.
Minto's wheel? I don't think so. That was a simple heat engine that didn't
violate anything, except that it seems to have dropped out of sight over the
past 30 years. g It put out less energy than you put in. I tried to build
one in the late '70s but I didn't have the tools at the time.
A small amount of heat energy as input could seem to make a great deal
of output power. More than the input heat. Much More.
Whoops. You misunderstand how it works. It worked on small *temperature*
differentials, like a low-temperature-differential Stirling, but the amount
of heat *energy* you put into it was considerable. Remember, solar
insolation, at low latitudes and high noon, is around 1 kW/m^2, or slightly
more. That wheel sucked up a lot of energy at 1 rpm.
But that wasn't the whole system.
http://amasci.com/freenrg/minto.html
Here are the things that struck me in following a couple of your links.
First, the National Geographic article incorrectly says that hydrolysis
of water is inefficient, or something like that. It isn't true. Actual
commercial processes have efficiencies ranging up to 90%. These are
processes that are currently in use.
Second, you said something about cheaper fuel-cell electric cars. I can't
see how. You still would have to carry around the energy to power the RF
generator. Why not just burn the fuel directly to power the car?
Third, the article in NG says that the efficiency of the RF-powered water
cracking system hasn't been determined. So where is all the speculation
coming from? Somebody at NG *must* have studied enough physics to
recognize what the limits are, and probably (or should) know that
existing processes are already pretty damned close to the limits as it
is. Again, cracking water into hydrogen can be *very* efficient, using
good, existing technology.
Yeah, I saw that.
And a lot worse...
Finally, I think you'll find that the cost of the platinum electrodes in
a conventional hydrolysis rig is a small cost of the total system, and
declines to almost nothing vs. energy consumed over time.
All I'm saying is that it does indeed looks like something interesting
is going down here.
Oh, it's interesting all right. So is cold fusion. And that one has been
on simmer for a couple of decades now. d8-)
Skepticism I appreciate, as long as it is scientific skepticism.
Well, it is. The question is where you think the efficiencies would come
from in this technology. It would be competing with technologies that are
already very efficient. It doesn't seem to offer anything special, which
probably is the source of the rather strong caution expressed by the
other scientists asked to comment.
I do NOT think there are any laws of thermodynamics being broken here.
Only if you're trying to get more energy out of the system than you put
in, which is a big no-no. And if you aren't, then the technology, while
interesting, seems to have little to offer.
--
Ed Huntress
I'm not about to claim any such nonsense, Rd.
And I do understand where you are coming from - no offense taken.
From what I saw in one of the demo videos, the flame - while very hot -
would not come anywhere near the 175 watts claimed for excitation power.
The thing that got my interest up is that this is something new in the way
of manipulating materials.
A (potential) new Paradigm, if you will.
Like when some weirdo first tried to bake his steel in ground up bone...
But, like I said before, time will tell...
Richard