COLD FUSION SUCCESS

[Earthrise]

Here is a link to Ross's US patent application US 20110005506
http://www.freepatentsonline.com/20110005506.pdf

It is just marginally more informative than his Italian patent. He does mention Piantelli in the Background section. He also mentions using boron in the invention. I would speculate his  catalyst is similar to the one outlined here:
http://www.ysxbcn.com/icnfm2007/part2B/s1002.pdf

The catalyst was most likely heated in hydrogen rather than nitrogen. The catalyst decomposes at high temperature, at least in nitrogen.

Piantelli was also proprietary concerning the surface treatment of the nickel rods used in his experiments. Everyone wants to cash in on the energy bonanza.

As far as getting useful information from the patent applications, they are pretty much useless.

Rossi has a few skeletons in his closet. He failed to produce working TEG modules for a customer named CTC  in Johnstown, PA USA. This was through  Leonardo Technologies Incorporated, another of his companies. The failed TEG modules could be attributed to mismanagement or bad luck, the actions discussed in the second link can't.

www.mail-archive.com/vortex-l@eskimo.com/msg38020.html

Rossi and Focardi LENR Device: Reality or Scam?
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/news/2011/36/3622rf-realityorscam.shtml

According to the link, in 1995, Rossi was jailed for conspiracy to engage in tax fraud for his involvement in a business that was trading precious materials between Switzerland and Italy.

Piantelli really did burn up a nickel rod, so the technology itself is real enough.
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/news/2011/36/36img/Piantelli-Melted%20Cathode-SBK.JPG

[Earthrise]

According to the link, in 1995, Rossi was jailed for conspiracy to engage in tax fraud for his involvement in a business that was trading precious materials between Switzerland and Italy.

Two tons of gold in an armored car! Might as well do it big.

[TEKTRON]

My feeling is that Cavitation LENR and Rossi Nickel LENR
are partially two different phenomena. Cavitation LENR
pretty much has to be initiated by the colapse of the
vacuum cavitation bubbles in water. It's difficult to see
how these cavitation bubbles of the appropriate parameters
can produced in the hydrogen gas. I propose that in the
case of Nickel metal, Wigner array dislocation energy is
the initiator. This dislocation energy has to be produced
in the fuel by irradiation inside a standard high flux nuclear
reactor before the Rossi Reactor will run. Both processes
than use the lattice assisted LENR backend process to amplify
phonons to produce heat output. I suspect that the "activation"
of the Nickel metal catalyst is a code word for this "neutron
activation" probably by alpha particles that puts additional
energy into the metal lattice. It is this energy that causes
the Rossi reactor fuel to play out over time. If this is case
the two process have very different economic and implementations
and structures.

The problem with cavitation/electrolytic LENR is that water
that forms the basis of it's TCB operation also limits the hot
side reservoir temperature to 100 degrees C boiling. This severely
limits the delta temperature in the Carnot heat engine cycle
which will be required to produce upgraded energy. In an ICE
engine, which compares to the 400 degree C. Rossi high
side temperature, a Carnot limit of about 33% is expected,
anything less will be a hindrance as excess heat must be
radiated into the environment.

My feeling is that Rossi is not who he claims to be relative to
Defkalian and if he is then the company has got problems.
He seems unaware of SPC statistical process control as used
in modern manufacturing.

:S:MarkSCoffman

The "E CAT"atalyst in my opinion is nothing more then Raney Nickel, A very well known catalyst in hydrogenation reactions.
Raney nickel is "sponge metal nickel" 

The stated transmutations of Ni to Cu may be related to contamination by leaching of the copper containment vessel.

Sorry, didn't mean to place this on you personalty, but I didn't know where to place this???

[wings]

Rossi is an interloper. Piantelli was the discoverer of the Ni Hydrogen process. His name should be on the patent instead of Rossi. Rossi bought his way in. Piantelli for some reason was excluded from the deal. He is not even referenced as having done doing prior work.

Pons and Fleishman also should have gotten a Nobel Prize for their discovery of LENR, also known as "cold fusion".

The most compelling argument for a nuclear reaction going on inside the reaction tube is an account of an accident Piantelli had early on with his experiments

"Piantelli didn't know how hot the experiment had gotten before he killed it because the monitor eventually blacked out. However, the metal thermocouples inside the cell melted. This told him that the temperature exceeded 1450 C. Understandably, he was angry because these experiments take a long time to run and he had to abandon it prematurely."
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/news/2008/NET29-8dd54geg.shtml#pf

A chemical reaction would just blow up and make the vessel into a bomb. I can understand why Rossi was so nervous and attentive monitoring the test demonstration now.

[Earthrise]

Yes, the "cold fusion" experiments are very dangerous. The explosions in the glass vessels of the heavy water electrolysis experiments prove that.

Piantelli's nickel rod experiment took off. If his vessel had burned through, there would have been a fire and a hydrogen explosion which could have killed him and burned down his lab.

It is my opinion that the devices built by Piantelli and later by Rossi are build much too lightly. The vessel could easily rupture, especially if power is being produced. The power level in Rossi's second experiment was scaled back, according to him. because of safety reasons. The experiments shouldn't have been conducted on a bench top. For safety reasons,they should be behind a blast shield.

In his US patent application, Rossi shows two electron microprobe scans of his powdered nickel catalyst. The element zinc shows up in the scans. Zinc may be a reaction product from the LENR, it could be a contaminant, or it could be from the nickel powder having been formed using nickel chloride and zinc dust. Raney nickel is still more likely his source.

I am awaiting the results of the Defkalion build of Rossi's 1 Megawatt power system. I hope he didn't bite off more than he can chew. A 100 KW intermediate build would have been more conservative and also much more doable. Only ten modules to control and worry about.