Meyer type WFC - from design and fabrication to test and development.

[Farrah Day]

Ok Kator

Overnight on my workbench in air, my test cell completely discharged... '0 volts' at last!

Bone dry, I tried to charge it up in air. Nothing happened. Left my PSU set at 31 volts across the cell for 5 mins, still no charge whatsoever. 

Put it back into my de-ionised water and it read 0.30 volt. This incidentally is the reading I get if I put my meter probes into the de-ionised water without the cell.

At least then, I know that my test cell is fully discharged and nothing in the water is causing it to recharge.

Now I apply 31 volts for 10 minutes @ 62 mA.

At 10 minutes I disconnect PSU. 1 minute after PSU disconnection, test cell shows 4.2 volts, after 2 mins = 3.7 volts, after 5 mins = 3.1 volts, and after 10 minutes = 2.5 volts. 4 hours later test cell still shows 1.5 volts.

If I take the test cell out of the de-ionised water, it still holds it's charge, and while wet, it will charge up again from the PSU.  As I am using pieces of laboratory rubber test tube stoppers to space the tubes, I assume that this must be due to the physical contact surface water is creating between the tubes, via these rubber spacers. Once these rubber spacers dry out, then I can not recharge my test cell.

Now, here's something else. I can rechage my cell out of the water whilst the rubber spacers are still wet, but this drastically reduces the current flow. If I recharge the wet cell on my workbench and apply 31 volts for just 1 minute just drawing a current of only 2 mA, then I get the following discharge rates:

With the PSU disconnected. after 1 minute, cell = 3.8 volts, after 2 mins = 3.5 volts, after 5 mins = 3.1 volts and after 10 minutes = 2.5 volts.

It appears then that I can obtain nearly the same discharge voltages from applying 31 volts for 10 minutes at 62  milliamps, as I get from 31 volts for just 1 minute at only 2 milliamps. Now, I have to assume that the amount of charges on the tubes will be vastly different, but it shows that it does not take a long charging period to obtain equal discharge voltages.

From an observation point, my test cell back in the de-ionised water, with 31v @ 62ma, I find that I can see no gas being given off initially. Then after about half a minute, there is noticeable reaction at my centre cathode - nothing at the floating tubes or anode. After about 5 mins, there is relatively vigorous gas production at the cathode, and some discernable gas production on floating plates and anode. This action I would expect to increase daily as my de-ionised water is exposed to the air and so will gradually become more contaminated. That said, current drain is remaining steady @ 62mA, which is the same as day one.

Again today, I found that once charged, nothing I could do would discharge the test cell faster than it wanted to go. Which is a bit of a pain as it means if I want to do tests from '0 volts' I have to wait for the cell to discharge overnight, and then just have one shot at it until the next day!

Crazy! But, totally fascinating stuff!

[clane121]

Hi Farrah Day,

To elaborate on my earlier comment, do you suppose that your charge is coming from photons, or a photoelectric effect?

Basically, your cell is a capacitor. The outer tubes predominant exposure to visible light, miniscule -x-ray radiation and/or other forms of electromagnetic radiation, causing a small charge on your cell. This would seem to make sense in view of the fact that you inner tubes are somewhat shielded from this by the outer tube, which may cause the potential difference between the plates.

This does seem to be somewhat in line with the "Hertz Effect" or photoelectric effect. By the same token, I'm no scientist, nor educated in that field. So, my observation is a guess at best. 

BTW, this observation was only in reference to your returning charge after the cell had been shorted and gained a charge seemingly out of nowhere.   

It's nice to see your systematic approach and I'll look forward to seeing your progress.

I am new on this forum and it's nice to see a community this dedicated and willing to share knowledge.

CLane121

[Farrah Day]

Hi Clane

I'm not attributing anything to photons, as the test cell does eventually discharge.  If it were photons charging it then it would never totally discharge, and indeed recharge in daylight... it doesn't.  No, its due to the electric current, I just can't explain why I can't instantly discharge it.

Thinking about it, I don't think that the cell was necessarily charging back up once I'd shorted it.  The voltmeter would instantly zero because I'm effectively shorting its terminals too, but would then take a few moments to re-establish its reading once I removed the short.  The charges are obviously not in direct contact with the surface of the tubes, but must be sitting on the other side of the chromuim oxide layer.  As this is an insulator, my shorting the cell has no effect on these charges.  At least that's my current theory.

[Kator01]

Hi Farrah Day,

you are really making progress. Your results give a indication to what I mentioned in an  earlier post of mine : charge might be stored in the thin water-layer covering the plate-surface. It has to to with the dense-water-finding of Dr. Augustin. Now it becomes necessary for me to prepare a short intro to this subject. It will take some time. It seems this thin dense - water - layer ( can be as thin as one atom diameter ) is the conductive path for both effects ( recharging the wet cell outside of the cell via rubber-bridge and keeping up the voltage although decreasing in time)

Although there seems to be no connecting line to what Tad said- but there is a phaenomenon which occurs if a high-voltage-charge is applied to a water-volume ( in this case it was tap-water )
You can read it here at Dr.Stiffler website :

http://www.stifflerscientific.com/

Please go to :

Water and High Voltage Effects #2

If you scroll down the page to the last picture you can see a vertical water-membrane moving along the acryl-tube. When I showed this picture to Dr. Augustin he said : this is a water-membrane consisting of the dense water ( 1.5 gramm / cm exp^3 ). High charge-density seems to influence the dense to normal-water - ratio and if there is a potential between the water-surface and the acryl-tube-surface one membrane-layer  lifts of the watersurface and thus a new water-membrane is building on the surface. But this again needs additional energy. He said that this is another proof of his theory.

In order to increase this dense-water-to normal-water-ratio one can either boil water for 20 minutes or degas the water which is best done via a supersonic-transducer immersed in the water or a glas of water resting in a supersonic-cleaner-device.

But this is just a secondary step in the future.

Now concerning increasing contamination : Do you have the money to buy a device which is measuring the ppm in water ? These instruments are build by Hanna-Instruments and are designed for different ppm-levels.

Here are the two type in question :

Dist-Series HI 98 311 which is for normal water measuring in myco-siemens and ppm
Dist-Series PWT HI 98 308 for pure-water ( destilled water)  ( 1- 99 myko-siemens )

You may find these instruments in shops for aquaristic-equipment and the price is about 60 Dollar each.

Mykosiemens = inverse of R ( Ohm ) so 2 Megohm  eq 0.5 mykosiemens

It depends which way you choose : Using destilled water for future basic tests  or tap-water and de-ionisied water which still holds a lot of minerals depending on the reversed-osmosis-process used.

If you buy this kind of water some information must be given on the tag of the bottle.

Any questions ?

Hope I have not made this too complex but I am almost sure it has to do with thin  dense-membran.

Regards

Kator

[Farrah Day]

Some interesting stuff on that link Kator.

Water and high voltage effects #1 seemed to produce very similar effects to that which I'm seeing.  Will study it further, while I consider my next experiment.