Quote from: rfmwguy on 10/11/2015 05:47 pmThe perfect experiment does not exist. It is folly to assume you or anyone else can design one.It's not about the "perfect experiment". It's that there are so many confounding factors that are in the same micro-newton range as the expected positive results.If you were building a device that could lift itself and 5kg to the ceiling of your workshop, you'd only need a spring scale from your local bait'n'tackle to measure the force being produced at the accuracy required at this level. You wouldn't need a "perfect experiment" that measures every breath of air down to the micro-newton. The only confounding factors (unless there's a tornado in your lab) is whether you are cheating and using magicians' tricks - and that is easily solved by independent replication.But when the heating of the air around the device can produce uplift larger than the desired effect, when visually undetectable thermal warping of the mechanism (or of the balance) may be sufficient to swamp the readings, when even current running through the power cables produces forces on the same order as those you're measuring, you are playing a vastly different game.Unless you are capable of going beyond the level of isolation of the Eagleworks tests, you can't really add anything to the field. I mean, it sounds like ridiculous fun and I wish all of you success, but you aren't doing "research".Quote from: rfmwguy on 10/11/2015 05:47 pmNo matter, research will go on without you and our hope is we can clear the rocket engine brick wall.If we cannot, mankind is destined to live and die on this planet when an entire universe awaits. What a sad resignation that would be.And this attitude is concerning too. You are significantly committed to finding the effect. Not just through your time and financial commitment to building a rig, but because you need it to be real.With a big effect, a bit of psychological bias doesn't matter. It either flies or it doesn't. But with an effect as tiny and easily confused as the EMDrive, even an experimenter who is honest and genuine can subconsciously bias the results (even if just by dismissing the importance of a confounding factor; as you have with outgassing. Maybe you're right or maybe it's just wishful thinking because you know it's too hard to correct for it if it is an issue, and you already have so many things you need to keep track of.)Put it another way: What will you do if you didn't get a positive result? Will you believe that you've successfully refuted the original claims? Or will you assume that you've made a mistake (because the effect must be real) and start fiddling with the set-up until you do get a positive response? Note that I'm not calling you a liar, or incompetent, or ungenuine, or too amateurish to be trusted. What I'm saying applies to any professional as much as it does to you, Michelle and others. Commitment-blinkers are really dangerous when playing with effects at the lowest edge of detectability.
The perfect experiment does not exist. It is folly to assume you or anyone else can design one.
No matter, research will go on without you and our hope is we can clear the rocket engine brick wall.If we cannot, mankind is destined to live and die on this planet when an entire universe awaits. What a sad resignation that would be.
Quote from: Paul451 on 10/11/2015 06:37 pmAnd this attitude is concerning too. You are significantly committed to finding the effect. Not just through your time and financial commitment to building a rig, but because you need it to be real.I'm not concerned that the Wright Brothers "wanted" heavier-than-air flight to be real, [...]
And this attitude is concerning too. You are significantly committed to finding the effect. Not just through your time and financial commitment to building a rig, but because you need it to be real.
Quote from: Prunesquallor on 10/11/2015 07:12 pmQuote from: Paul451 on 10/11/2015 06:37 pmAnd this attitude is concerning too. You are significantly committed to finding the effect. Not just through your time and financial commitment to building a rig, but because you need it to be real.I'm not concerned that the Wright Brothers "wanted" heavier-than-air flight to be real, [...]{Sigh} You completely ignored what I said immediately after that. Hell, the very next words: "With a big effect, a bit of psychological bias doesn't matter. It either flies or it doesn't."Instead you ignored what you didn't want to acknowledge in order to get the effect that you wanted.
Regardless of size of the effect, it is not unreasonable to expect experimenters to have an expectation (even hope) of the outcome. Regardless of the size of the effect, physics doesn't care what the experimenter expects. Regardless of the size of the effect, experimental bias (either intentional or unintentional) won't survive the scientific and peer review process.So i fall to see the distinction you are making.
physics doesn't care what the experimenter expects.
Regardless of the size of the effect, experimental bias (either intentional or unintentional) won't survive the scientific and peer review process.
To eliminate gas effects it seems a pressure lower than one microtorr is needed. Such pressures are routinely obtained in large vessels in industry, but need both a roughing pump and a turbomolecular pump/oil diffusion pump (with at least a dry ice/acetone trap) in series and, importantly, a lack of exposed soft parts. UHV metal-metal gaskets would probably be the best and cheapest join type, but cajon or swagelok fittings / welded glass would also work.
Quote from: Tetrakis on 10/11/2015 04:15 pmTo eliminate gas effects it seems a pressure lower than one microtorr is needed. Such pressures are routinely obtained in large vessels in industry, but need both a roughing pump and a turbomolecular pump/oil diffusion pump (with at least a dry ice/acetone trap) in series and, importantly, a lack of exposed soft parts. UHV metal-metal gaskets would probably be the best and cheapest join type, but cajon or swagelok fittings / welded glass would also work.I believe that I'm having a hard time finding your assertions credible, your quote being an example.Granted EM tests at atmospheric preasure at 760 torr see some lift, and this is expected, but I haven't seen much evidence for hot air balloon flights at 150,000 feet (28 miles or so), about 1 torr. In fact, I was suggesting a 10th of a torr, 100 millitorr, for a pump rated to 10 millitorr about 35 mile altitude equivalent. A relatively cheap embodiment.You're suggesting a microtorr. That's a remarkable requirement unless you are in sales for Beckman Coulter or Dynavac.Science isn't about getting the best equipment.It's about framing a testable hypothesis and trying to falsify it, followed by replication attempts and reports by many others. Eventually a consensus may emerge. Read your Thomas Kuhn and stay away from those parts catalogs.To your microtorr requirement, I'd be bewildered to see an EM drive hypothesis where the null hypothesis would be rejected because the experimenter operated at 100 millitorr instead of 1 microtorr... But, I'm all ears.For EM experiments done at atmospheric preassure, while no one finds that ideal, it is possible to frame an hypothesis and an experiment that tests for force under those conditions. RFMWGUY asked, is the thermal lift retarded when the device is on(?), if so, that is partial (albeit not confirming) evidence. Thermal lift should not be retarded in a hot air balloon simply because you started spritzing the balloon with microwaves.It is not axiomatic that it shall fail unless it's done in a vacuum. Non vacuum testing simply adds to the potential errors and factors to be compensated for. Careful experimental design and analysis can compensate.Further, since there is no accepted theory as to why any of this should be real, for those who want to know, there needs to be testing that is atheoretical to provide a body of observations that ultimately can be used to theorize why, or why not.Back to lurking. Wish this site had an ignore poster checkbox.
Quote from: glennfish on 10/11/2015 10:08 pmQuote from: Tetrakis on 10/11/2015 04:15 pmTo eliminate gas effects it seems a pressure lower than one microtorr is needed. Such pressures are routinely obtained in large vessels in industry, but need both a roughing pump and a turbomolecular pump/oil diffusion pump (with at least a dry ice/acetone trap) in series and, importantly, a lack of exposed soft parts. UHV metal-metal gaskets would probably be the best and cheapest join type, but cajon or swagelok fittings / welded glass would also work.I believe that I'm having a hard time finding your assertions credible, your quote being an example.Granted EM tests at atmospheric preasure at 760 torr see some lift, and this is expected, but I haven't seen much evidence for hot air balloon flights at 150,000 feet (28 miles or so), about 1 torr. In fact, I was suggesting a 10th of a torr, 100 millitorr, for a pump rated to 10 millitorr about 35 mile altitude equivalent. A relatively cheap embodiment.You're suggesting a microtorr. That's a remarkable requirement unless you are in sales for Beckman Coulter or Dynavac.Science isn't about getting the best equipment.It's about framing a testable hypothesis and trying to falsify it, followed by replication attempts and reports by many others. Eventually a consensus may emerge. Read your Thomas Kuhn and stay away from those parts catalogs.To your microtorr requirement, I'd be bewildered to see an EM drive hypothesis where the null hypothesis would be rejected because the experimenter operated at 100 millitorr instead of 1 microtorr... But, I'm all ears.For EM experiments done at atmospheric preassure, while no one finds that ideal, it is possible to frame an hypothesis and an experiment that tests for force under those conditions. RFMWGUY asked, is the thermal lift retarded when the device is on(?), if so, that is partial (albeit not confirming) evidence. Thermal lift should not be retarded in a hot air balloon simply because you started spritzing the balloon with microwaves.It is not axiomatic that it shall fail unless it's done in a vacuum. Non vacuum testing simply adds to the potential errors and factors to be compensated for. Careful experimental design and analysis can compensate.Further, since there is no accepted theory as to why any of this should be real, for those who want to know, there needs to be testing that is atheoretical to provide a body of observations that ultimately can be used to theorize why, or why not.Back to lurking. Wish this site had an ignore poster checkbox.Look into a Crookes radiometer. They wont work at atmospheric pressure, and they won't work under hard vacuum. The devil is in the details, and it wasn't until fairly recently that anyone understood why they work at all. Folks here are slowly coming around to the protocol that I esposed eons ago, and for which I got a lot of snotty personal e-mails.I'll say it again:1) You can't design a cavity which will "tune", at high Q (whatever weird Q method you choose) to a microwave oven magnetron.2) You can easily design a tuned cavity for any frequency and any mode (common industrial practice).3) Design a tuned cavity, for the mode of your choice, and use a phase lockable source to drive it.4) A microwave oven magnetron is a microwave source 100% AM modulated at the rate of its power supply (50-60 Hz).5) Your phase lockable source should be able to emulate 4 above.
Quote from: rq3 on 10/11/2015 10:52 pmQuote from: glennfish on 10/11/2015 10:08 pmQuote from: Tetrakis on 10/11/2015 04:15 pmTo eliminate gas effects it seems a pressure lower than one microtorr is needed. Such pressures are routinely obtained in large vessels in industry, but need both a roughing pump and a turbomolecular pump/oil diffusion pump (with at least a dry ice/acetone trap) in series and, importantly, a lack of exposed soft parts. UHV metal-metal gaskets would probably be the best and cheapest join type, but cajon or swagelok fittings / welded glass would also work.I believe that I'm having a hard time finding your assertions credible, your quote being an example.Granted EM tests at atmospheric preasure at 760 torr see some lift, and this is expected, but I haven't seen much evidence for hot air balloon flights at 150,000 feet (28 miles or so), about 1 torr. In fact, I was suggesting a 10th of a torr, 100 millitorr, for a pump rated to 10 millitorr about 35 mile altitude equivalent. A relatively cheap embodiment.You're suggesting a microtorr. That's a remarkable requirement unless you are in sales for Beckman Coulter or Dynavac.Science isn't about getting the best equipment.It's about framing a testable hypothesis and trying to falsify it, followed by replication attempts and reports by many others. Eventually a consensus may emerge. Read your Thomas Kuhn and stay away from those parts catalogs.To your microtorr requirement, I'd be bewildered to see an EM drive hypothesis where the null hypothesis would be rejected because the experimenter operated at 100 millitorr instead of 1 microtorr... But, I'm all ears.For EM experiments done at atmospheric preassure, while no one finds that ideal, it is possible to frame an hypothesis and an experiment that tests for force under those conditions. RFMWGUY asked, is the thermal lift retarded when the device is on(?), if so, that is partial (albeit not confirming) evidence. Thermal lift should not be retarded in a hot air balloon simply because you started spritzing the balloon with microwaves.It is not axiomatic that it shall fail unless it's done in a vacuum. Non vacuum testing simply adds to the potential errors and factors to be compensated for. Careful experimental design and analysis can compensate.Further, since there is no accepted theory as to why any of this should be real, for those who want to know, there needs to be testing that is atheoretical to provide a body of observations that ultimately can be used to theorize why, or why not.Back to lurking. Wish this site had an ignore poster checkbox.Look into a Crookes radiometer. They wont work at atmospheric pressure, and they won't work under hard vacuum. The devil is in the details, and it wasn't until fairly recently that anyone understood why they work at all. Folks here are slowly coming around to the protocol that I esposed eons ago, and for which I got a lot of snotty personal e-mails.I'll say it again:1) You can't design a cavity which will "tune", at high Q (whatever weird Q method you choose) to a microwave oven magnetron.2) You can easily design a tuned cavity for any frequency and any mode (common industrial practice).3) Design a tuned cavity, for the mode of your choice, and use a phase lockable source to drive it.4) A microwave oven magnetron is a microwave source 100% AM modulated at the rate of its power supply (50-60 Hz).5) Your phase lockable source should be able to emulate 4 above.You are a little out of date. Full wave rectifiers and azmuth magnets are planned to clean up the mag. A solid state source is impracticat at kw power levels with current designs. These are points we've discussed adnauseum since thread 3.No one is 100% certain the effect is lockable yet. It may be a result of phase amplitude frequency or mode changes. We have tk await a peer reviewed paper before drawing any conclusions about source locking, although it seems likely imho.
Quote from: rfmwguy on 10/11/2015 11:02 pmQuote from: rq3 on 10/11/2015 10:52 pmQuote from: glennfish on 10/11/2015 10:08 pmQuote from: Tetrakis on 10/11/2015 04:15 pmTo eliminate gas effects it seems a pressure lower than one microtorr is needed. Such pressures are routinely obtained in large vessels in industry, but need both a roughing pump and a turbomolecular pump/oil diffusion pump (with at least a dry ice/acetone trap) in series and, importantly, a lack of exposed soft parts. UHV metal-metal gaskets would probably be the best and cheapest join type, but cajon or swagelok fittings / welded glass would also work.I believe that I'm having a hard time finding your assertions credible, your quote being an example.Granted EM tests at atmospheric preasure at 760 torr see some lift, and this is expected, but I haven't seen much evidence for hot air balloon flights at 150,000 feet (28 miles or so), about 1 torr. In fact, I was suggesting a 10th of a torr, 100 millitorr, for a pump rated to 10 millitorr about 35 mile altitude equivalent. A relatively cheap embodiment.You're suggesting a microtorr. That's a remarkable requirement unless you are in sales for Beckman Coulter or Dynavac.Science isn't about getting the best equipment.It's about framing a testable hypothesis and trying to falsify it, followed by replication attempts and reports by many others. Eventually a consensus may emerge. Read your Thomas Kuhn and stay away from those parts catalogs.To your microtorr requirement, I'd be bewildered to see an EM drive hypothesis where the null hypothesis would be rejected because the experimenter operated at 100 millitorr instead of 1 microtorr... But, I'm all ears.For EM experiments done at atmospheric preassure, while no one finds that ideal, it is possible to frame an hypothesis and an experiment that tests for force under those conditions. RFMWGUY asked, is the thermal lift retarded when the device is on(?), if so, that is partial (albeit not confirming) evidence. Thermal lift should not be retarded in a hot air balloon simply because you started spritzing the balloon with microwaves.It is not axiomatic that it shall fail unless it's done in a vacuum. Non vacuum testing simply adds to the potential errors and factors to be compensated for. Careful experimental design and analysis can compensate.Further, since there is no accepted theory as to why any of this should be real, for those who want to know, there needs to be testing that is atheoretical to provide a body of observations that ultimately can be used to theorize why, or why not.Back to lurking. Wish this site had an ignore poster checkbox.Look into a Crookes radiometer. They wont work at atmospheric pressure, and they won't work under hard vacuum. The devil is in the details, and it wasn't until fairly recently that anyone understood why they work at all. Folks here are slowly coming around to the protocol that I esposed eons ago, and for which I got a lot of snotty personal e-mails.I'll say it again:1) You can't design a cavity which will "tune", at high Q (whatever weird Q method you choose) to a microwave oven magnetron.2) You can easily design a tuned cavity for any frequency and any mode (common industrial practice).3) Design a tuned cavity, for the mode of your choice, and use a phase lockable source to drive it.4) A microwave oven magnetron is a microwave source 100% AM modulated at the rate of its power supply (50-60 Hz).5) Your phase lockable source should be able to emulate 4 above.You are a little out of date. Full wave rectifiers and azmuth magnets are planned to clean up the mag. A solid state source is impracticat at kw power levels with current designs. These are points we've discussed adnauseum since thread 3.No one is 100% certain the effect is lockable yet. It may be a result of phase amplitude frequency or mode changes. We have tk await a peer reviewed paper before drawing any conclusions about source locking, although it seems likely imho.I don't think I'm out of date. In fact I know I'm not. While I'm in awe of your effort, the fact that Freescale, for example, is working on kilowatt level microwave sources for consumer appliances should be evident to everyone involved in this area. Often, a simple phone call will result in donations of equipment, or samples, that the average experimenter can only dream of. You have but to ask, the worst is that they say no.
In that document, the following statement is made: QuoteThere appears to be a clear dependency between thrust magnitude and the presence of some sort of dielectric RF resonator in the thrust chamber. The geometry, location, and material properties of this resonator must be valuated using numerous COMSOL® iterations to arrive at a viable thruster solution. We performed some very early evaluations without the dielectric resonator (TE012 mode at 2168 MHz, with power levels up to ~30 watts) and measured no significant net thrust. Where do they account for outgassing from a big block of plastic under high thermal load?
There appears to be a clear dependency between thrust magnitude and the presence of some sort of dielectric RF resonator in the thrust chamber. The geometry, location, and material properties of this resonator must be valuated using numerous COMSOL® iterations to arrive at a viable thruster solution. We performed some very early evaluations without the dielectric resonator (TE012 mode at 2168 MHz, with power levels up to ~30 watts) and measured no significant net thrust.
Shell, I've followed your design logic for some time now and am impressed by your analysis and plans. This could be a millinewton level ke force your about to measure, well above the snowflake levels we've had to deal with. My phase II is a 17.5 millinewton goal, I may need some power supply help from you or phil.
. I'm after data and there is no bad data.Shell