My East-West light speed anisotropy and the null result

[maxke...@gmail.com]

My East-West light speed anisotropy experiment and the null result.


This animation is a vital component of this post.
It fills in the blanks.
https://youtu.be/N4J--dMXOMc
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The following video clip was extracted from my east-west light speed
anisotropy experiment which was based on Fizeau's ether drag experiment
in 1859.
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The outcome from that experiment was a null result. There was no
evidence of an east-west light speed anisotropy.

But I had very little confidence in that outcome. Did I really
understand these interference patterns?
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The setup used for the Michelson-Morley experiment in 1880 can be used
to demonstrate that the interference pattern I was using was valid for
the task.

The light paths can be analysed idividually and simply by unfolding
the two arms at the beam return mirrors and taking a laser beam source
and half silvered mirror with them.
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There will of course be no interference patterns generated by the
beams from two different sources.
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Before I go any further, the integrity of the half silvered mirror
needs to be tested.
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Take note of the double image when the laser beam is reflected off
the glass face.
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This half silvered mirror is the point of focus for the two beams of
the unfolded MMX device. One leg is pointing east, while the other
points to the north.
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The laser beam is initially reflected off the silvered face of this
half silvered mirror, losing 50% of its power, and then off the inner
glass face at the far side. The glass face reflection is very weak and
can be ignored. The remaining beam loses 50% of what's left of its
power when it passes straight through the target mirror to a screen
which is mounted directly behind it.
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And now for the east pointing beam.
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The laser beam initially passes through the half silvered mirror and
reduces in power by 50%. It then travels to the target mirror.
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The beam is initially reflected at 90 degrees off the glass face and
then off the silvered face of the target mirror. The glass face
reflection in this case is very significant.
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The two beam elements generated here give a very robust interference
pattern.
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In this clip, beam-north is focused midway between the two elements
of beam-east. The interference pattern will fade in and out if the
length relationship between the two beams varies. But the interference
pattern itself only gives a rough indication of how thick the half
silvered mirror glass is.
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A reliable fringe shift will only occur if the trajectory of
beam-north is shifted to the outside edge of the strongest element of
beam-east.
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To convert to the unfolded view of Fizeau's ether drag experiment,
all I need to do is shift the screen from the south side of the half
silvered mirror to the west side and turn the half silvered mirror
by 180 degrees.
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The beam functions are reversed. Beam-north now generates the
interference pattern.

Beam-east is now comparing with the strongest element of beam-north.
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Exactly as it was in my east-west light speed anisotropy experiment.

But the null result is very much in conflict with Fizeau's positive
result. This animation demonstrates why.
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Local to the earth, the propagation base is clearly the ECI frame.
According to Fizeau, the east flowing water will drag the light
propagation base along with it to a greater extent than the water
flowing west.

For a 10 m/sec water speed in my device I would expect a fringe
shift of .184 of a 634nm wavelength. That's what a Fizeau device of
the same proportions would give if the water flow direction was
reversed.
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In the quest to resolve the conflicts I removed every potential
cause. I replaced the half silvered mirror with a beam splitter
where there would be no feedback problems, and I separated the two
light beams that would normally share the same water tube.

The laser beam is initially split into two parallel beams 12mm apart
which travel along two water filled tubes where the water is flowing
in opposite directions.
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The beams are recombined to follow parallel paths which diverge into
each other enough to generate an interference pattern by the time
they reach the screen, which has been tilted to be almost parallel
with the beam trajectory.

The interference pattern is only magnified in the plane of the two
interfering elements.

Using two completely different light paths makes this device very
sensitive to physical distortion. I wasn't expecting too much
here.
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An 8.5 hp petrol powered centrifugal water pump proved to be
absolutely useless for the water flow control.
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I replaced the centrifugal pump with the twin screw pump from my
original setup and attached a 6 kg flywheel to the crankshaft of
the engine. The water flow rate was still all over the place.

The next step was to make a small torque converter to connect between
the drive motor and pump to smooth out the bumps.

The torque was transferred via a water medium. A trickle of water was
maintained through the unit to stop the water boiling.
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Here's an example where the engine is idling and the torque converter
speed is varied between idle and zero.

run relevant clip 200312 avi
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The fringe wobble was still much greater than the fringe shift I was
trying to identify. This is where I threw in the towel.
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The next step was to remove the rogue interference pattern in my
original experiment.
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Details of that experiment can be found here
https://youtu.be/zkDRw1s4XlY
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The beam divergence from source to screen using my HeNe laser is
less than 6mm. A 6mm thick half silvered mirror was enough to
separate the beams so they wouldn't interfere.

The two truly interfering elements can now be properly compared.
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The tilted screen is now used to magnify the interference pattern.
The screen can be rotated by 180 degrees around the beam axis so
that an alignment with the compare angle between the beams can
always be achieved. It's around 10 degrees off horizontal in this
case.

This setup was used to generate the next clip.

In the video clip, 1 flash indicates that the unit is now stable
and the water flow is east. 2 flashes and the water flow is west.
3 flashes indicates that the unit is moving to the next target.

The two beams that will interfere are set below the two bright
spots on the screen which result from the primary beam reflecting
off the closest water tube window, reflecting off the glass face
and the inner silvered face of the half silvered mirror. The missing
bright spot is beyond the screen limit. And the picture is inverted
as well because the camera is upside down.
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There's still no sign of an east-west light speed anisotropy.

It's now time to test the validity of Fizeau's experiment.
All I need to do is reverse the water flow direction.
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That was a simple task.
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And there it is.

Reversing the water flow direction is a fairly substantial physical
change. It would be very difficult to rule out physical distortion
to the device as the cause.

The fringe shift can be accounted for if I apply a 20 gram sideways
load on the copper tube leading, into or out of, the water tube on
the laser end of the device.

Such a distortion would be evident in the global picture though.
But the same fringe shift occurs for every possible compare angle
scenario.

There's no doubt that this phenomena is caused by length
relationship changes between the two beams.
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I'm left with only one answer here.

The laser beams lose a substantial amount of energy on the journey
through the water tube. Which can only be caused by an interaction
between the beams and the water. In my east-west light speed
anisotropy experiment, since there's no detectable anisotropy, that
interaction remains constant for all pointing directions.

Reversing the water flow is an entirely different ball game.

The fact that both beams travel through the same water tube is
particularly significant as well. Each beam affects the environment
of the other, which will further retard the progress of each beam.

Fizeau's experiment shows the consequence of light beams traveling
in opposite directions through a liquid medium which is in changing
motion relative to the light source. It doesn't lend much support
to Fresnel's hypotheses, or anything else.

The MMX null result proves that the local propagation base for
light is the ECI frame. My null result proves that an East-West
light speed anisotropy is beyond our detection capability.

No sensible universe would have a problem with any of this.
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Max Keon