interesting concept! Looking forward to Part 2. What's extremely valuable is that you have energy monitoring throughout, so we can calculate the watts consumed to temperature difference and then calculate the COP off that. That way we can see how the COP of a heat pump contrasts to the COP of this system
Good stuff. A few days ago I picked up Nine 305w panels off of my local CL. Yesterday I bought an EG3 12k Hybrid mini split. Can't wait to get it all hooked up and working. My existing 2400w and 800Ah system will power it.. but not long enough for these 90+ degree days here in S. Oregon.
Glad to see the PV2L trend continuing. Maybe it won't be anywhere near commercial systems, but there is just something to a system being able to run without any offsite input (grid). Although running an ac (heat or cold) just on a solar load will be pretty hard (with the solar dips and all).
@Craftypiston Direct solar does have a lot of challenges, sun going behind the clouds and all. When experimenting with direct solar fridges, same problem but I managed to apply and test some creative solutions. Future videos in the series will cover fridges and compressors too
A good resource channel regarding Peltier device cooling is the Tech Ingredients channel, they have built a fridge, a freezer and a generator. Regarding the Peltier device generator they built which was an excellent video, I asked them what was the power consumption of the LED floodlight that they were powering from the 36 Peltier devices which in its finished product state was able to fit inside a pot of boiling water, the light was rated for 45W and it lit up the place quite good! But during the video, at the beginning, they tested the Peltier device and worked out that it was possible to achieve 2.1W per device, they were running a 45W floodlight with no problem but at 36 Peltier devices at 2.1W they were getting over 70W of power being generated.... Had they put a battery in circuit, they could have had the energy to keep the lights running after the camp fire were out! They really did a great job of demonstrating what's possible.... Some people tend to play around with one or a few Peltier devices and seem to think that it's already a lot! Back before we had solar panels we had solar cells! I bet that there were people back then saying that 10 solar cells were a lot but still not enough to be of any kind of use, but here we are today, we have panels because some people refused to give up and kept adding solar cells making their own panels until some company noticed and began making panels at a much cheaper price! If I remember correctly, BP (British Petroleum), the big oil company was making solar panels earlier in their career! So much for the big oil company conspiracy theory LoL.... Ohhhh how people forget..... Anyway, Tech Ingredients channel, if you haven't seen it already, I highly recommend it, lots to learn which will hopefully help you with your mission....
@PeterMilanovski Boiling water light, that is really neat! I have not yet delved into power generation, focusing mainly on freezers/fridge and air conditioning. It's a lot of work and very tedious. It's funny how technology is initially rejected or dismissed early on, but it shows up later anyway :)
@gregboyd4321 Hi, I don't use a BMS on the hand built prismatic batteries. However there is a JST cable on their in case I want to look at the cell voltages. Been doing it this way for around 10 years. (About 20kw cells in my house, never showed those).
@pepethefrog7193 Good idea... I have some half inch foam board to eventually install, when I get the chance. The roof is insulated with 2 inch foam to keep the heat out which collects above it
Very very nice prototype! What do you figure the temperature difference is of the outgoing air? What type of radiator is being used? I'm just wondering if different styles would significantly change the efficiency. I wonder if different coolants would make and changes? I have to admit, I'm envious of your project right now. I'd love to be doing the same thing myself. I'm getting a lot of enjoyment and education from your videos, so that is almost as good as having the projects myself. When I do start again, I'll be sure to share the projects with you. They may not be as good as yours, but it might be fun for you to watch. The main project I want to make, I want to eventually make it available to people to 3D print the parts themselves. That's a long way off though.
I'll let DD speak the specifics but in general, water provides the best heat dissipation for its cost. Most of the glycol based coolants (like you use in your vehicles) decrease the dissipation but it gives better corrosion and freezing characteristics. If worrying about corrosion and freezing isn't a concern, nothing AFAIK beats distilled water.
@colin8532 Thank you, feel free to share your projects - none of us work in billion dollar labs but all research and creative efforts are of value - and worth sharing. I tore apart the old setup (water tank was inconvenient and evaporation concerns) in favor of a more powerful system with 6-8 peltiers. Video of that soon as possible. Measuring outlet air can be deceiving, because outlet air temps are not just governed by the cooling power, but also the speed of the fan! But I'll see what I can do with a K thermometer to get temperature readings
@subhobroto Ah you're too kind :D if I keep any of these setups, I will put bleach in. I dropped a brand new radiator in the dirt the other day and had to carefully flush out all the contamination. So there goes all that distilled water :)
Nice! The problem with peltiers is they do not like temperature differential at all. They are quite efficient, maybe even comparable to low efficiency AC units if the differrential can be kept under 10-20 deg C. But the problem with that is absolutely huge radiators and fans are required. And all heat sinks must have very high amount of fins. And there can be no heat leakage anywhere, the hot side needs to be insulated. Also, the cold side need better heat sink to keep it high enough temperature to not condense significant water. You will not get very cold air, but this is the only way to make peltier heat flux efficient enough.
@Niko-rq7ie They are pretty tedious to work with but really fascinating. Testing a different setup with 8 elements, bigger radiator. In the first quick test it blew cold air. Should have some clips of it soon.
@@solarpoweredge I can't remember the specifics, but it gets pretty depressing doing the math on this. To get something equivalent to a 6000btu window AC unit, you'd likely need 100+ of these cheap peltiers and run with very low amps to get anything approaching a reasonable efficiency. At least they are cheaper in bulk, but I found the other materials like metal waterblocks and tubing to be way too expensive. It gives off so much heat I wonder if a 55 gallon drum or a 275 gallon tote of water may be a better idea than a traditional radiator and fan (or likely, dozens of fans). Please prove me wrong :)
@@solarpoweredge In multi element systems, it is better to use individual heat sinks, or water blocks, if there is even slight variation of thickness of the elements. Also, heat sink waviness and roughess make things worse. And with peltiers, any thermal resistance growth, even due to little too thick thermal paste will cause significant effect, because the ceramic on the elements do not distribute heat to the better contact areas.
@@orangezeroalpha If you could achieve side to side temperature differential of 20 deg C, the cooling power from 60 watt (mac heat transfer) element is about 40 watts with 90 watt power draw. 40 degree differential, it is about 20 watts with power use increasing little from 90 watts.
@orangezeroalpha Peltiers have unique properties and are worth investigating; so I chose to include them in my experimental research. Exactly as expected, the first test was good training but pretty underwhelming. The second test (running now) is performing well enough to merit the time spent. I was surprised how much cold air and dehumidification their was. I just might leave it running all the time in some form - probably with a bigger radiator and more elements. It depends on how many watts I can safely push through and other factors. Incidentally I do work with refrigerants and compressors, which where this series is headed, it takes time (and a lot of $). I am developing a powerful compressor based direct DC solar powered air conditioner. The goal is to freeze my workshop with pure solar. I will document some of the work along the way.
You and I chase after the same goal, however, I have chosen a completely different pathway. I use direct solar to run dc motors, which in turn, run air compressors and sometimes ac generators. I find it less complicated making my adventure more mechanical. Fewer wires does not, unfortunately, mean my shop is any less a mess. I think messiness is just a fundamental property of shops. I have an idea to use a stream of compressed air powering an "eduction" pump and drawing a vacuum over water, attempting to lower the water temperature by increased evaporation. By manipulating pressure, the water will "boil" at ambient pressure. It takes a lot of air, but fortunately, I have a lot. In fact, many of my friends tell me I'm full of (hot) air.😂 I'm autistic, live alone and therefore, call the shots. I'm the boss and if the boss says, "Build a flying saucer." I'm on it!
@WhatDadIsUpTo This is all very interesting. I'd like to see the water experiments. Everything needs investigated, so many ideas :) Storing power with air is something I want to achieve. Been saving for a good sized air compressor pump but who knows when I will get my hands on that. Plus all the hardware and such. The list of projects is just too big lol. PS it sounds like we are both secluded. I have been locked down in my house for almost 10 years. And you are right about the wires and mess. The way I see it, big mess = "stuff is getting done"!!
What DC motors are you running? Are you using air compressors as batteries to store energy during the day and then use them to run generators at night?
you want a heat exchanger on the hot and cold side of the tec 2 pumps and 2 loops one inside chiller loop and one hot side loop to rator and fan one radiator and fan inside the inside loop will be cold and cool the air through the radiator I would prob use a glicole mix for the loops
I used a similar set-up on my homebrew cabinet instead I had a small radiator with the water running through it and a fan and outside I ha 2 peltiers either side of a small aluminium water block with the cooling side of the peltiers and heat sinks to cool the water I never tried it but I suppose I could have reversed the petiers to heat it as well but I used a reptile heat belt to heat it
@gregboyd4321 Hi, I don't use a BMS on the hand built prismatic batteries. However there is a JST cable on their in case I want to look at the cell voltages. Been doing it this way for around 10 years. (About 20kw cells in my house, never showed those).
@gregboyd4321 I've never had cell balance problems on storage batteries using individual cells. They are all hand built packs from years ago. Still working fine. This kind of info (how to avoid using a BMS) is generally not on YT, perhaps I will do a video in the future.
5 amp 12v modules in this first experiment, not driving them very hard. Second experimental setup is under construction, will test bigger modules and higher power levels.
interesting concept! Looking forward to Part 2.
What's extremely valuable is that you have energy monitoring throughout, so we can calculate the watts consumed to temperature difference and then calculate the COP off that. That way we can see how the COP of a heat pump contrasts to the COP of this system
@subhobroto Absolutely right about monitoring, still digging into this topic and hope part 2 will be a little more interesting
Keep on looking forward to your new videos. Love the experimentation!!
@AlbertKopp Glad you like them, part 2 upload soon :D
This is really killer stuff you're working on. Thanks for sharing .
@GreenTextPro Welcome!!! :D making a more powerful one, will upload clips asap
Good stuff. A few days ago I picked up Nine 305w panels off of my local CL. Yesterday I bought an EG3 12k Hybrid mini split. Can't wait to get it all hooked up and working. My existing 2400w and 800Ah system will power it.. but not long enough for these 90+ degree days here in S. Oregon.
@OFFGRID_Trucker Wow, a very exciting setup, have fun!
Glad to see the PV2L trend continuing. Maybe it won't be anywhere near commercial systems, but there is just something to a system being able to run without any offsite input (grid). Although running an ac (heat or cold) just on a solar load will be pretty hard (with the solar dips and all).
@Craftypiston Direct solar does have a lot of challenges, sun going behind the clouds and all. When experimenting with direct solar fridges, same problem but I managed to apply and test some creative solutions. Future videos in the series will cover fridges and compressors too
Seen guys use a similar set up but run the cooling tubes under ground or in bottom of pond. Thanks for sharing👍
@Nico-vh1qp I am very interested in underground cooling, so many ideas to test :) thanks for watching and commenting!
A good resource channel regarding Peltier device cooling is the Tech Ingredients channel, they have built a fridge, a freezer and a generator.
Regarding the Peltier device generator they built which was an excellent video, I asked them what was the power consumption of the LED floodlight that they were powering from the 36 Peltier devices which in its finished product state was able to fit inside a pot of boiling water, the light was rated for 45W and it lit up the place quite good!
But during the video, at the beginning, they tested the Peltier device and worked out that it was possible to achieve 2.1W per device, they were running a 45W floodlight with no problem but at 36 Peltier devices at 2.1W they were getting over 70W of power being generated....
Had they put a battery in circuit, they could have had the energy to keep the lights running after the camp fire were out!
They really did a great job of demonstrating what's possible....
Some people tend to play around with one or a few Peltier devices and seem to think that it's already a lot!
Back before we had solar panels we had solar cells! I bet that there were people back then saying that 10 solar cells were a lot but still not enough to be of any kind of use, but here we are today, we have panels because some people refused to give up and kept adding solar cells making their own panels until some company noticed and began making panels at a much cheaper price!
If I remember correctly, BP (British Petroleum), the big oil company was making solar panels earlier in their career! So much for the big oil company conspiracy theory LoL.... Ohhhh how people forget.....
Anyway, Tech Ingredients channel, if you haven't seen it already, I highly recommend it, lots to learn which will hopefully help you with your mission....
@PeterMilanovski Boiling water light, that is really neat! I have not yet delved into power generation, focusing mainly on freezers/fridge and air conditioning. It's a lot of work and very tedious. It's funny how technology is initially rejected or dismissed early on, but it shows up later anyway :)
Those green - turquoise batteries in the desk
@gregboyd4321 Hi, I don't use a BMS on the hand built prismatic batteries. However there is a JST cable on their in case I want to look at the cell voltages. Been doing it this way for around 10 years. (About 20kw cells in my house, never showed those).
Instead of getting another AC try insulating the hut. Double layer roof like some landrovers had?
@pepethefrog7193 Good idea... I have some half inch foam board to eventually install, when I get the chance. The roof is insulated with 2 inch foam to keep the heat out which collects above it
Very very nice prototype!
What do you figure the temperature difference is of the outgoing air?
What type of radiator is being used? I'm just wondering if different styles would significantly change the efficiency. I wonder if different coolants would make and changes?
I have to admit, I'm envious of your project right now. I'd love to be doing the same thing myself. I'm getting a lot of enjoyment and education from your videos, so that is almost as good as having the projects myself. When I do start again, I'll be sure to share the projects with you. They may not be as good as yours, but it might be fun for you to watch.
The main project I want to make, I want to eventually make it available to people to 3D print the parts themselves. That's a long way off though.
I'll let DD speak the specifics but in general, water provides the best heat dissipation for its cost. Most of the glycol based coolants (like you use in your vehicles) decrease the dissipation but it gives better corrosion and freezing characteristics. If worrying about corrosion and freezing isn't a concern, nothing AFAIK beats distilled water.
@colin8532 Thank you, feel free to share your projects - none of us work in billion dollar labs but all research and creative efforts are of value - and worth sharing.
I tore apart the old setup (water tank was inconvenient and evaporation concerns) in favor of a more powerful system with 6-8 peltiers. Video of that soon as possible. Measuring outlet air can be deceiving, because outlet air temps are not just governed by the cooling power, but also the speed of the fan! But I'll see what I can do with a K thermometer to get temperature readings
@subhobroto Believe it or not, I am using distilled water... mainly because it's clean :)
@@solarpoweredge I guessed that's what a smart inventor like you would do. The only little change I would do is put in 2ppm bleach
@subhobroto Ah you're too kind :D if I keep any of these setups, I will put bleach in. I dropped a brand new radiator in the dirt the other day and had to carefully flush out all the contamination. So there goes all that distilled water :)
Nice! The problem with peltiers is they do not like temperature differential at all. They are quite efficient, maybe even comparable to low efficiency AC units if the differrential can be kept under 10-20 deg C.
But the problem with that is absolutely huge radiators and fans are required. And all heat sinks must have very high amount of fins. And there can be no heat leakage anywhere, the hot side needs to be insulated. Also, the cold side need better heat sink to keep it high enough temperature to not condense significant water. You will not get very cold air, but this is the only way to make peltier heat flux efficient enough.
@Niko-rq7ie They are pretty tedious to work with but really fascinating. Testing a different setup with 8 elements, bigger radiator. In the first quick test it blew cold air. Should have some clips of it soon.
@@solarpoweredge I can't remember the specifics, but it gets pretty depressing doing the math on this. To get something equivalent to a 6000btu window AC unit, you'd likely need 100+ of these cheap peltiers and run with very low amps to get anything approaching a reasonable efficiency. At least they are cheaper in bulk, but I found the other materials like metal waterblocks and tubing to be way too expensive. It gives off so much heat I wonder if a 55 gallon drum or a 275 gallon tote of water may be a better idea than a traditional radiator and fan (or likely, dozens of fans). Please prove me wrong :)
@@solarpoweredge In multi element systems, it is better to use individual heat sinks, or water blocks, if there is even slight variation of thickness of the elements. Also, heat sink waviness and roughess make things worse.
And with peltiers, any thermal resistance growth, even due to little too thick thermal paste will cause significant effect, because the ceramic on the elements do not distribute heat to the better contact areas.
@@orangezeroalpha If you could achieve side to side temperature differential of 20 deg C, the cooling power from 60 watt (mac heat transfer) element is about 40 watts with 90 watt power draw. 40 degree differential, it is about 20 watts with power use increasing little from 90 watts.
@orangezeroalpha Peltiers have unique properties and are worth investigating; so I chose to include them in my experimental research. Exactly as expected, the first test was good training but pretty underwhelming. The second test (running now) is performing well enough to merit the time spent. I was surprised how much cold air and dehumidification their was. I just might leave it running all the time in some form - probably with a bigger radiator and more elements. It depends on how many watts I can safely push through and other factors.
Incidentally I do work with refrigerants and compressors, which where this series is headed, it takes time (and a lot of $). I am developing a powerful compressor based direct DC solar powered air conditioner. The goal is to freeze my workshop with pure solar. I will document some of the work along the way.
You and I chase after the same goal, however, I have chosen a completely different pathway.
I use direct solar to run dc motors, which in turn, run air compressors and sometimes ac generators.
I find it less complicated making my adventure more mechanical.
Fewer wires does not, unfortunately, mean my shop is any less a mess. I think messiness is just a fundamental property of shops.
I have an idea to use a stream of compressed air powering an "eduction" pump and drawing a vacuum over water, attempting to lower the water temperature by increased evaporation. By manipulating pressure, the water will "boil" at ambient pressure.
It takes a lot of air, but fortunately, I have a lot. In fact, many of my friends tell me I'm full of (hot) air.😂
I'm autistic, live alone and therefore, call the shots. I'm the boss and if the boss says, "Build a flying saucer." I'm on it!
@WhatDadIsUpTo This is all very interesting. I'd like to see the water experiments. Everything needs investigated, so many ideas :) Storing power with air is something I want to achieve. Been saving for a good sized air compressor pump but who knows when I will get my hands on that. Plus all the hardware and such. The list of projects is just too big lol.
PS it sounds like we are both secluded. I have been locked down in my house for almost 10 years. And you are right about the wires and mess. The way I see it, big mess = "stuff is getting done"!!
Do you have a TH-cam channel?
@shanonallen5395
Yes, but it's purpose is to provide an avenue for kids & grandkids to keep up with my shenanigans.
What DC motors are you running? Are you using air compressors as batteries to store energy during the day and then use them to run generators at night?
@subhobroto
Surplus motors, yes, I don't use batteries. Instead, I use stored air pressure to run air motor Gen sets.
you want a heat exchanger on the hot and cold side of the tec 2 pumps and 2 loops one inside chiller loop and one hot side loop to rator and fan one radiator and fan inside the inside loop will be cold and cool the air through the radiator I would prob use a glicole mix for the loops
@linearburn8838 Good ideas thank you
Look into thermal heat cooling. Ex ammonia or li br cycle
@whatthefunction9140 Good idea, will do
I used a similar set-up on my homebrew cabinet instead I had a small radiator with the water running through it and a fan and outside I ha 2 peltiers either side of a small aluminium water block with the cooling side of the peltiers and heat sinks to cool the water I never tried it but I suppose I could have reversed the petiers to heat it as well but I used a reptile heat belt to heat it
@errolfoster1101 Nice!!!
What type of battery BMS is used with those green tortoise batteries?
@gregboyd4321 Hi, I don't use a BMS on the hand built prismatic batteries. However there is a JST cable on their in case I want to look at the cell voltages. Been doing it this way for around 10 years. (About 20kw cells in my house, never showed those).
So they balance themselves?
@gregboyd4321 I've never had cell balance problems on storage batteries using individual cells. They are all hand built packs from years ago. Still working fine.
This kind of info (how to avoid using a BMS) is generally not on YT, perhaps I will do a video in the future.
What peltiers are you using? and what current/voltage?
5 amp 12v modules in this first experiment, not driving them very hard. Second experimental setup is under construction, will test bigger modules and higher power levels.
@@solarpoweredge so tec1-12705s?
@superskrub4209 Yes and I will test some 12715