How To Make Solar Concentrating Mirrors (super HOT focal point)
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 ก.ย. 2024
- In this video I show how to convert inexpensive truck mirrors into powerful first surface solar concentrators. Check out my sponsor Brilliant for a really fun way to learn! www.Brilliant....
First surface mirrors are an extremely efficient way of concentrating solar energy, much more efficient for their size than a fresnel lens. This type of mirror is also essential for optical applications.
Check out the video about making first surface mirrors over on GreenPowerScience: • First surface mirror D...
Thanks to all my Patrons for helping me make these videos! A special thanks to my top Patrons: Syniurge, Matthew Leitzke, TheBackyardScientist, Enzo Breda Lee, John Johnson, & Thibaud Peverelli! / nighthawkprojects
Thanks for watching!
Yes, I did repost this video. Last Thursday it seems TH-cam was having some internal problems or perhaps was running an experiment with the promotion algorithm where videos posted on that day were shown to an unusually small amount of people. Reposting a video almost always results in worse performance than the original, but in this case so few of my subscribers were able to see the clip when I published it that I decided it was worth the risk to give a few more of you the chance to watch. I also wanted to add an additional warning about the vapor of the dichloromethane paint stripper I use in the video as it is a rather dangerous chemical if not used carefully. It must be used with a lot of ventilation as it is metabolized by the body into carbon monoxide and poses similar risks.
NightHawkInLight I was actually going to watch the vid again to get the brand name of the aircraft paint stripper and got the notif today lol. Thx. love all your vids and GreenPower as well. Very high quality videos that have cleared up a lot of uncertainties for me. Keep it up!!
Thanks for re uploading it! I always insta-click your videos when I see them pop up but for some reason it wasn’t there. Hmm
Didn't make the video worse.
glad you reposted since I seem to be one of the people who didnt get notified :)
youtube's terrible promotion system is why I just view all new videos from my subscriptions instead of relying on a broken system to delivery interesting content... Of course, this means that I rarely discover new channels, but it is the only viable solution until youtube gets their stuff straight (if ever)
I’ve used carburetor cleaner to remove the paint, the benefit of that is the high pressure jet helps remove the paint no scrubbing needed.
YES Cody!! Can't wait to see your video on it!!
These puny mirrors aside, make a giant one out of a space blanket and melt rocks with it!
Daniel Pas kinda remind me a bit of death star.
The video brings back memories of years ago when I built my 12.5" Newtonian telescope. The 1" glass was ground down and aluminized. Great video!
Did you hand grind your mirror? I've been watching some videos on the process. Astonishingly I've read that hand ground mirrors can be made to tighter tolerances than is possible by machine, though that fact may be out of date.
Hi :) I'm thinking about making my own telescope, but I got no idea how to do it in the cheapest way. mirrors for telescopes are not cheap :(
@@kaczkinson I bought a 6 inch telescope mirror off of eBay for $30 years ago.
@@scottmichael3745 no way, nowadays a 3 inch telescope is 100 dollars,
@kaczkinson
I've had this Telescope Building with John Dobson about hand made telescopes showing up in my recommendations and it is very interesting.
I believe the handmade method would be project overkill if the desired use is just to focus the sun, however, the option it use it in a powerful telescope in the future would be available. All the really hard work has already been performed, lol
I don't mind watching it again. And i shall watch it again . I love how in depth yet simplistic you make everything seem to be. Please keep up the outstanding work. Love your Channel.
Glass made pot covers make for an excellent glass concave surface to make this project. Cheap, no paint to remove, small hole in the middle for support, many sizes available. You'll need to apply the reflective paint of course
Using smoke to show the difference between curved & parabolic - deeply satisfying.
I know this is a very old vid, but this is a thought experiment I run in my head, ad infinitum: How to make a big mirror for a Dobsonian telescope. There was an article in Popular Science, I believe, which had a great method -- basically a 15"-20" bowl, on an old record turntable with the central spindle removed, filled with very slow setting epoxy. And set the whole thing up on some foam in a place far from traffic or other vibrations. It creates a parabolic surface, the focal distance determined by the RPMs of the turntable. But you still have to send out for silvering. I love to think on ways to achieve such a surface myself. This is a clever solution (and I wonder if polishing might improve optical quality).
Hey what do you think of diy plasma sputtering for the reflection property's. I love the turntable idea, any new info?
@@diesockedeslebens6599 No. Most ideas have fatal flaws. Putting a coat of thin chromium paint on it while still spinning, is the best I've come up with. Thin, runny paint which is still dense enough to cover the surface doesn't seem too difficult to come up with, and that would leave the layer on the surface very thin, to minimize imperfections due to drying. I dunno if you'd get even atomizing with plasma. Ideally, you'd want a single molecular thickness on the surface of a perfect parabola.
I have heard of other people using the spinning motor, but with a bowl of mercury as the reflector. If you can isolate interfering vibrations, then that kinetic mirror would be beautiful. But it'd need mountaintop sorts of isolation.
@@diesockedeslebens6599 It would be a heck of a vacuum chamber, but you could do it. For real big sizes you probably want an atmospheric pressure process like chemical vapor/solution deposition. (A lot like how they silver normal mirrors)
@@willcool713 two minor corrections, first of all, metal doesn't form molecules in this kind of example and therefore is an irrelevant way of measuring, would be easier to measure in micrometers or nanometers at these scales. And lastly, ions don't "atomize" in the conventional sense. It's literally like a "field" of spray rather than a jet or stream, it's just about the most smooth and even coating you could get.
@@platinumsky845 Yeah, I guess I'm not familiar with the plasma techniques. I was imagining something makeshift, not precision.
I'm still thinking along the lines of a chromium flake paint with an evaporative base that effectively leaves no binder. But even a thin clear top residue might be okay at the resolution I'm likely to work with. Putting it on while spinning ensures any slight excess conforms to the same parabola. It wouldn't be a perfect surface, but if the mirror were large enough it could probably stand up to 8K imaging, as long as the rest of the optics were quality. Not sure how far you could push the resolution for optical zooms, but it would be easy to image, say, craters on the Moon and see how precisely you can focus. If the surface distortion is less than atmospheric twinkle, then it's good enough for my purposes.
I've just about got a plan. I'd really like to create a cheap, big mirror that's easily replicated.
You should read about the solar collectors used to simulate the thermal pulse of a nuclear bomb. Crazy how powerful the roughly 1kw/m2 of the sun is when you focus it to a small area!
Awesome video Ben!
Are you verified
@@ninjanoobyes
Last I checked I am verified.
No problem for reposting! Im happy to watch it again! Keep up the good work
I did get the video last time you uploaded, but I'm fine with watching it again haha
Miguel Almeida me too.
If you wanna go bigger, one method I remember mythbusters trying is stretching a mylar foil (space blanket) over a large cylinder (turkey fryer or something), and pulling a vacuum.
For that you can either drill a hole on the bottom and add some fittings and pump out some air, or you can also heat it up a little, and then stretch the foil quickly, and as it cools it will stretch the foil in a paraboloid.
That was a good video I was able to finally see exactly where the focus point was when you used the smoke test
What a beautiful show of spherical abberation. Well done. Liked and subscribed.
Interesting as usual. Thanks.
I wonder if you could use fiber optic cable at the focal point to transfer it to wherever you want
I'm so glad you made this video, my father found a mirror like this on the road and I had tried to make a parabolic mirror. Thanks to you I should be able to make one.
I'm glad you reposted this video as the concept may become a valuable part of my project. Thank you very much.
Thanks for showing the spherical mirror and how it focuses to a line rather than a point! Helps me with my project with focusing light I cannot see, 2.4ghz
Know what? I'll watch it again. I won't lie, your videos are so informative and kinda have this hypnotic vibe... 😂
Excellent presentation, @nighthawkinsight. I've always wanted to make a giant telescope, but my problem was always the cost of the primary mirror. Thanks for sharing.
I'll watch it again. Fellow Michigander here.
7:42 you can see smoke or vapor in the back ground hit the focal point and heat up and rise again...pretty cool
Awesome video thanks :)
Sounds like Archimedes of Syracuse was right and mythbusters really debunked their own selves for doubting him. Archimedes was the first person to use this method and burn invading Roman ships over 2500 years ago
This was Really Helpful being an Rv person I can do this and have NO Bills thank you Love the channel
I would love to see a project making a solar generater out of this.
Yeah with a mini steam turbine setup. If someone could develop a home-scale version of this... we're off the grid man! (except for internet connection obvs.) (and TV)
@@spod32827 ha, well check this guy out for the wifi
I am also interested in setting this up with a steam turbine. If you come across any resources on building one from scratch lmk please.
@@nicholasherrera1785 check out a “ sterling engine”. Will get you on your way i hope. Good luck
Read my post.
I love your way of expression it's very nice thanks
First surface mirrors are used mostly for one specific reason:
Ghosting.
On a normal mirror a part of the light gets reflected by the glass it self. For scientific purposes you very very likely do not want that.
The second reason why it is done sometimes is when the optical transparency of the carrier material is not as desired - normal glass mirrors absorb the near IR spectrum. It is not that much of the total power of sunlight. And if you do not need the mirror for "optical" purposes ( i mean like taking photos ) then you can get a big parabolic dish and cover it with aluminium tape, mylar or even tinfoil if done carefully.
Lol i bought a mirror and took it out and it didn't even have the paint backing...😂😂
Sure, I'll watch it again ! 😊
Thanks for sharing and take care. 👍
a well spoken young man. Very interesting and well thought out and put together. Kudos
Always love to watch your videos! This video got me thinking more about altering the direction of a IR laser beam for a laser microphone used at large distances...
Yes, that's great!!! The applications are limitless
You can try an offset satellite dish by making reflective the surface😊😊
Amazing video: it's unbelievable of things you can do, with every day mirrors that you buy at a truckstop LOL awesome video dude! Keep them coming
I took a parabol mirror(tv) and put reflective foil on it. Worked great. I had to use welding goggles when i burnt wood for testing because it was extremly bright (looking at the spot).
Video on a solar concentrator for hot water. I'm thinking copper tubing but I'll let you work out the details of the project. Thanks can't wait to see it.
Brilliant! I’m a 60 year old from South Africa, and very interested in solar.
I look forward to all your posts. I will be making this. Can't wait!
The more I watch your channel the more I'm impressed with your experiments. It's always interesting and your voice is clear and easy to understand. You must be a teacher in real life, if not, you should be! Thank you for interesting videos. I will be trying this as I did the star lite. That one really blows Mike mind as it works so well and can be used for many things. Sometimes I have plumbing projects that I need to sweat a pipe too close to a wall and worry about starting the house on fire. Now I can mix up a small batch and use it as a backstop behind the pipe I heat up. You should do a video of this mirror using the focal point to see if you can burn through the star lite as you already have both available and that would be a cool test of durability. Thanks again for cool experiments!
Love the shout outs to other channels, it's my favorite way to find new content.
Cool video, and thanks for the tip. I think one of those might be useful in a camping kit.
Watching again because I wanna help out an amazing content creator!
Wow man the spherical mirror focus point was amazing ...
Wonder if this can be used to distill sea water. use steam to create electricity and provide drinking water and salt as byproduct. free energy factories on coastal states with shortage of freshwater can use this to avert huge crisis if done rightly. This should work right ?!
The only issue is the sun is not always clearly visible. Hard to predict overcast days, etc. But otherwise yes all that would work.
yes
it can be ised for areas which are sunny etc
If you want to create steam you need to focus quit a lot of light there and not let it reflect. There are simpler ways than evaporation to get clean water - specially as this is really wasteful in terms of energy to the point that it would very likely be detrimental to the area if done in a large enough scale to alleviate a shortage of fresh water.
What? For free? Helping people for free? How are people supposed to make money in that? Do you want the Rothchilds to not be able to afford their lifestyle? Next you’re going to want to cure cancer for free or something.
Very clever a technique. Congratulations.
Amazing. Like making a natural laser. There is so much more to learn here I think. For instance. What sort of energy could be created by lining up 3 or 4 of these, in such a manner that their points, all meet together at one point.. also could this be set up next to a “dirty water” supply, in order to make drinking water? Wow, the possibilities are countless. Thx
I love people that think, question, explore. Thanks for your curiosity.
Desalination via vaporization & distillation?
@@mangeload absolutely. Free, sun made. Maybe a green house, made of magnified glass. All lasers pointed to meat all over the surface of the body of water. Now place many tubes, to catch the vapour, and drip into a clean water supply. Filter that through sands and solis, to add the correct minerals. And you have clean drinking water. Would work in hot countries as well as cold.
Good source for materials I had not thought about.
"gloves contact the stripper" haha XD
5:14
As I said in the original video the info about the Aeroplane stripper is very useful, thank you.
Instead of rubbing the paint residue off after the aircraft stripper (best stuff in the world, it even takes off powdercoat) does it's thing, use running water to remove the remnants to avoid scratching. Aircraft stripper can be cleaned up with water or soap & water without worrying about environmental issues (in small quantities, I'm not so sure about running quarts of the stuff down the drain). I've been using this stuff for years, though I prefer professional grade brands vs the hardware store stuff (penetrates way faster, dries slower). One other great use for it is etching patterns in powdercoat, you can make stencils out of Kapton tape (powdercoat masking tape) which the stripper won't touch, and if the edges are cut and bonded cleanly to your substrate, you'll get perfectly straight and even lines between transitions. Makes for a very sharp looking cutout in the powdercoat.
I was so hoping you had found a way to add the reflective portion to a surface. I would love to add it to the surface of a old TV satellite dish.
Mirror window tinting film.
Great how to video. Thanks so much for sources and descriptive information. Really appreciate your time providing this information. Thank you. I will watch again too. Just because it's so interesting.
Thanks for another informative video. These mirror techniques are right up my alley!
Even better the second time 🖤🖤
Use a piece of charcoal instead of steel for the target in water. When I tried that, it worked great!
That's a great idea
thank you, will look for truck rear view mirror
Very good teacher ! I do enjoy your shows everytime. Tqs.
It is interesting. Excellent method! Thanks
I would like to see this concentrating mirror on a heliostat and using it as a heat source for your water distiller
I'm going to try the Sattlite dish and aluminum tape for a cooking outdoors
the lenticular lenses from old big screen tvs are awesome, too
The tric, fo the paint stripper is to leave it alone for 10 to 20 minutes. A gas forms to melt the paint. Disturb it and you disturb the process
Thank you. Ive been looking for something like this for a while to heat a small Sterling Engine for a proof of concept. This will help a lot! 😎🤜💥🤛
Wow, this video was very interesting and left me wanting to learn more.
Well explained 👌👍
Thanks for your efforts
I work with this aircraft stripper on a regular basis, easiest clean up method is water! And lots of it. It will also wash away the paint so all that is left is the bare metal!
Can't stress enough about the gloves. I was applying varnish stripper on a summer day and was having to work fast since its quite volatile and evaporates quickly. I poured some out onto the piece I was working on then set the lid on the can lightly. When I went to grab the lid to lift it off for the next section, it caught and lifted the whole can up but then it dropped and splashed the stripper all over, including onto my gloved hand. Knowing this stuff is nasty I ran for the bathroom sink and was removing the gloves as fast as I could in the process. It still went through the glove and gave me a burn. I had a red hand for several days. Ironically its the same chemical they use to decaffeinate coffee.
That is so cool! I love being able to see the focus point.
this would be awesome for creating a large reflex reflector for a compact flashlight. with some 3d printed hardware and a parabolic mirror you could place the LEDs surface at the focal point and in theory get a super tight beam out the other end
Tre interesa filmeto. Gratulon kaj dankon!
Is a spherical mirror better than a parabolic mirror, and what size works the best for a higher concentration of energy? Great videos my friend. You are so amazing.
Spherical mirrors are easier to produce, but are inferior in that they have no one focal point but spread over a line.
The best size would be simply bigger. A 100 cm² mirror focusing on 1mm² is still a lot less powerful and with the same power density as a 1m² mirror onto 1 cm².
@@ABaumstumpf thank you for a reply 😎👍
I new member of channel.
Im your fan.
From Brazil.
You can make a Stirling engine with this thing, I think it should be a interesting project
How and what is a Sterling engine? Too lazy to google it RN 😂
Very very nice and useful information
We can create thousand times more energy with this concave mirror but the question rises on what object you may able to store this power to use afterwards. In America executed this experiment successfully years ago they have created so much electricity which was more than the energy wants of whole world
To anyone coming to this video years later: I have literally just done this. And some notes:
Though I used the same paint stripper that NightHawkInLight used, it did not seem to strip the paint as effectively, so some elbow grease and plenty of time is needed to remove it.
Something I found on my own, is when you are getting the last bits of paint and stripper off, running it under hot water does wonders to help clean the rest of it off.
My first attempt is... messy. There's still some paint spots on it, but that is because while I was removing the paint with the microfiber cloth I noticed a small area where I accidentally removed the metallic layer. About one inch long, it is barely noticeable and looks like a smudge.
I'll make a video on it later on, as well as record my second attempt.
Tre interesa ideo! Gratulon kaj dankon pro la montrado!
Thank you for teaching this about mirrors
Fantastic demonstration with also clear concept 💡 👌
Years ago the German military used to issue a metal ashtray/cigarette lighter to the troops. It used the same principle and had a piece that came out of the middle which would hold the tinder or cigarette.
you talked a bit about the fragility of the metal layer...do you need to apply something over it to protect it?...if so..what do you suggest?
THANK YOU
have you ever considered to buy a parabolic glass and use the tollens reagent to make your own mirror?
should be much cheaper
No but that's a good idea
I'll check Ebay. Thanks
We did this in first year chemistry as a nice gimmick to get more enthusiasm for chemistry.
If you have parabolic glass, just use it as a lense
you could make the boiling in the testtube more efficient if you dye the water black. The light will penetrate the glass but get absorbed by the liquid directly.
Does anyone know if this mirror would work for a telescope? I've seen so many people asking but hardly an answer. Thanks!
I don’t think so. Telescope mirrors have to be very clean, with close to no imperfections, with a very accurate parabolic shape. These mirrors are normal mirrors, which likely contain many imperfections. Then again, there is a telescope mirror which has a few bullet holes and it’s still working...
neat ! i'll be keeping one in my car for sure !
very interesting. Thank you very much for nice video
I have seen a couple of your videos and love your experimental mind. Be so kind as to see how BoneWare Cutlery was created so as to understand my creative mind, please. My interest is reducing waste and have a potential process related to this video to turn some of the most difficult plastic waste into a usable product.
Your videos are so good, they almost mesmerize the viewer. Before I know it, they've ended, and I've been entertained the whole time.
very helpful, thanks.
Before watching this, let me say I used an old digital satellite dish and mylar sheets.
..Were you able to cook small dishes or boil water with that ?
My brain froze immeadiately, as soon as i heard the word 'Skillshare'. F commercials, they are the main reason why we used to use utube in the first place ..
Yes and they are the reason why you can watch hundreds of thousands of high quality videos for absolutely free.
@Nik's Workshop i can do this regardless of sponsorship. This is the choice of some Folks, who think they could make also some Money beside publishing their videos. The Videos get published anyways, in Most cases
If i had to choose between a Video Made by an Enthusiast, Loving to Share his thoughts and telling a true Story; or Someone who's thoughts and recommendations are in fact just the result of a donation from his sponsor, i would go with the First one for Sure.
By the way: i Support some Folks as a patreon, to See them doing more advanced stuff. This content in result is Only in my favour, No special interrests taken Care of.
Thank you
don't have time to watch it twice tonight, but I put back my missing like :p
Try magnifying mirror for makeup use. Can you try to make telescope
Love you man , great content
you can use a lens from an old projection TV as a large magnifying grass.
Very nice. Thanks!!