DIY chiller

[Paul B]

I really built this evaporative chiller for my blackworm tank but here in NY it is almost 100 degrees now so I transfered it to my reef for a while. It chilled my worm tank down to 65 degrees but that is only about one gallon.
I will see how much it chills my 100 gallon reef. If it works I will put this back on the worms and build a larger one for the reef.

 

[mcoomer]

A few more details on this, please. Is that a fan in the upper right corner of the unit? It should help but don't know if you'll see much change on 100 gallons of water. Keep us posted.

Mike

 

[Paul B]

Yes thats a fan. I am not sure if it will make any difference either but like everything else, it is a test.
The water drops 1/2 a degree as it exits the device.

Here it is over the worm tank

 

[Paul B]

Before I switched to LEDs I used to have to put in frozen gallons of ice, I no longer need to do that. I don't need a chiller either, this is just an experiment. The tank was 82 degrees yesterday, now it is 80 degrees, so the chiller cooled it down by 2 degrees which is better than I thought due to the small size of the device.

 

[mcoomer]

Two degrees to 80 is a very nice drop indeed. If you can simply hold that temp you're in good shape.

Mike

 

[Paul B]

80 degrees is much cooler than this tank has even run in the summer. It is 80 degrees in the room the tank is in but the tank usually ran in the high 80s, almost 90 with the MH lights.
I don't need a chiller, this is just a test of the device.

 

[Paul B]

The fan is way too small for this and is a computer fan I had from something else. I don't need more cooling but it would work much better with a larger fan, a fan that almost pulls the water off the plates would be the most efficient and cause the most evaporation. This process works by evaporation so you want it to evaporate. That is how we cool off, by sweating and evaporation which I am doing now.
The tank is in a finished basement (like almost everyone in NY has) it is much cooler in the basemrnt than the rest of the house. My top floor is now hotter than 90 degrees, the thermostat only goes to 90 so I don't know the actual temp but yesterday it was 104 degrees here and today will be the same. The basement is still 80 degrees and the tank is also exactly 80 degrees. Normally the tank runs about 10 degrees hotter than the room but with the LEDs and this chiller, the tank is producing no heat at all. If it stays over 100 degrees here for another day or so, the basement will also get much hotter.
The humidity is also about 70%
I went to the town pool yesterday to swim my laps and when I went into the shower a guy was coming out of the steam room. I said "Are you kidding me? A Sauna. It's 104 degrees out.
He told me he went in there to cool off.

Our surrounding areas lost power yesterday and I am prepared with my generator but I will be out on my boat today (in the water up to my neck to be correct) and if the power goes out, I won't know about it.
I have solar electric on my house so right now my air conditioning is almost free but that goes off if the power goes out.
I know there are plenty of places in the US where it is much hotter.
We have not had it this hot in NY since the 30s or so and 104 is the hottest I remember here in NY, although it never got this cold in Viet Nam :spin1:

And we should think of the troops we have in Afganistan where it is always this hot.:thumbsup: