Just a quick video showing a 1st generation prototype for building thermal heating panels from recycled materials. not to shabby for under $150 bucks! Thanks for watching
Next time insulate the back and sides with foam board insulation then some foil faced foam board. Spray the interior black before installing downspout pipes, then seal it. Use a smaller fan. Like a PC fan at the bottom and the top. Higher heat production and more efficient air flow. Also, you can get a small solar panel to directly power the fans. That's real savings.
Increase air flow limit temperature gain to about 80 degree f. Highest home heating efficiency is obtained this way. You reradiate to much heat from the collector. Stripping the heat from the collector quickly means more heat in the home. Nice build and video.
It's AIR you're heating guys!. Your metal downspouts, conduit nipples and similar hardware are way stronger (read expensive) than needed to channel the flow of warm air. Laminar flow off the front surface of black painted corrugated paper would work better. Also absolute temperature matters less than BTUs. The volume of air X temperature increase yields a more meaningful number, that's a measure of how much ENERGY is being colected. And your arduous overbuilt construction causes you ask 900.00 a pop for this baby bottle warmer?
Sounds right to me: you could build it with corrugated cardboard at the rear, corrugated translucent paneling in front to collect and hold the heat in, and just simple piping at one end of the thing, pushed by a pump. There is even a design on RU-vid where the airflow on a similar device is created just by the fact that hot air rises. (convection) It could flow out the top into the room to be heated, and circulate while cool air from below would come back into the heater.
bodryn I'm thinking the cardboard would be enclosed in a box that's insulated on the back and sides. I would also think that clear glazing vs translucent would make the cardboard hotter because of the scattering effect of the translucent material. Of course cost/performance should rule here but there is some very clear corrugated stuff at the home depot. A heat loss path through the glazing would be minimized by encouraging non-turbulent laminar flow over the cardboard. That would be done by carefully introducing the cool air into the bottom of the panel. With laminar flow, the hot air rising from the cardboard would be not have time to reach the glazing before the air gets ducted out at the top of the panel. That would eliminate the need for double/triple glazing by minimizing the heat loss through the front. The laminar flow characteristic will be a function of the slope and height of the panel. Some "cut and try" builds and performance measurements would be needed to optimize the design.
I was thinking the same thing about using downspout and forget about the beer or soda can. But instead of wood blocks to seal the end, using two downspout 90 connectors or a gutter. Thanks. Excellent video
Incase noone else said anything...next time u can save a little time by reversing the wood blade, so it runs backwards. Cuts al, copper, brass and basically any soft metal very nicely. Nice job
Cool video, the only thing I can suggest is for the people swapping the blades out on the saws. PLEASE MAKE SURE you get the right disc rated at the right RPM for your saw. Not all discs are the same. Everyone have a good one.
I've been working in solar thermal, and related thermodynamics and heat transfer since engineering school (1980). Though one can build very simple solar thermal collectors with Home Depot materials, they won't perform nearly as well as a well designed and properly fabricated one. Though the data presented in the video doesn't really give us much of an idea of the performance of the collector (we don't know the outside air temperature, the solar insolation level, the sun angle vs the collector orientation, or the air flow rate, so we have no idea of how much energy is actually being collected) we can very roughly guess that the max temperature differential for this collector (the maximum difference between the collector temp and outside air temp, where heat production is zero) is about 90degrees F or about 50 C. A decent commercial flat plate collector, made with proper materials (able to withstand maximum temps, years of UV light exposure, selective emissivity coating on absorber etc) will reach 100 Celsius over ambient at zero output. In the case of this video we would expect to see a max temp of 330F not 210F. While a max temp of 210 may seem impressive and useful you need to keep in mind that this was only 90f hotter than the outside temp. Consider what would happen on a zero degree day in winter, where you need a minimum of about 90f temp above ambient to provide useful heat to the home. (you can't heat your home with air that is at the same temperature as inside the home, it must be somewhat hotter, which is why the air coming out of your heating ducts is substantially warmer than your home). The system presented would provide roughly zero heat on a zero degree day, at solar noon, if it was properly oriented at latitude +15 from horizontal. If the orientation was less than this, or there was any clouds or haze, or if it was earlier or later than noon, the collector would actually pull heat out of the house. A good quality, properly insulated collector, with a selective emissivity coated absorber and low iron glass cover (better still double glazed with a layer of fep inside) would provide significant heat on a 0f day, in winter sun, even with some haze.
+strato man yeah, but it only cost him 150 bucks... I've watched a lot of videos on these... and although they might not perform as well as a commercial unit... they perform pretty damn well and can be a pretty good and cheap way of adding heat to your home... especially if you use recycled materials and a cheap temp controller device to cut the fan on and off. I live in the south... and our average low is only 32 degrees.... For a small well insulated home like mine this type of thing could be a great DIY supplemental tie in to my central air.
+Jared Cox You can purchase a decent selective coated, low iron glass, 2 sq meter panel from China for about $120. Such a panel will be rated to take water or propylene glycol at 8bar 120psi, and will heat that liquid to 90c over ambient and will last a couple of decades.
Well, that's true.. but that would require a water heat tank, heat exchanger, pressure relief tank, pump, lot's of piping, valves, and expensive controllers vs a 10 dollar one I could use for this system. I could take this type of system and pull air from my central air return in the winter... blow it through a solar air heater like this using a cheap low watt fan (using recycled materials) and feed my central air duct on the other side of the heating element to deliver heat to my small home... if it didn't provide enough heat the existing HVAC system would supplement it. And it would last decades as well as long as the box was built out of good material and sealed well.
you do seem to have a good bit of knowledge in the area... so i am interested in hearing what your best cheapest solution is for solar heating air and water for your home.. that also integrates with an existing normal unit (HVAC or typical hot water heater)
+strato man couple decades cuckhold shmecklegaze. if it doesn't last 150 years with minimal DIY maintenance, then it isn't worth building. Obviously you're knowledgeable. Tell us about a GOOD system, please :)
I am not against making money but there are dozens of video's like this on youtube he doesn't fully explain it. A man is worth his pay but this is fairly simple although I am grateful for this video. Just build a box use clear glass,black paint,foam board on the back shiny side up,connect them, have one in and one out,instead of using the sealant use that expandable foam on most of it, use a small fan that one is way to big for the construction to use in the winter. Don't sell your stove lol.
Easy answer to the blank ends, is to cut alternative slots in the end of the tubes and make them flush to the frame, maybe a little filler of some kind just to make a seal. The air will flow up the tube, across to the adjacent tube and down again to the next adjacent tube bottom. A solar powered computer fan win blow the air into the house. Any savings are lost when you add a non solar powered fan.
Good video heres a tip if you will turn that wood blade over backwards to where its running backwards it will cut that thin metal and won't leave those bers like the metal blade did .the kit is a little pricey though most people looking to install something like that probably can't afford it. I would seriously consider looking at different materials that downspout material has got to be expensive. Great idea though I wouldn't have thought you would have gotten that kind of temp. Off of a unit like that.
What happens in say Feb when its 10 degrees and you want your house set at 70?? kinda confused, all these videos are in the heart of summer with no mention of how it works in cold....like when you need it.
I made one of these using a simple plastic vapour barrier over the front of a 4 foot by 6 foot wood box. The back was insulated the sides were not. On a cold -20 Celsius , or -4 Fahrenheit day in northern Ontario, as long as it WAS sunny the thing made heat!! Passive room temperature air 22 Celsius air moved into the box and a cpu fan moved air back into a small duct into the house at 80 Celsius. One issue was dwell time, air moved into the box needed time to warm up, the faster you moved the air the less time it had to heat.
jay herne yes I want to make one and rig the fan to a timer allowing it to run for ten minutes and off for 40 I think it would be more efficieint with a slow running computer fan
Good, fair question. I agree that many of these units are very small compared to the need. You can light a candle in a room, and it is hot, but there is no way it will raise the temp in the room. These solar units may produce heat, and may only produce heat when the sun is shining...but using more and larger collection units should make a huge difference, even if it only works for part of the time (when the sun shines). Hypothetically, a few days of heat per week for maybe 10 hours a day is much better than nothing and should be worth it.
I built a similar device abut 6 years ago using tempered glass (too expensive). I was able to get 235f, but at a lower volume of air. I also use a 155f thermal switch, solar panel and fan.
I first tried the soda can design and was not happy with the build process. Rain gutter is the way to go. Wish I had seen this video first as I would have saved a ton by using the shower door.
Have you tried 2" foam insulation panels to make your end plugs? Inexpensive and you could make a "cookie" cutter out of a scrap of your downspout. Might want to use your hand held grinder to sharpen the edges up a bit, should work a treat though.
it easily heats a 300-400 sf area to 85 degrees in under 30 minutes on a sunny day. As far as storage, we are tinkering with running the hot air through a heat exchanger that heats up glycol that is them piped down to a basement room filled with sand and other heat trapping materials. the room then stores the heat at a constant temp and can be slow vented for dispursion through a home or office. the idea and appliction has been around for a long time, we just made it for less expense
I really enjoyed your video. I have been collecting aluminum cans for about 5 months now to build one. I guess I am going to crush them now and take them to the recycle center. I love the idea of using the downspouts, plus you don't have to drink beer and soda (calories....argh) to collect cans..Very nice and clean design....and 200 degrees....WOWZER!!!
I would use aluminized mylar spray painted black as a backing to reduce heat loss. An emergency blanket from Wally World can be had for less than 2 bucks.
yup, thats an old video bud. watch some of the new ones. We now mass produce 100 of our commercial heat panels per month. That video was a myth-buster style poke of fun at back yard builders and beer can inventors. Yes they can work, yes we used other materials to try and achieve a better result, but bottom line, we have perfected the true heat panel systems and can do it for less than what anyone at home can. Thats the power of persistance and mass production, thats why you shop at walmart
Raises an interesting thought. As an extension of generating free heat, perhaps you can think of inexpensive thermal energy storage, to allow the heat to be enjoyed over a longer period (into the dark hours of the day).
You could use polystyrene (heat rated) for the end caps. You could use CPVC for the connecting tube instead of expensive and heavy steel. I just wonder if airflow across the membrane would allow for a significant temperature rise?
This looks like a neat idea, but I wonder what the heat you would achieve would be (compared to 210 deg) on a winter day when you really need that heat. seems like the idea has potential, but just wondering what kind of heat you got out of it from a weaker winter sun and how much space you've been able to heat with it?
Steve L He DID mention that it was the costs for the PROTOTYPE model and out of recycled material. I'm SURE he uses all new and top quality stuff for the ones he sells to the public. What do you think? ;-)
Not to be critical but, you should be measuring the heat at the top tube not the bottom tube due to the laws of thermal dynamics you'll definitely reach higher temperatures because your blowing cold air into your box and forcing the heat down to the cold end of the box thereby lowering the temperature reverse the airflow direction from blow air into the top tube to pulling air out the top and in from the bottom.
I've hearing this rock song for years (rock classic if you asked) and for the first time ever, I now know the title and what they are saying! POUR SOME SUGAR ON ME! Out fucking standing!!!
Miracle hack! Take a used, preferably many, many tooth blade and turn it around backwards. This is a trick siding workers use in their skill saws. I like old, worn out, carbide tipped blades. Recycle! Repurpose! Respect from the crackpot Eco-Warriors!
Ummm. What was temp difference from blue gutter test and the built panel test. Same day? Same time on a comparable day? Also,, I personally prefer to run tne air conditioner when its above 80 degrees outside. Not really looking to make more heat. You would have to show me, before I spent money on this, how well it works on a sunny or partly cloudy 20 degree day. That's when I would want supplemental heat instead of buring natural gas in my furnace.
I have 2 Patents on Transpired Solar Collectors for agriculture purposes to heat commercial poultry, turkey and swine houses. Also have a control system that works with the existing fossil fuel heating systems to provide the needed heat during the baby chicks first days in the grow house. My system is 400' x 4' x 4" thick. Will have a website up soon.
Am I missing something here. If the unit is placed inside an insulated house behind a window, it doesn't matter what the air temp is. It matters how much sun it gets. For a really efficiently insulated house this could work well although it probably won't continue to radiate enough heat after sundown without some back up.
You're right, you are missing something here. Most of these units made, are installed Outside the window, and it is just to "Offset" the heating bill during the day by gaining some free sunlight. Not used as a primary heat source.
I am sure that I miss something, as I don't see how is practical to use a solar heater outside! How is this effective or how do you use it for heating the inside of your home?
This be great for green houses. Doing winter stuff. Gave me an idea for water aswell. Wish ther was a way to store the heat to last the cold nights. Maby useing water as a heat sink.
Free=Free. I am happy to see you are trying to learn about RE, but remeber this, not all sources will work all the time. there is over 200 days/yr in places like co or mn that have great sun but temps under 20 degrees, do you think they dismiss this technology because it does not put out heat at "night" or when its "cloudy"? think dude, this is free heat...you take it where you can get it! To answer your question though, the rest of the time you find other means, most are not free!
You have a good idea going here, You would be better off spacing them apart to make more surface area for heating the sides of the leader pipe. but after thought is easy to do I say great Job !!!!
Think about this for nighttime heat. find an unused corner in the attic or basement and put a insulated 4x4x4 box and fill it with plastic water bottles. with an intake and exhaust. on each level have the bottles sitting on a piece of wood with holes drilled in such a manner at to make the heat have to go from level to level heating the bottles. Finally exhaust the heat into your home ducting for nighttime heat.
Panel is posible do only with metals, colour - used for fireplaces for high temperature, rock insulation and glas. Any plastic, glue etc. will evaporate and you will breathe it.
please check out all my videos of the solar hot air panels on here. our final versions have all tested out at 150-220 degrees max. taking in 8 degree air on one video it still produced 150 degrees. normally you pull inside air into the unit so it will put out 200. our new production units come in 3x4 or 3x8. they easily heat 400-800 sf areas.
again, guys...i have over 100 videos on here, this is #23. please watch a few, and understand what we are testing. We do have a solar powered air conditioner, so check it out. this is a solar thermal hot air panel! It is used during winter...not summer. i get 50 comments a day, asking or telling me stuff i already know, just subscribe, watch the videos and enjoy. I am doing this to help you. I spend the time and money so you dont have to, i have much to show you.
that was a very old test panel, we have since perfected it and yes sell hundreds a month. $899 is very affordable considering it can offset that in heating costs in one year. Please do your research guys before you comment on something you clearly don't understand
justinmy300z hey Justin. You mentioned you sell these units? Can you please provide some details @ raheel.raayimpex@gmail.com. I am interested in buying a couple of units.
There are people actually stupid enough to pay $900 for one of these? Just because it could save that much in a year doesn't mean that justifies such a ridiculous price. Rick is right in saying that knowledge is power. Fortunately for the uploader, most people have no interest in being knowledgeable - they'd rather pay out the nose than use their head.
I was it in the shop today cutting the tops and bottoms off of pop cans, I got about 8 done, and I thought "Wait a minute, I have a whole bunch of aluminum, eaves trough downspout in the rafters in the garage!" Thanks for proving that my new invention works, even if you did beat me to it...
Hey man, I'm loving the vid. Just moved to Japan and looking forward to building one of these things. Great video-- pour some sugar on me-- awesome addition! Keep doing' what your doing'.
Justin, I'm thinking of 'borrowing' (steal is such an ugly word) your design, only putting CPVC inside and building a solar pool heater... the shower door and downspouts are an awesome idea! I'm in central Texas, may be able to swim all year (nah!)
rstevewarmorycom, what puzzles me is you, like so many others, never watch all of the video or even take a minute to see the many other videos added since the first! that is a very old video, and we only made it to "imitate" the process for science and fun. My company has since mastered the heat panel, mass marketed it and sells thousands a year...i AM an engineer bud, the correct kind! one who does his research before spouting off. "you people"...lol
I would like to know how they do for house use. What size is needed for x amount for square feet and how they're functioning cost compares to standard heating and cooling systems.
nice video, dont worry about the nasayers. I have a question how cold can it be out side before it dont work. either way I like to give it a shot to see if I can use it to keep my shed warm in the winter.
Is that 210 degrees guaranteed on a 20 degree day? I know how to almost double the heat collection from that panel. And triple it's effectiveness another way.
Very impressive considering the amount of air you use. What's the purpose of gluing down-spouts together? It would seem much easier using tin sheet for end caps. Just wrap the end and then either rivet or glue them. You could do the same with nipples between them tubes. Just cut the holes round/square and then use interlocking method just like the duct works. Thanks for the vid...I'm no longer save aluminum cans because of your vid.
I would appreciate if you would tell us the CFM rating of the blower, and also what the ambient air temperature was. That would give a mass flow rate - more or less - and a delta T so we could determine exactly how many BTU the collector delivered. I'll not worry about de-rating the blower because of the collector's static resistance; you mentioned you were overdriving it at 18v, which I think should be sufficient to approximate the actual rated output at the downstream end of the collector, in spite of the resistance.
Not to right a book, but also noticed not many people using dual pane? Old or cheap double panes would make quite an insulative difference on the side w/least insulation value...
I understand this gets really hot which is great, nice video by the way. But my question is about the duration, how long will it hold hot air such as like during winter night does it still have some heat left in there or does it run out fairly quick?
I guessing it won't fully heat a big room without cooling off because of the cooler air that you'd have coming in the inlet side. But I'd be interested on just what temperature it will keep a room and what size the room is.
South side of my two story is going to get the side covered like this. Was wondering what material to use. Had thought about the wavy shingle board stuff at Menards but that could smell. Won't need plywood backer. Maybe foil wrap to reflect summer heat. I have shade for summer on west and east ends of house.
ok.. so how the heck do you expect this to work in the rain? or during poor weather when sun is covered? the times when HEAT is really needed, when its night at 4am and your freezing your arse off?
If you recirculate the air through a window air vent, you start with warmer or colder air but as the temp in the room rises, the air temp from the system also rises. Theoretically could be several trillion degrees as temps rise. I've never tried it and I'm not a scientist but it would probably wipe out life on the planet. At least this is what the folks at the electric company told me.
If the device had an R value of infinity, I suppose it could sort of happen, but the R value of a device like this is going to be very low, and only so much heat differential is possible between the solar heated air and the outside air before it stabilizes. I'd like to see the amount of heat generated on a zero degree day before I wanted one.
Nice !! What about using thermosyphon to force the air to go true the house ? And what about doing a whole roofing sheet system more or less like this ? ; )
If you are still checking RU-vid messages, I have three 4×6 Revere themal water heating panels......I need some tips as far as recirculation and storage. I am only planning on using two of the panels. I would like my well pump and electric pump ran off solar panel and or inverter. Thanks
You would be better off to get smooth glass. Solar heaters do better with direct radiation rather than diffuse. Even solar PV systems, though they are rated for direct or diffuse radiation do better with direct radiation. Any sort of solar concentrators like trough collectors are rendered useless without direct radiation. The radiation is so diffuse that it destructively interferes and cancels any potential gain out. Great design! I would have never though about using guttering downspouts.
actually the wood blade can be used and is better, it doesn't leave melted ends like in the video, gutters are thin gauge anything thicker, then i would change blades. note; use an old wood blade that is to dull for wood, that is perfect for gutters!
A plumber I know made poor mans solar panels like this by mounting old radiators in a similar way and painting them matt black. He ran the hot water they produced into under floor heating.
Some people don't live in sunny areas or have sun facing windows, so hook a blow dryer up to a rechargeable car battery such as a car battery or whatever and stick it in the solar heater and the heat circulating in the aluminum and pumping back into your house should double.
sorry that concept is so very flawed, if you can't position it in sunlight and still work with windows then you shouldn't even bother, just let the blow dryer running off the car battery be the heat source, don't send it thru the box, that would be wasting energy.
Very nice idea!! I like the idea of lowering our carbon footprint & cost of energy. Can you quantify how much heat you generate from one panel? BTU/hr?
