Please keep going with this experiment and ignore negative comments. I love Peltier's idea, but I could never find anything meaningful and practical done by someone. Please continue and I hope you will end up with something practical (cooling using max 50W, dealing with condensation on cold side sink and exhaling a heat properly). I wish you to succeed!
If it helps at all, 2 decades ago, peltiers were really big in the PC overclocking world. Homebuilt chilled computer clusters contributed massively to humanities knowledge of our own DNA as well as the function of protein. Commercially, in some parts of the world, benchtop water filters, dehumidifiers and a range of other appliances leverage the tech. I've recently repowered some wine fridges with them, and currently using them to generate power.
@M3rVsT4H Very fascinating stuff. I think peltiers combined with solar can do a lot for us - or at least I hope. Appreciate all the positive feedback and will keep hammering on this project.
@M3rVsT4H If I can make a good enough fridge, I will upload and share the results with you. It's gonna take a bit more time lol. I scoured the net for peltiers to bench test, some came from Sweden and US sources. Turning over every rock :)
I enjoy your videos very much, and love playing with peltiers myself. Currently I am trying to add a thermostat to a small cooler setup to see if I can increase efficiency, and decrease, of course wh usage. I too use solar energy for my experiments. Keep the videos coming, and thank you!
@177airhead5 Welcome and glad to hear it! thanks for the positive feedback. It is good to know you are working with solar and peltiers too. If the end results are any good, I will upload and share my "research results" as soon as possible. Right now are still a lot of combinations to test. It seems peltiers can be more efficient under narrow circumstances. But it's been very tedious and frustrating trying all the possible combinations.
I learned something from a recent goodwill purchased kurps sub keg cooler. I took it to pieces and figured out that the beer cooler used pwm to pulse power to the peltier to get up to temp and tapered off. This thing wasnt well insulated but it did the job and used the least amount of power. At 12v it used 60 watts and leveled off at 300ma when satisifed.
@egn83b Very cool! Looking for a peltier fridge to take apart and mod, they're hard to find. I have one made by Black and Decker over 15 years old but it has to stay in one piece....
@Victoria-gq8gt You're extremely welcome! many days have I thought to quit yt and focus on surviving. But when I see people watch and enjoy this stuff. Your comment sure brightens things up lol. Glad you are here and thanks for watching :D
I would ignore the negative comments. No time for that. To be data driven usually pays off over negative criticisms. Also, I wonder if a broken mini fridge could be sourced and retrofitted with peltier devices? You could always wrap that with more foam board and aluminum tape. Finally, a wood cabinet could be built around it, making the mini fridge more appealing and super efficient with the r value. Good job
@mr.makeit4037 You're right! thanks for the encouragement... I am concerned other DIY'ers would be discouraged from being open minded and performing investigations and experiments. That's not the spirit and purpose of this work. So I have been diligently cleaning up the mess... Retrofitting: right on... I have been scraping the net looking for a broken mini fridge (or small chest freezer). So far, nothing. I hate tearing up working appliances. I happen to own a relic of the past: a Black and Decker "full size" Peltier mini fridge. The construction is identical to the compressor based cousins. It's a power hog, about 20 years old, and doesn't get very cold. It's staying in one piece forever... too bad I cannot find a broken one for sale to mod!
A few summers ago I became obsessed with these Peltier devices. I found it hard to trust the datasheets as importers often mark them as being far higher performing than they are physically capable of being. I resolved to to test them myself and when the oft stated "5%" efficiency (which is nonsense!) comes when people just crank up the power as high as possible with very little regard for insulation and then have the gall to say it fails. I tested many devices in all sorts of configuration with fixed volumes of water cooling, if you'd like me to share my notes I'd be happy to send them. I was in search of the highest efficient heat pumping point and intend to build a device with up to several dozens of these chips just to extract as much cooling per watt.
@mentefinale3 Hello, your work sounds very intriguing. I'm thankful there are open-minded people looking at peltiers. The treatment Peltiers get seems very strange! There does not seem to be much desire to bring progress. Sadly I have not been able to share the most recent work. There were several breakthroughs. In one series of experiments I cut the power draw by 50% for same temperatures. It was shocking. Found it best to ignore the establishment narrative and really focus on what peltiers do well, plus find better ways to use them. Using what was learned, I am building a small test refrigerator and a more powerful air conditioning device. Feel free to email me if you so wish, and by all means to share your work and ideas. I hope to follow up and share more content related to Peltiers as soon as humanly possible!
What I have always wanted to do but haven't taken the time to try is to take a standard small air conditioner and replace the fan motor with a 12v DC one then cut the feed line going to the front evaporator and add in a high pressure 12v fuel pump and automotive recharge valve then recharge the system with the car coolant replacement kit and this may work for a small refrigerator as well
@phillangstrom8693 That could be a good project - I've been thinking about tearing up a window AC. Problem is, I don't want to use a working AC. And all of mine work. So looking for one that doesn't work so I don't feel bad cutting it apart.... I'd love to find a broken "mini" refrigerator to convert, so far haven't been able to find one. Will keep looking around!
I am curious, and will watch to see the techniques you are using. I am hoping to cool a chest cooler with excess solar power over what I need to charge my ebike battery. I could buy a 30 qt compressor fridge that uses about 120 W-hours a day.
@skyl4rk Glad you're here, I will share any good results asap. Tedious work is still ongoing. I am trying every combination of peltiers, heat sinks, heat sink compounds, exotic metal (seriously), different brands of modules, different voltages, everything under the sun :) PS the cheap 20qt compressor freezer shown in the video uses about 50 watts, or 350wh per 12hr day. When ambient temps are hot, it used more power. That's the performance level I am trying to catch up with...
There's never any shortage of people to tell us something can't be done who have no experience themselves. Those attitudes are nothing more than a poison in the minds of people who may have otherwise been able to innovate and improve the world. Society needs more people who encourage others and help fuel independent thought. Sadly, that's not the world we live in.
@colin8532 All good points! I support DIY'ers and hope they will dare to look into things for themselves... that is how many new inventions get discovered, which can benefit us all :)
putting aluminum foil tape on the outside of a refridgerated vessel improves its cooling ability because it has low emissivity and flicks the heat of the room away. i put a bunch on my 12v fridges and lowered their daily power use by about 20-30%
@vevenaneathna You are right, thank you for sharing your ideas and results. 20-30% is a huge difference. I have some of that "foil-backed" insulation left over and have been testing it with my fridge. Currently building a small fridge prototype. I'll upload as soon as I can. The foil is not pretty to look at on my fridge, but if it works who cares :D
I'm traveling a different pathway headed towards a similar goal. You're absolutely right about your methods. Like Jiminey Cricket said in the Disney movie Pinocchio, "Alway let your conscience be your guide." The only place for negativity in MY life is in doing math. I've built wind turbine air compressors for nearly 60 years in the face of naysayers who tell me I'm crazy. Maybe I am crazy, but it's my nightmare. The naysayers can have their own; stay out of mine. I'm currently developing (surely somewhere around the ten-thousanth iteration by now!) my own method of mechanical cooling using stored compressed air running inside a custom-designed vortex tube. I'm autistic and will NEVER be finished, constantly seeking new pathways. My advice to you is, stay the course. Einstein is rumored to have flunked 8th-grade math! So What? Who Cares? He stayed the course and look what he accomplished!
@WhatDadIsUpTo 10-4..... thinking outside of the box, advancing progress, seeking new avenues is not crazy, but it sure gets a bad rap sometimes. Your air compressor setup sounds fantastic, I'm all for it :D for various reasons I have not been able to do a lot of work in that direction, but I will someday. I am saving up for a bigger tank, piston compressor, various accessories. Several projects in mind. Maybe this will make it into video someday... The vortex tube cooling device is extremely intriguing and needs to be investigated. It's good you're looking into it. I am seriously thinking about this tech a lot. Anyway like you said, stay the course. I'll keep working at stuff :)
@solarpoweredge If you don't mind the almost-nausiating stench of whatever odorant is added to propane gas, a used propane tank makes a dandy receiver. I keep my system at 40 psig. I have a 4oo + gallon capacity system (excluding piping) at 0 psig. At 40 psig, some of my smaller air engines, that operate at only 1 psig would run ad infinitum with a full system 400 gallon x 40 psi = 16,000 one-gallon segments effectively.
@WhatDadIsUpTo OK great that will be backup if I can't afford a bigger tank. Love the idea of an air engine running for ages and replenished by solar, I need to get into that ASAP
Wouldn't a compressor based refrigerator always be more efficient tho? I think Peltier shines where you can actually find a temperature differential that you can naturally abuse, otherwise I'd say compressor is best, but would love to see your results.
@Adrian_Galilea Efficiency can include but is not limited to: cost, ease of use, durability, complexity, electrical power consumption, DIY accessibility, long term outlook, etc. For example Microwave ovens waste a ton of power, but they get the job done so quickly they are in wide use. Peltiers are a very unique in that they can make "cold" for so little effort and complexity, even connected straight to a solar panel. No refined gas, no compressors, no high pressure or brazing copper pipes. Research is still ongoing... by ignoring conventional thinking about Peltiers, I boosted the efficiency of one of my test rigs by 50%. Got down to 14F for half the power. At first I thought I made a mistake, but it was a verified result. I believe there is more to Peltiers than commonly accepted. The research has been expensive and takes a lot of time. Hope to present the results and findings as soon as humanly possible.
Question, If you reverse the battery polarity will the hot and cold sides of the peltier reverse? I guess I was wondering if it did you could reverse for a few seconds and melt of some of the ice that forms. Like a defrost mode. Great video
@donaldhoudek2889 Yes! they can run backwards polarity, that would heat up and defrost. Good idea and good thinking :) The current plan is to find better heat sinks (for the cold side) and prevent ice from forming, in theory anyway. There is an overwhelming number of combinations to test, I have many sizes and types of heat sinks, modules etc. and each combination is being efficiency tested over time. Each test lasts several hours, and I write everything down to compare. When it finishes I will present any good findings :)
@@solarpoweredge I was just looking at my project parts box and saw my 1"x 1" mini 5 VDC brushless fan and thought that that may be a testable option for the fridge as it uses very little power. It would be just enough to get a little circulation around the cold side heat sink. Just a thought.
@donaldhoudek2889 You're right on target, I'll look for a better fan option, or maybe 2 of them. I had propped a small fan in the corner of the box aiming up, but I don't think it moved enough air
@donaldhoudek2889 I bet it's good. There is a copper heat sink on amazon but they want big bucks for it. Maybe I'll save up and get it soon. I have been very curious to test this versus Aluminum heat sinks.
I was watching your solar shed exhaust fan video's. I have a question. I want to put a 100 watt solar panel along with a 12v radiator exhaust fan in my van. I have a 100 amp lifepo4 house battery with a DC to dc charger. I plan on getting a DC to dc charger/mppt controller. My question is can I run the positive and negative from the solar panel to the exhaust fan and to the mppt controller? I want to power the fan off the solar panel alone.
@pkennedy4256 That is an experiment I have done with varying results :) I suggest cautiously testing the idea to see if it works - a 24v car radiator fan might be a better match for the 100w panel, although they're more expensive.
@vrrevolution9183 That sounds interesting, looking for one now. Bought some foam earlier to try making better insulation for a bigger freezer - if that goes well I will post it
Ambient air temperature without water cooling always has negativity with it. Temperature differential without water cooling isn't that much has negativity with it. Funny solar panels are not that efficient but they work like peltier agreed about the negativity.
@Off-gridPA I love solar panels... what we need for peltiers is better "potential" cooling power to reduce ambient temperature swings. Hope there is some way to do that, I am trying
@@solarpoweredge Like overclocking a computer as long as you got good cooling on hot side? Peltier modules can go to like 15/16 volts 60watt I have. Peltier is thought provoking. 🧐
@Off-gridPA Peltiers thought provoking... 10/10 best statement ever! :D 👍 certainly better cooling on the hot side is a must. I think I made a few breakthroughs in the workshop past few days (goal is more cooling for less power) hope to share an update as soon as possible
![Felix "Unfair" | [Stray Kids : SKZ-PLAYER]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Oswujxm2Ag0/mqdefault.jpg)
Please keep going with this experiment and ignore negative comments. I love Peltier's idea, but I could never find anything meaningful and practical done by someone. Please continue and I hope you will end up with something practical (cooling using max 50W, dealing with condensation on cold side sink and exhaling a heat properly). I wish you to succeed!
@martinesproduction Thank you so much for your support :) I am trying to come up with an attractive diy fridge project as soon as I can
If it helps at all, 2 decades ago, peltiers were really big in the PC overclocking world. Homebuilt chilled computer clusters contributed massively to humanities knowledge of our own DNA as well as the function of protein. Commercially, in some parts of the world, benchtop water filters, dehumidifiers and a range of other appliances leverage the tech. I've recently repowered some wine fridges with them, and currently using them to generate power.
@@solarpoweredge The one thing I'm yet to achieve to my satisfaction is what you're working on. Will definitely follow your progress. :)
@M3rVsT4H Very fascinating stuff. I think peltiers combined with solar can do a lot for us - or at least I hope. Appreciate all the positive feedback and will keep hammering on this project.
@M3rVsT4H If I can make a good enough fridge, I will upload and share the results with you. It's gonna take a bit more time lol. I scoured the net for peltiers to bench test, some came from Sweden and US sources. Turning over every rock :)
I enjoy your videos very much, and love playing with peltiers myself. Currently I am trying to add a thermostat to a small cooler setup to see if I can increase efficiency, and decrease, of course wh usage. I too use solar energy for my experiments. Keep the videos coming, and thank you!
@177airhead5 Welcome and glad to hear it! thanks for the positive feedback. It is good to know you are working with solar and peltiers too. If the end results are any good, I will upload and share my "research results" as soon as possible. Right now are still a lot of combinations to test. It seems peltiers can be more efficient under narrow circumstances. But it's been very tedious and frustrating trying all the possible combinations.
I learned something from a recent goodwill purchased kurps sub keg cooler. I took it to pieces and figured out that the beer cooler used pwm to pulse power to the peltier to get up to temp and tapered off. This thing wasnt well insulated but it did the job and used the least amount of power. At 12v it used 60 watts and leveled off at 300ma when satisifed.
@egn83b Very cool! Looking for a peltier fridge to take apart and mod, they're hard to find. I have one made by Black and Decker over 15 years old but it has to stay in one piece....
Seeing these videos pop up makes my day! Thank you
@Victoria-gq8gt You're extremely welcome! many days have I thought to quit yt and focus on surviving. But when I see people watch and enjoy this stuff. Your comment sure brightens things up lol. Glad you are here and thanks for watching :D
I would ignore the negative comments. No time for that. To be data driven usually pays off over negative criticisms.
Also, I wonder if a broken mini fridge could be sourced and retrofitted with peltier devices? You could always wrap that with more foam board and aluminum tape.
Finally, a wood cabinet could be built around it, making the mini fridge more appealing and super efficient with the r value. Good job
@mr.makeit4037 You're right! thanks for the encouragement... I am concerned other DIY'ers would be discouraged from being open minded and performing investigations and experiments. That's not the spirit and purpose of this work. So I have been diligently cleaning up the mess...
Retrofitting: right on... I have been scraping the net looking for a broken mini fridge (or small chest freezer). So far, nothing. I hate tearing up working appliances.
I happen to own a relic of the past: a Black and Decker "full size" Peltier mini fridge. The construction is identical to the compressor based cousins. It's a power hog, about 20 years old, and doesn't get very cold. It's staying in one piece forever... too bad I cannot find a broken one for sale to mod!
Keep up the good work and ignore the ignorant posts.
@kenjohnson3412 Will do :D
A few summers ago I became obsessed with these Peltier devices. I found it hard to trust the datasheets as importers often mark them as being far higher performing than they are physically capable of being. I resolved to to test them myself and when the oft stated "5%" efficiency (which is nonsense!) comes when people just crank up the power as high as possible with very little regard for insulation and then have the gall to say it fails. I tested many devices in all sorts of configuration with fixed volumes of water cooling, if you'd like me to share my notes I'd be happy to send them. I was in search of the highest efficient heat pumping point and intend to build a device with up to several dozens of these chips just to extract as much cooling per watt.
@mentefinale3 Hello, your work sounds very intriguing. I'm thankful there are open-minded people looking at peltiers. The treatment Peltiers get seems very strange! There does not seem to be much desire to bring progress.
Sadly I have not been able to share the most recent work. There were several breakthroughs. In one series of experiments I cut the power draw by 50% for same temperatures. It was shocking. Found it best to ignore the establishment narrative and really focus on what peltiers do well, plus find better ways to use them.
Using what was learned, I am building a small test refrigerator and a more powerful air conditioning device.
Feel free to email me if you so wish, and by all means to share your work and ideas. I hope to follow up and share more content related to Peltiers as soon as humanly possible!
What I have always wanted to do but haven't taken the time to try is to take a standard small air conditioner and replace the fan motor with a 12v DC one then cut the feed line going to the front evaporator and add in a high pressure 12v fuel pump and automotive recharge valve then recharge the system with the car coolant replacement kit and this may work for a small refrigerator as well
@phillangstrom8693 That could be a good project - I've been thinking about tearing up a window AC. Problem is, I don't want to use a working AC. And all of mine work. So looking for one that doesn't work so I don't feel bad cutting it apart.... I'd love to find a broken "mini" refrigerator to convert, so far haven't been able to find one. Will keep looking around!
I am curious, and will watch to see the techniques you are using. I am hoping to cool a chest cooler with excess solar power over what I need to charge my ebike battery. I could buy a 30 qt compressor fridge that uses about 120 W-hours a day.
@skyl4rk Glad you're here, I will share any good results asap. Tedious work is still ongoing. I am trying every combination of peltiers, heat sinks, heat sink compounds, exotic metal (seriously), different brands of modules, different voltages, everything under the sun :)
PS the cheap 20qt compressor freezer shown in the video uses about 50 watts, or 350wh per 12hr day. When ambient temps are hot, it used more power. That's the performance level I am trying to catch up with...
There's never any shortage of people to tell us something can't be done who have no experience themselves. Those attitudes are nothing more than a poison in the minds of people who may have otherwise been able to innovate and improve the world. Society needs more people who encourage others and help fuel independent thought. Sadly, that's not the world we live in.
@colin8532 All good points! I support DIY'ers and hope they will dare to look into things for themselves... that is how many new inventions get discovered, which can benefit us all :)
So cool!
@Matt-c5f9o :D 👍
putting aluminum foil tape on the outside of a refridgerated vessel improves its cooling ability because it has low emissivity and flicks the heat of the room away. i put a bunch on my 12v fridges and lowered their daily power use by about 20-30%
@vevenaneathna You are right, thank you for sharing your ideas and results. 20-30% is a huge difference. I have some of that "foil-backed" insulation left over and have been testing it with my fridge. Currently building a small fridge prototype. I'll upload as soon as I can. The foil is not pretty to look at on my fridge, but if it works who cares :D
I'm traveling a different pathway headed towards a similar goal.
You're absolutely right about your methods.
Like Jiminey Cricket said in the Disney movie Pinocchio, "Alway let your conscience be your guide."
The only place for negativity in MY life is in doing math.
I've built wind turbine air compressors for nearly 60 years in the face of naysayers who tell me I'm crazy.
Maybe I am crazy, but it's my nightmare.
The naysayers can have their own; stay out of mine.
I'm currently developing (surely somewhere around the ten-thousanth iteration by now!) my own method of mechanical cooling using stored compressed air running inside a custom-designed vortex tube.
I'm autistic and will NEVER be finished, constantly seeking new pathways.
My advice to you is, stay the course.
Einstein is rumored to have flunked 8th-grade math!
So What? Who Cares?
He stayed the course and look what he accomplished!
@WhatDadIsUpTo 10-4..... thinking outside of the box, advancing progress, seeking new avenues is not crazy, but it sure gets a bad rap sometimes.
Your air compressor setup sounds fantastic, I'm all for it :D for various reasons I have not been able to do a lot of work in that direction, but I will someday. I am saving up for a bigger tank, piston compressor, various accessories. Several projects in mind. Maybe this will make it into video someday...
The vortex tube cooling device is extremely intriguing and needs to be investigated. It's good you're looking into it. I am seriously thinking about this tech a lot.
Anyway like you said, stay the course. I'll keep working at stuff :)
@solarpoweredge
If you don't mind the almost-nausiating stench of whatever odorant is added to propane gas, a used propane tank makes a dandy receiver.
I keep my system at 40 psig. I have a 4oo + gallon capacity system (excluding piping) at 0 psig.
At 40 psig, some of my smaller air engines, that operate at only 1 psig would run ad infinitum with a full system 400 gallon x 40 psi = 16,000 one-gallon segments effectively.
@WhatDadIsUpTo OK great that will be backup if I can't afford a bigger tank. Love the idea of an air engine running for ages and replenished by solar, I need to get into that ASAP
Wouldn't a compressor based refrigerator always be more efficient tho?
I think Peltier shines where you can actually find a temperature differential that you can naturally abuse, otherwise I'd say compressor is best, but would love to see your results.
@Adrian_Galilea Efficiency can include but is not limited to: cost, ease of use, durability, complexity, electrical power consumption, DIY accessibility, long term outlook, etc.
For example Microwave ovens waste a ton of power, but they get the job done so quickly they are in wide use.
Peltiers are a very unique in that they can make "cold" for so little effort and complexity, even connected straight to a solar panel. No refined gas, no compressors, no high pressure or brazing copper pipes.
Research is still ongoing... by ignoring conventional thinking about Peltiers, I boosted the efficiency of one of my test rigs by 50%. Got down to 14F for half the power. At first I thought I made a mistake, but it was a verified result.
I believe there is more to Peltiers than commonly accepted. The research has been expensive and takes a lot of time.
Hope to present the results and findings as soon as humanly possible.
Question, If you reverse the battery polarity will the hot and cold sides of the peltier reverse? I guess I was wondering if it did you could reverse for a few seconds and melt of some of the ice that forms. Like a defrost mode. Great video
@donaldhoudek2889 Yes! they can run backwards polarity, that would heat up and defrost. Good idea and good thinking :) The current plan is to find better heat sinks (for the cold side) and prevent ice from forming, in theory anyway.
There is an overwhelming number of combinations to test, I have many sizes and types of heat sinks, modules etc. and each combination is being efficiency tested over time. Each test lasts several hours, and I write everything down to compare. When it finishes I will present any good findings :)
@@solarpoweredge I was just looking at my project parts box and saw my 1"x 1" mini 5 VDC brushless fan and thought that that may be a testable option for the fridge as it uses very little power. It would be just enough to get a little circulation around the cold side heat sink. Just a thought.
@donaldhoudek2889 You're right on target, I'll look for a better fan option, or maybe 2 of them. I had propped a small fan in the corner of the box aiming up, but I don't think it moved enough air
@@solarpoweredge If I remember correctly, copper was rated better as a heat sink material than aluminum was, but it will be a more expensive option
@donaldhoudek2889 I bet it's good. There is a copper heat sink on amazon but they want big bucks for it. Maybe I'll save up and get it soon. I have been very curious to test this versus Aluminum heat sinks.
I was watching your solar shed exhaust fan video's. I have a question. I want to put a 100 watt solar panel along with a 12v radiator exhaust fan in my van. I have a 100 amp lifepo4 house battery with a DC to dc charger. I plan on getting a DC to dc charger/mppt controller. My question is can I run the positive and negative from the solar panel to the exhaust fan and to the mppt controller? I want to power the fan off the solar panel alone.
@pkennedy4256 That is an experiment I have done with varying results :) I suggest cautiously testing the idea to see if it works - a 24v car radiator fan might be a better match for the 100w panel, although they're more expensive.
i was messing with a Styrofoam and 5 gallon bucket combo for hot water have you looked into the 5 gallon Styrofoam inserts with the screw lid?
@vrrevolution9183 That sounds interesting, looking for one now.
Bought some foam earlier to try making better insulation for a bigger freezer - if that goes well I will post it
Ambient air temperature without water cooling always has negativity with it. Temperature differential without water cooling isn't that much has negativity with it. Funny solar panels are not that efficient but they work like peltier agreed about the negativity.
@Off-gridPA I love solar panels... what we need for peltiers is better "potential" cooling power to reduce ambient temperature swings. Hope there is some way to do that, I am trying
@@solarpoweredge Like overclocking a computer as long as you got good cooling on hot side? Peltier modules can go to like 15/16 volts 60watt I have. Peltier is thought provoking. 🧐
@Off-gridPA Peltiers thought provoking... 10/10 best statement ever! :D 👍 certainly better cooling on the hot side is a must. I think I made a few breakthroughs in the workshop past few days (goal is more cooling for less power) hope to share an update as soon as possible