Recirculating cooling system.

[Digital_Plasma]

Hi,

It's been a while since i have had time for my hobbies, but now im back in it again. Glad to be back.

Earlier I have had problems with cooling water getting to hot. I have used 2 x 40 liter buckets as cooling water vessels (running water directly from the faucet is too expensive!) Now im planning on "upgrading" the cooling system by putting in an active cooler. I have my eyes on either of these two designs:

Grill

Any of you guys used these types of coolers before or know anything of how effective they would work? The grill type I would make myself with copper tubing and copper wire soldred to the pipe. Although it's gonna be a hell of a soldering job... I haven't thought so much about pipe size yet since some of you might have greater insight in this than I. You properly need more info, so ask if needed.
What do ya think?

[googe]

That fan idea is pretty cool and simple . I know a few people that use car radiators and they say they work well, pretty cheap for a second hand one.

[Digital_Plasma]

Yeah the car radiator type was actually what made me curious. But I think the wife would make me live in the garage if I started draging used car parts home. That's why I was thinking "small scale" that still would work.

[BentJar]

I can speak on the radiator set up. It works great, uses no water and it is my final solution to condensing. I tried many things but this one is troble free, quite and cost me nothing.

[Digital_Plasma]

How many liters/quarts do you run through the system?

[Maxximus Flavius]

I'm having the same issues with cooling water on long runs. I'm on expensive municipal water and am reluctant to pour money down the drain. So, since I tend to re-invent the wheel constantly, I did the copper coil on a fan thing without researching prior art or effectiveness.

It was simple to do and I finally had a use for my spring benders. They spaced the coil nicely.


I used about 8' and mounted it on a 7' high volume fan.


I did a test run off my hot water tap which runs about 54C. I saw about a 4-5C drop in temperature. Not really worth while.

So, next was to use the rad off an antique Ninja I'm restoring. I had to mount it sideways to get flow across as many tubes as possible. The condenser discharge is not enough to flood the radiator. With the same 7" fan, I saw about 8C difference. With a reservoir of 70 litres, it was just enough to do five stripping runs over 5-6 hours.


When I went to adjust something, I touched the fan with my thumb and sheared off two blades I didn't re-install the guard cause I "knew" I was going to be careful.

So, I think for me, a heat exchanger/radiator/heater core is the way to go. And a couple of fans with guards.

[Maxximus Flavius]

I saw a mention of a cooling tower and it got me thinking. I remember how surprisingly effective running the hot discharge across a large aluminum lid was. My favourite $store has $1 stainless bowls available. I bought five, drilled a hole in the centre and one on the edge.


I sawed an aluminum tube (closet pole?) in half, flattened one end, drilled a hole and then bent it about 30 degrees.


Then just a simple matter of sliding them on to a 1/2" threaded rod. I acquired a bag of shaft collars from somewhere, and decided it was easier than threading nuts. So the idea is to have the water cascade down the bowl, funneled into the edge hole by the rim, and then guided back to the centre of the next bowl by the channel. I''m very pleased with the initial results. The air temperature was about 22C and I measured a 13C drop with the starting water at 50C. The beauty in my eyes are that it is easily added to until you run out of rod

[S-Cackalacky]

Maxximus, I like your cooling tower idea - very creative. I've been batting around a similar idea using a different technique. I was thinking of having plastic buckets cabled together one above the other using picture hanging wire. Each bucket would have tiny holes drilled in the bottom. The hose from the condenser output would run to the top bucket. The idea being that the water would rain down from one bucket to the next being cooled by the ambient air until it rained down from the bottom bucket back into the water vessel. A fan could be added for a cross current air flow. I was thinking it could be hung from one of the overhead joist in my basement, or a free standing rack or a-frame.

Don't know if I'll ever try this. My small pot still has been doing fine just recirculating water from a 15 gallon container. I plan to move to a 15.5 gallon keg at some point in the future, so who knows.

Just sayin',
S-C

[Maxximus Flavius]

In the course of everything I attempt, I never get it right the first time. Of course, I never ever get it perfect either. So, here's version II of the dollar store cooling stack. I found that flows of more than .75 litre/hour overwhelmed the rims of the bowls and the water just spilled over in waterfall fashion. I racked my meager brains for a "dam" idea to stop the overflow. Then about 4:00 this morning it came to me. Five more bowls to act as catch basins. I removed the rim from an equal number so that they would be smaller then the catch bowls. The catch bowls have a hole drilled just off the centre to drop the water onto the top of the next bowl.


Now I have an array of ten bowls that are slightly taller then the original configuration with a calculated flat plate are of over 560 square inches.


I will run some tests tomorrow. If the performance isn't what I want, I'll just stack more bowls. At a dollar per, I can afford quite a stack. I still think it looks kinda cool.

[S-Cackalacky]

You're bordering on a modern art museum piece there Maxx.

Just sayin',
S-C

PS - Hope you can get the bugs worked out. This might have some good potential.

[lampshade]

One advantage of the double-bowl approach is that you can distribute, by holes placed evenly around the circumference of the collection bowl, the water over several areas of the below bowl. Of course, you would have to size the holes so that (a) they are big enough to drain all of the collected water while (b) they are not too big so that all of the holes have an opportunity to drain water, instead of a few holes draining all of the water.

With the earlier funnel approach, there is no guarantee that the water will flow over all of the below bowl.

[Maxximus Flavius]

I'm very happy with the first results of my cooling tower. A couple of changes in the distribution across the cascade bowl as suggested by Lampshade. Here's the assembly order.

First the catch bowl pinned down with a shaft collar and then another shaft collar to act as a stop for the cascade bowl.


Then the cascade bowl and a shaft collar.


Now for a ABS ring as a diffusion/spacer. The shaft collar is actually optional and redundant because the next bowl can be pressed down tight to hold everything centred.


| did a leakdown test to see if the concept was feasible. Notice the rivulets of water spaced all around the diffusion ring. It's leaking at just under a litre a minute, which for my application is perfect.


Then for the rest of the assembly, just repeat until you run out of bowls. | bought the last of the dollar store stock and now have 12 bowls or 6 sets. There's just something right about the number twelve Here's the stack running with the top bowl flooded.


And how well does it work? Amazing, which accounts for my current good mood. I siphoned 20 litres of 51C water into the top of the column and when it was all done, the catch pail registered 31.5C. The air temperature was 21C. Yeah, I think that I'll do an eight hour reflux run with this thing in the circuit. I'm going to experiment with some dishwasher rinse solution to see if it improves the wetting action across the bowls. I've done a short test and the water seems to spread out over the surface more. I'll do a before and after video.

[Maxximus Flavius]

I'm going to post any new info in a new thread I'll title "CHILLER", which is an acronym for "Cooling Hack Illustrating a Linear/Laminar Economical Radiator"

[lampshade]

That is so cool looking and novel. I can't wait for the video.

One drawback: Because it is so cool, it will definitely draw attention.

[woodshed]

Impressive. I'm envisioning a wall like this at the distillery. What's it sound like?

[Maxximus Flavius]

Impressive. I'm envisioning a wall like this at the distillery. What's it sound like?

Just a subtle trickling sound that reminds you of meadows, doves, beautiful maids, sunshine and a great sandwich. Oh, and good drink of whatever you're drinking.

Actually,very quiet. I haven't run it with my pond pump yet, but I suspect the pump will be the noisiest part of the system.

[Digital_Plasma]

Sorry, I haden't noticed this before.... VERY cool idea Flavius! Very Feng Shui. Were you planning on setting a fan or two to make the cooling process more efficient?

[Maxximus Flavius]

Sorry, I haden't noticed this before.... VERY cool idea Flavius! Very Feng Shui. Were you planning on setting a fan or two to make the cooling process more efficient?

I've started a new thread titled the C.H.I.L.L.E.R where I will continue posting on the development. It's a fluid idea at the moment, pun intended,

As to your fan suggestion, yes it looks like I'll have to incorporate some sort of airflow.