I usually run around 2kW.
Ambient is around 30°C here most days so an air cooled system will be pulling off warmish product. A calculator (.xls?/link) to work out how many meters of ½” finned tube I’ll need to get under 40°C with a small volume recirc system would be great. That’s one idea but I’d like to look at all possibilities.
I won’t ever be running more than 5kW through my boiler but I won’t be able to pull the same amount of power with a refrige system as well at my place so... Hmmm
I did do some work at an ice-cream factory a while back that had ice banks.
The idea would be to freeze a chest freezer full of water with a coil running through it over night. Then pump heat into it all day. The ice cream plant used up most of the towns power so it's not a dissimilar situation at my place, spread the power use over 24 hours.
Anyone doing something like that out there??? It might require a heavy dose of heads (antifreeze) in the coolant line to work properly but might have merit (the factory certainly had some crazy sh!t in there).
In colder clims then air-cooled is the obvious answer but what are people closer to the equator doing?
Open to any outside-the-square ideas
