Cooling School project: Phase Change

It is an evaporation system. It's just a sort of bong, basically.

 

well thanks everyone I'll hope this will get us much further. I will keep posting stuff about our schoolproject. To show how it is doing, sort of a log.
thanks again

 

iM Looking into building some phase units, only because i have two of the best builders (chilly1 and Fugger) in my town. The proble is not only getting the RIGHT parts, but the tools you will need to fill, pull, test, bleed your system cost over 500USD if your lucky. Not to mention the refer agents can be very harmful to your health, and at some of the preassures that some builders work at, the whole system can turn into a mass of flying debry really quickly.

What i have learned about phase changes is that UNless you are an HVAC engineer, or you can sit an work with an experienced builder who has a history of success, and safety. then this **** is simply out of hand crazy dangerous hard.

Been up for 28 hours so i dont care about my spelling.

 

if you're definetly keen to do something on the lines of cooling for your project, phase is definetly out of reach, but there are other things you can do. i know peltiers have been mentioned and prehaps something along the lines of a water chiller might be more realistic? the cheaper mini-fridges you can buy from argos etc also work using peltiers, so you could well have a go at making your own. i think that is probably a more reasonably level of difficulty/expense/work/danger. still, something like this will require some serious thought before you go charging in. personally, unless its something you could use yourself after the presentation, id be trying to think of something fairly cheap. bragging rights in a class project aren't really worth that much.

 

yes,
but we think that's too easy(for this project).
'Cause you just have to buy a peltier, and build something around it and you have a beverage cooler or a cpu cooler.
And we think our grade is gonna be much lower if we do peltier.
Because you have to do some research(what is more possible with phase change i think) and you have to build something

 

If you think Peltier cooling is easy and does not require research, you don't understand it well enough...

 

If you try and build a phase change cooler I reckon there's a good chance you will die/be grievously injured. I'm not trying to be a downer, it's something I've wanted to do for ages, but you read the few build logs out there (www.vr-zone.com has one i think) and you get stuff like valves exploding, coolant leaks... all sorts. The guy on VR-Zone had a valve punch a hole through his door... wouldn't be funtimes against your head or anything. And I think he was an EXPERT.

Do something with pelts, there's still a lot of interesting stuff you can find about thermoelectrics and I reckon it's much less likely to kill you.

 

i doubt your grade would be lower for doing a peltier project, bearing in mind unless you have the kinda class thats into that sort of stuff, most people wont even have heard of the peltier effect. i imagine you can do some kinda talk/presentation about how the peltier effect works and how you've used it to make your product. there's a lot of potential i think. but, as nexxo has said, there's a lot of research, planning and understanding you'll need.

 

building a pelt system might be "easy" but building a good system, using the right voltages for your plates, balancing the heat load, constructing an efficent block capable of removing the heat effectivly, and finding or designing a radiator, and fan combination that has the capacity to remove the rtotal heat of the system, is a lot harder then it sounds.

I mean honestly i can make phase change sound simple too. Oh you pull a compressor out of a frig, slap on an after market evap, do some soldering, and fill the system, that doesnt mean its going to work well. Just because something sounds simple, dosent mean it is, or that it takes excating work.

What is this project for anyway, what class, what grade level?

Unless your in a Mechanical Engineering Class, i dont think you need to put in all the work. hell even in most Mech classes it would be uncalled for.

If you really, and i mean really want to impress the class, do All the thermodynamics and Heat Transfer equations for your pelt system. That would be impressive, and the research would keep you MORE than occupied and Prove to your instructor that you desirve high marks.

 

in 3 vwo we did a little project with a bottle rocket that also wasn't much more than make a bottle aerodicamic, stronger, and create a more efficient jet than pump in more tha 10bars and hope it doesn't kill you. You can make this as hard as you want: make the pelt PWM controlled or something, create your own waterblock etc etc.
what evryone is trying to say:
1 expensive (for a school project)
2 very dificult
3 quite dangerous (high presure, toxic junk and the like)
4 you don't get the coolants easy (need licenses (correct me if im wrong))

i would ask what your teacher thinks of it, if school can pay some of the costs and you get good help on welding, filling etc.
we just don't want u get injured or maybe even worse. not speaking of maybe lost money if it fails.

 

the man has got a point!! in all the time of reading and looking about on the net i havn't seen a tidy pelt cooled system. people make water blocks for college projects, i have and iv got an A at a level in sunny england. as iv said quality. you could make a high quality coat hanger and get a high grade. and remember the guy marking your work has to understand why and what you are doing!!

 

From what I have read, if you solder phase change gear you WILL die. Brazing is the absolute minimum :/

 

Yup.

More reason why I'm postponing my phase build till I get real tools. I'm insane, but I'm not nuts. I still wanna live to see most of my kids leave home.

 

One of our friends Ganzz combined a copperblock with a peltiercooler and a zalmann stripped fan. Here are pics to prove it:

http://img226.imageshack.us/img226/2648/dsc005159kr.jpg
http://img226.imageshack.us/img226/5179/dsc005140cm.jpg
http://img92.imageshack.us/img92/3296/dsc005116tj.jpg

Thanks to all your support we now know it is better to focus upon peltiercooling instead of phasechanging, cause it's simpler, cheaper and safer (as if we care )

Thanks alot guys

 

sounds like you guys have been busy here. lol. why dont you make a twin stack pelt cooler and work that one out? that would give you reasonably low temps.

can i ask what an argon torch is nexxo? argon is inert

 

argon is used for force air out of the welding point, so the final join has no trapped air in it.

 

...and it reaches temps close to 9000 degrees C. Ouch!

 

ahh ok. i thought you meant as a shiled gas, but i wasnt sure if it was some super mega torch that i hadnt heard of

just incase you were intrested: http://www.lincolnelectric.com/knowledge/articles/content/migfaq.asp

gaz

 

another question: Does anyone(Dutch) know where we can find piece of copper? We wan't to build our own WC block but where can we find the copper?

 

how big a lump you need? iv got some lieing around i can sell.