DIY CHILLER

[joseney21]

I'm finishing up my father in-law's setup and guess what i stumble upon, a little cooler that states it chills 44-46 degrees below the outside temp.in an 80 degree room the unit will chill down to 35F degrees.i'm sure you loose efficiency when dealing with water and hose coil, but it might be worth a try.i'm going out to buy one this week.

KOOLMATE by IGLOO $50 @ costco....i'll post results and setup within the following two weeks.

P.S. it does state not to use ice or liquids to fill up the unit unless it's in a closed container as these will corrode motor and fan....but i'm sure there has to be a way around this.BTW has anyone ever seen anything similar to this??

[ April 27, 2005, 10:15 AM: Message edited by: joseney21 ]

 

[tinyreef]

i'm actually using a mini-cooler from vector/rubbermaid. it's a thermoelectric cooler with those same specs. (1-gallon capacity)

while the cooler does do the temperature change it states, transferring that drop in temperature to a cooling coil is the difficulty i've been facing so far.

i'm running 1/8" stiff PE water hosing thru the reservoir area, only about 1-gallon volume is really useable. the cooling effect has to be non-contact because the chamber is aluminum and not water-proof.

let me/us know if you come up with a better heat-transfer. that has been the difference between me cooling my 20gal. setup down a couple of degrees versus 10F or more (imo the capacity/ability of this cooler setup if heat transfer was more efficient).

 

[cali_reef]

Are you coiling the 1/8 tubing inside the cooler? Do you mean 1/4 tubing like the type used on RO units?

I have seen people trying to cool a small tank with this type of DIY chiller.

You can not and should not let tank water come in contact with the cooler surfaces, best bet is to coil as much 1/4 inch plastic tubing in the cooler as possible, this may drop your temp a little but it is not very efficient. Plastic\nylon tubing is a good thermo barrier, you would need to cool the tubing a lot before the water running inside can be effected, letting the water flow thru the tubing slowly helps. Best method would be running a small coil of stainless steel or titanium tubing inside the cooler but these material are hard to come by and to work with.

 

[tinyreef]

"Plastic\nylon tubing is a good thermo barrier, you would need to cool the tubing a lot before the water running inside can be effected, letting the water flow thru the tubing slowly helps. Best method would be running a small coil of stainless steel or titanium tubing inside the cooler but these material are hard to come by and to work with."
yeah, the tubing ain't exactly the optimal heat-exchanger i want it to be. cooler water is very cold, it's a shame i can't get a good transfer, still cools the whole system a couple of degrees tho.

if i could get a decent heat-exchange medium (i'm still pondering a couple of ideas) my next problem would be an affordable temp. controller because i believe this setup would cool the system too much! we'll see. <sigh>