Has anyone tried the solar attic heat exchanger to heat the pool?
offthedeepend
16 years ago
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joanneswimsct
16 years agolast modified: 9 years agoRelated Discussions
Solar heat, anyone?
Comments (10)Very interesting Larry. I have my pond covered with a vinyl translucent tarpaulin, which is supported by a simple 2X4 frame. The whole thing is sloped down from about two feet at one end to ground level at the other. This keeps the winter winds off the pond's surface. Without going into too much detail again, I circulate the pond water with a small GPH pump, via the bottom drain piping to a 50 gallon sump barrel and back to the pond where it keeps a large hole in the surface ice open for gas exchange purposes all winter. I have a hatch cover made from a piece of EPDM liner,[approx 18" X 24"] installed into the tarp that I can lift to check on the pond inhabitants over the winter. When I lift this hatch cover there is condensation on it and also covering the inside of the tarp. I can feel the warmth of the air coming out of the opening when I lift the cover off. It is certainly warmer than the air outside of the tarp covering. I believe there are two sources of energy warming the pond water, one from the circulating water and one from the sun. The underground piping run is over ten feet long and is four feet below the surface. The sump barrel the piping connects to is buried three feet into the ground. I believe it and the piping act as heat collectors from the surrounding soil,which is below the frost line. The plumbing acts the same way as a heat pump coil used for home heating. The tarp keeps the cold wind off the pond, as I already stated, but also gathers heat from the sun,just the same as covering a compost pile/box with plastic sheeting. Where the energy in the form of heat, drawn from the sun helps the break down of the compost material. I looked in to-day at the pond and there is the start of some ice coverage, sort of slushy at present, but the plants on the pond's perimeter are bright green and better looking, than when I covered the pond over a few weeks ago. So the cover and the water circulation I would say are working for my pond in keeping the air and water temperatures quite temperate. I have been doing this for years and it is the same thing every winter, inside that covering, there seems to be a micro mild climate maintained, that the plants flourish in. As do the fish, because they grow bigger each winter. "Horton"...See MoreHas anyone tried to make a solar light tube
Comments (1)Hi, I suppose that would work. You might consider using aluminized mylar instead of emergency blankets -- its available from some of the hydroponic places. The commercial solar tubes do include a gadget on the top end that is supposed to direct more light down the tube -- you might want to take a look at this at a store. I guess you would just want to be careful not to make a big heat leak from your living space to the attic where the new fixture goes in the ceiling. Gary...See MoreHas anyone tried out Solar disk!
Comments (12)They say to cover about 80% of your pool surface and to count the area between the rings as "covered" in that 80%. For our 330 square foot pool we have 9 rings and they work pretty well. The ones you buy are 60 inches in diamater. They've worked really well at keeping the heat in overnight except in the windiest weather - but they do need to be constantly rearranged and reinflated. We're going to make the ones the guy designed as a DIY plan on ebay - those are 42 inch in diamater and we think we'll need 18...we're making 9 of those to start (that's how much our roll of tubing makes) to see if this version will eliminate some of the design issues we've got with the all inflatable ones. Boby - I'll definitely post how the plans work and if they helped with the wind (thanks for posting that link!)...it'll be a couple weeks though - I'm heading out of town this morning....See MoreIntelliFlo Pump and Pool Solar. Anyone using?
Comments (16)From the man who invented the pump..... "When using IntelliFlo on a 2 story house what you want to do is lower the prime flow to as low as possible. How the pump primes is not common sense... adjusting this parameter opens up the look up table and makes the algorithm much more simple to see a "true" or "positive" for the pump to attain prime. The second thing you want to do is adjust up your max flow for the panel i.e. if you are having trouble at 25 GPM try 26 etc. The hardest part of using the IntelliFlo in this application is getting the software to think it is primed... usually starting the pump in the controller before the solar is initiated solves this issue as well. It will take some trial and error adjusting but once you find the flows your system works best at... you can set it and forget it and pay dividends with the overall cost to operate." If you need to restart while solar is activated, prime the pump with the solar off and then kick it back on. You have an issue that is common but if addressed properly, it will work fine. Your max speed is limited by that 1.5 line. For your pool, I would have throttled down that pump from the "out of the box" 3HP to a 2HP and then program accordingly. That field adjustment needs done by a qualified tech and is usually a benefit of a paid installation. If someone installed it for you, you can call them back to do it....See Morestephenchs1984
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