Passive solar heating panel plans - Page 4

 On 3/8/11 4:57 PM, Curbie wrote:

I don't know - Daniel just got his prototype working. It appears to be
cobbled together using bicycle parts and pop/beer cans - which should be
available in a lot of developing areas.

I'd be willing to bet dollars against doughnuts that it'll see a fair
amount of improvement. (I have a few [half-baked] ideas of my own) :)

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/

  On 3/8/2011 5:02 AM, Morris Dovey wrote:

Just wondering how much you calculate would make it worth your time and
effort....

thank you much....have fun....sno

--
Correct Scientific Terminology:
Hypothesis - a guess as to why or how something occurs
Theory - a hypothesis that has been checked by enough experiments
  to be generally assumed to be true.
Law - a hypothesis that has been checked by enough experiments
  in enough different ways that it is assumed to be truer then a theory.
Note: nothing is proven in science, things are assumed to be true.

 On 3/8/11 3:06 PM, sno wrote:


At 3%, the idea had a lower approval rating (among folks with an
interest in solar heating) than George Bush's foreign policy.

What's to calculate?

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/

 Morris,

In order to compare the merit of two plans (active to passive or
passive to passive) it seems that someone would need both plans. The
thing I like about your passive collector is cost, size, and the
ability to retrofit them to an existing structure, a lot of passive
plans require the space and cost of mass thermal and large amounts of
costly thermal glass.

If you don't have time... you don't have time, just seems a shame to
abandon let hard earned knowledge.

Curbie

 On 3/8/11 5:22 PM, Curbie wrote:


The original goal was to arrive at a commercial product that the
construction folks could treat like a standard window unit or pre-hung
door, and that could be installed in a conventional structure to reduce
heating costs.

The installable module approach turned out to be a good idea, and (to
even my surprise) an exploration of the physics led to a panel capable
of delivering 100% of the heat for an ordinary, conventional structure.

One of the things I learned was that an active panel _cannot_ outperform
a sufficiently well-designed passive panel. At first that seems
counter-intuitive - but it's true, because efficiency doesn't come from
a fan.

What seems difficult for most people to keep in mind is that it's all
about heating _air_ (or water or whatever) rather than any of the
panel's parts. To build a /really/ efficient panel, the design needs to
operate at the absolutely lowest temperature possible, and the
difference between the warmest panel parts and the collection media
lowered to an absolute minimum.


The knowledge hasn't been abandoned. I've been shoveling everything I
have into a USB FLASH drive. In addition, there are panels scattered
across the US and Canada to backup the data.

Right now there are a billion and a half people experiencing severe
water crises. See:

    http://hdr.undp.org/en/media/HDR06-complete.pdf

for details. I think I know how to solve that problem, but it's going to
take everything I've got and all the help I can beg to get the job done.

--
Morris Dovey
DeSoto Solar
http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/