Solar parabolic collectors, question?

 

With the cost of glass dirt cheap and the ease it can be molded & mirrored
why is there so little discussion on this technology?
A good portion of our heating bill is the hotwater heater. I would think
this would be an ideal application.

 

Handling overheating is a costly problem and tracking can be high tech and
perhaps high maintenance.

Does the new guy have to clean the mirrors each week? Is asbestos still
available?


With the cost of glass dirt cheap and the ease it can be molded & mirrored
why is there so little discussion on this technology?
A good portion of our heating bill is the hotwater heater. I would think
this would be an ideal application.

 



   You don't need a mirror to heat domestic hot water.  They usually use a plain
old solar heat collection box for that.  Here in Florida, the old-tech way was a
tar-coated water tank on the roof!  I remember when they were very common.

Vaughn

 

On Thu, 19 Aug 2010 16:45:00 -0700, "ghelf"


Tons of info here http://www.redrok.com/main.htm , as well as
affordable controllers http://www.redrok.com/electron.htm#led3x .


Yeah, one would think that more people would do solar water heating.
Fixed collectors here http://www.sunraysolar.com/pricelist.php .

Wayne

 

On 8/19/2010 6:45 PM, ghelf wrote:

What discussion were you hoping to see or do you think is needed? If
you're interested in building one of these critters you might be
interested in the pages linked-to at

    http://www.iedu.com/DeSoto/Fluidyne/Heat/


Parabolic collectors tend to be pretty lossy, and their only real
advantage over flat panels is that they can produce much higher
temperatures.

The downsides to parabolic collectors for home use are that they can
cause serious injury (burns and blindness), they require a powered
tracking subsystem, and they don't work particularly well when the sky
isn't clear. Flat panels don't have these drawbacks.

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