Solar Thermosyphen Project

I built solar thermosyphens for the knee wall of my south facing screen porch.

My goal was to use as much recycled and reclaimed material as possible.

The heat is fed into the enclosed porch. I open the house window and I have free heat in the winter.

In the summer months the sun tracks higher in the sky and the overhang of the roof prevents the sun from hitting the collectors.

Step 1: Trimming window panes

 I picked up a bunch of double hung windows out of a house that was getting replacement windows. The contractors are happy to give them to you. Saves them a trip to the dump.

I used a circular saw and a straight edge and trimmed them  to  all have a uniform side, I made them about 1 3/4 inch.

Comments

[Inquisitive1951]

Hi,
Neat idea. Couple of questions.

1) How does the heat actually get onto the porch? Are there vents above the collectors?

2) Have you considered water tanks as collectors rather than metal plates. They would hold the heat long after the sun went down wouldn't they?

Thanks for sharing.

[slayerofgoliath]

This is the simplest of solar systems you can use.

There are vents on the inside of the porch both at the top and bottom of the collectors. I open a window or the front door and allow air and heat to naturally convect.

When ever you add water to the equation you have obstacles to overcome including added weight to structure and maintainability issues.

I have a separate domestic water heating system that I an working on for this spring, however in Ohio we can only use this during the summer months then we need to drain down and winterize, or use glycol which adds even more complications and considerations.

[Dr.Bill]

Passive design works the same as a heatilator on fireplaces.

[Inquisitive1951]

Drbill,

Thanks I thought so but is wasn't quite obvious from the instructions. It's a lot like the cansolair units that are made commercially. I've seen installations that use a small solar fan to help circulate the air and that have dampers to avoid reverse convection when the temperatures get cooler at night.

I was particularly interested in the use of a different medium of exchange given the longer winter nights and shorter days, to see if there was a way to extend the working time. With the windows above the unit, this system as is supplements the daylight, I wondered if instead we could use the black units to store the daily sunlight as a heat sink and then slowly allowed them to cool via convection into the room.

[Dr.Bill]

Nice passive design.
Metal heats up.
Hot air rises and goes out top holes.
Draws in cool air behind it through bottom holes to heat up as it passes hot metal and out the top holes.

[tecneeq]

Clever. Clever indeed. Well done and a good instructable. Thanks mate.