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3. What Are Solar Heaters, How They Work And What They Are Used For

A simple solar heater consists of one (or a set) of solar collectors and a pump to run water or air through the solar collector. More complicated (and larger) designs will consist of a heat exchanger and an insulated water tank to store heated water.

Solar water heaters essentially have the same design as a solar space heater. The difference is the medium that flows through the solar collectors. One is water while the other is air.

The big advantage that solar water heaters and solar space heaters have over solar (photovoltaic) panels is its efficiency and its cost. As solar heaters are much more efficient and much cheaper than photovoltaic (PV) panels, you should consider installing them before spending a cent on PV panels. Ideally.

Solar water heaters are becoming more and more common because they are practical, affordable and are easy to install. Even if you are living in areas of low geographical latitudes, you can easily collect hot water with temperatures up to 60°C.

The most common types of solar water heaters are evacuated tube collectors. These heaters have the best efficiency. With better efficiency, the area needed for solar collectors can be smaller. Thus much space can be saved for other applications…like a photovoltaic panel. Glazed flat plate collectors are popular for domestic hot water applications. Unglazed plastic collectors are generally used to heat swimming pools.

You have no excuse not to own a solar water heater.

If cost is an issue, you can construct your own solar water heater using a wooden frame, a piece of corrugated zinc, lengths of flexible copper tubing, a piece of transparent perspex and some black paint. Costs you less than $50. Water running through the copper tubing can be easily heated by 25°C if you get your design right.

As light enters through the transparent Perspex, it remains trapped within the wooden box because of greenhouse effect. Since everything within the box is painted black, heat absorption is at its maximum. As water flows through the copper tubing, it is heated by conduction.

A simple solar collect like this can be constructed within half a day, so there is no reason why anyone should not be using a solar water heater.

Continue Reading:

1. Installing Solar Water Heaters
2. What You Need to Know about Solar Water Heaters
3. 7 Different Ways of Using Solar Energy At Home and In Your Office

Pool Solar Panels | Pool Solar Heaters

Solar heaters are also covered with a glass panel to act as a greenhouse, trapping heat within the enclosure. Since heat cannot escape through convection (due to glass), the only way of dissipation is through conduction. Fortunately the rate of conduction is much slower. Therefore most of the heat is retained.

How they work

Cold water runs into a heat exchanger and out comes warm water for your pool. This happens as the black-painted pipes absorb heat from the sunlight and transfer them to the water passing through. The surfaces of the heat collector box are also painted black and certainly helps warm up the air within. This, too, adds to the temperature of the water in the pipes.

The sunlight intensity, rate of water flow and diameter of pipes determine how hot the water will be. Generally, the thinner the pipes, the more efficient the heat transfer. This is because there is more surface area through which heat can be conducted from the pipe into the water.

Advantages

Solar heaters rarely need any maintenance at all. They can also last many decades without significant wear and tear, provided it’s built and installed properly. Most importantly, solar heaters are cleaner and cheaper than gas and electric heaters.

The typically payback period of a pool solar panel is about 1 to 2 years, depending on the sunlight intensity and fuel costs.

Because solar heaters are very simple in design, they make very popular DIY projects. Homemade heaters will obviously cost much lesser than commercially made pool solar heaters. A typical heater may cost within the $4,000 price tag while a do-it-yourself solar heater often cost only a tenth of this price. Therefore the payback period is much shorter.

Installation

Installing a pool solar panel will not be a very tedious task. Most importantly, you should tilt your panels toward the south (if you are staying in the northern hemisphere) so that they can receive more sunlight throughout the year.

Other installation considerations include local building and insurance requirements as well as safety issues. An option is to have a qualified solar thermal contractor to install your solar heating panels for you. This will ensure quality.

With its simplicity, ease of installation and durability, pool solar heaters are getting more popular with consumers. Many DIY enthusiasts are also beginning to put together copper pipes to make their own homemade solar heat collectors to warm up their pool. Such do-it-yourself projects will only get more popular as consumers realize the benefits of using pool solar panels.

Continue Reading:

1. What Are Solar Heaters, How They Work And What They Are Used For
2. 7 Different Ways of Using Solar Energy At Home and In Your Office
3. Heating Up Your Swimming Pool Using Solar Energy

If you were to install the complete system, it shouldn’t cost you more than $500 to $600. Compared to the entire cost of the swimming pool and the maintenance cost, this is meager.

(A swimming pool costs more than $30,000 in many places)

A swimming pool without no heating facilities is useable for about 4 months in the whole year. With heating, you can use it for 8 months. This is why pool heating is so popular.

Making your own solar pool heater is exciting, because the rewards are so visible. Your family will know that the solar heater warms the swimming pool water. And you made the solar heater…from scratch. Your friends will know it too.

Thus the rewards are more than just functional or financial. It’s ego.

All right, that’s enough for now…let’s move on to the design of the solar heater.

A homemade solar water heater can be built using a PV panel and a solar collector. The PV panel will supply electricity to a submersible pump while the solar collector provides heat to the water flowing through it.

Very simple.

The following is a list of parts you have to buy for this project:

A 12-volt Submersible Pump

1. A 12-volt submersible pump
2. Flexible tubing that fits the submersible pump
3. Black PVC tubing
4. PVC junction (that fits the PVC tubing)
5. A Valve that fits the PVC tubing

With a PV panel running the submersible pump, the amount of water that flows through the solar water heater depends on the intensity of the sun.

In a way, this regulates the water temperature at the output.

When the sun is strong, water is heated faster. But water also gets through the pipes faster. Thus the heating period becomes shorter. The converse is true. When sunlight is weaker, water flow through the pipes slower. Water is now heated longer but with less intensity.

At night, the submersible pump doesn’t work because the PV panel doesn’t supply electricity.

Since the submersible pump is a separate entity from your filter pump, you can run your pool filter for as long or as short as you want without disturbing the pool heating schedule.

(Tip: You can schedule your filter to run at non-peak hours to save on electricity bills.)

When choosing the submersible pump, you must make sure the pump has enough head pressure to get water to where the solar collector is. For example, the solar collector may be located at the roof, which is 20 feet high.

Your pump must have at least 20 feet of head pressure plus an allowance of about 4 to 5 feet more. Thus you’ll want to get a pump with 25-feet head pressure. (Or round the figure up to the nearest spec you can find.)

You’ll want your pump to have a little more pressure than necessary so water flow won’t be weak. With this, you can also have the flexibility to change your solar collector’s position later on if you want to.

When you choose your PV panel, remember to check the power requirement for the submersible pump. Get a rating of at least 10% above what’s required.

A submersible pump costs about $50 and the PV panel costs (at most) $150. The PVC pipes will set you back by another $30.

For the extra money that you spend on a PV panel, you’ll recoup it back (very quickly) because you can keep the energy bills for your filter pump to a minimum.

Finally, you can fix a valve to allow water to bypass the solar collector.

A Bypass Valve For The Solar Collector

There will be times when you feel there’s sufficient heat in the water. All you have to do is open the valve so water flows through the valve instead of the collector.

This happens because water flows in the path of least resistance. Although there will still be water going through the collector, it’s limited.

You can take this further by using a thermistor to create a feedback loop. When your swimming pool’s water is at its desired temperature, the valve is opened so very little heating takes place.

(For this to work, you’ll have to buy a solenoid-driven valve…it costs more.)

In Part Two, we’ll look at how to join the PVC pipes together to make a solar collector.

Continue Reading:

1. Pool Solar Panels
2. How To Make A Solar Powered Water Fountain
3. Heating Up Your Swimming Pool Using Solar Energy

We’ll cover both topics here.

Simple Pool Solar Water Heater

A simple pool solar water heater includes a pump, controller, filter and PVC pipes to route the water flow. To increase the heating, you have to increase the water flowing into the solar collector.

You can do this by turning a valve that channels more water through the solar heater. When the valve is closed, water runs entirely through the solar heater.

When it is open, little water flows through the solar water heater due to its high water resistance. (Water, like electricity, prefers the easier path to flow through.)

By adjusting the valve, you can control how much heat you will introduce into your swimming pool.

Pool solar water heaters are much cheaper than PV panels. While the latter requires thousands of dollars to install, solar heaters only require a few hundred dollars for a good system.

People commonly ask what type (and size) of solar collectors they should get. This can be determined by going through a few questions:

1. How long is your pump’s running time?

If your pool filter is turned on for a long time, you have more opportunity to introduce heat into your pool. The converse is also true. Thus if you intend to run your pump for many hours a day, you can get a smaller-sized solar collector.

2. How is your pool installed?

Some pools are installed above the ground. These pools lose heat at a much faster rate. Thus you’ll need large solar heaters to compensate for the heat loss.

3. How will you install your solar collectors?

There are different ways of installing your solar collectors. Often, aesthetics and efficiency do not coexist. Solar collectors mounted flushed to the ground do not get as much sunlight as those tilted towards the sun.

4. How much sunlight do you get?

This depends on your location. Shading also affects how much sunshine you receive at your pool and at your solar collector. You may want to clear some branches or find a sunny spot to place your solar collectors.

5. How much wind do you experience?

Wind removes heat from your swimming pool. For open ICS solar collectors, even heat collected at the solar heater is taken away. So if you experience strong wind at your area, these are what you can do:

-    Increase the solar collector size

-    Use a glazed solar collector

-    Plant bushes around your pool and solar collector to break up the wind flow

-    Increase the daily pump time through the pool solar heater

While installing your pool solar water heaters, you will want as much value out of it as possible. This can be achieved by improving its efficiency.

Here are some tips that you may find helpful:

1. Run the pool solar heater during the sunniest time of the day.

Running water through solar collectors drain energy. You may not need to heat up your pool throughout the day. Conserve energy by heating your pool during the sunniest time of the day. You can continue running it till the evening if you want to.

Keep experimenting… After a while, you’ll find the optimum period to run your solar heater.

2. Use a pool cover

Your solar heater can be 50% more effective when you use a pool cover to retain its heat. If you use a solar pool cover, it will also help introduce more heat into the pool.

3. Connect solar collectors in parallel

Connecting solar collectors in series increase the water resistance and makes your pool pump work harder. Connecting them in parallel cuts the resistance in half. This helps to save electricity.

Continue Reading:

1. Installing Solar Water Heaters
2. What Are Solar Heaters, How They Work And What They Are Used For
3. Heating Up Your Swimming Pool Using Solar Energy

Make Your Home & Office Clean & Green Using Solar Energy

There are many different ways of using solar energy. You can use it for heating, cooling and for generating electricity.

Each approach has different costs and complexity.

Here are 7 ideas how you can make use of clean, green solar power:

1. Generate electricity.

This is the first thing on everyone’s mind when we talk about solar panel. After all, we are all hoping to rely less on fossil fuel in the future. Using electricity generated from solar panels, you can power your household appliances and workstations in the office.

You can also store the solar generated electricity in rechargeable batteries to power up garden lights, floodlights, gate openers, garage lights, et cetera.

2. Passive space heating.

Instead of using electricity to heat up your house, the sun can do the work. You can trap heat in your home and office by using blinds, sunrooms and awnings. As simple as this sounds, it works very well to lower your electricity consumption.

3. Heat up air and water.

Your water supply can be heated up using solar collectors. Solar water heater do not require many moving parts other than the water pump itself.

Depending on your solar heater design and sunlight intensity, water temperature can be increased by as much as 10 to 15 degree Celsius. You can also increase your indoor temperature by letting a stream of air pass through solar heated water. This can be done using a simple heat exchanger.

4. Warm up food.

Do you pack lunch to work? If you do, there is no need to wait for your turn to use the microwave oven anymore. You can simply use solar energy to heat up your food at your own convenience.

5. Heat up your swimming pool

You can circulate swimming pool water through a solar collector. This helps you get lots of heat into your pool so you can enjoy a rejuvenating dip after you come back from work.

Another way to heat up your pool is to cover it with a solar blanket, which also prevents heat loss through evaporation.

6. Enhance your landscaping

You can use super-bright LED lamps as landscape lighting. This can save you the trouble of hiding cables under the soil. You may be surprised at how well these LED lamps bring out the color of your plants at night.

7. Water your plants

Solar panels can provide electricity to sprinklers that water your plants. You can build a self-sustaining garden by collecting rainwater underground and using them to water the plants at regular intervals during the day.

How else can you use solar energy in your daily life? Hopefully these ideas above can help you find your own ways of using solar power in creative ways.

Continue Reading:

1. Home Solar Power — Different Ways of Harnessing Energy From The Sun To Reduce Energy Bills
2. Survey Your Household Energy Usage Before Installing Solar Panels
3. Creating An Energy Efficient House – A Primer On Why You Should Do It and How

Generally, the techniques for harvesting solar power are classified into 2 main categories: active or passive.

Active solar techniques involve inventions like photovoltaic panels, pumps, and fans. These are responsible for converting solar energy into useful output. Passive solar techniques involve positioning materials (with desirable thermal properties) along the path of solar radiation and designing spaces that allow natural convection (air circulation).

You have to consider the benefits of each approach (active or passive) before you implement them. Active solar techniques are somewhat more expensive to implement. However it gives you more control and the energy can be converted into a wider range of output other than heat. Passive solar techniques involve careful thought to the architectural design of your house. However it does not drain as much financial resources. Most people will consider implementing both types of system that complement with one another.

The most common installation you can consider is the solar heater. They are cheap, easily installed and are efficient. These nifty devices can help you cut a large percentage of your energy bill by taking care of your heating needs. You can heat up your rooms without using any electricity. You can also heat up water so you can have a warm bath or swim after work.

Heat gathered during the day can be stored in materials with high specific heat capacity (or thermal mass). They act like rechargeable batteries for storing heat in the day. At night, they provide you with warmth while the ambient temperature outside falls. Some of these materials include water, bricks, cement and stones.

The next most common installation you can consider is a solar panel. Solar panels convert the energy from the sun into electricity via a process known as Photovoltaics (PV). Thus these contraptions are also known as photovoltaic panels.

Photovoltaic panels are popular because of their practicality and convenience. While solar heaters gives out only heat, electricity from solar panels can be converted into heat, movement and light. Electricity can also be stored in battery banks so there will still be electricity supply even at night or during an overcast afternoon. However the down-side of this installation is the cost. For the average household, it may require up to $8 per watt to install. A 2.5kW system can easily cost you $20,000. (This costing is not exact as it depends on several factors like your location and solar panel efficiency.)

There are also other systems that can be built into the architecture of your house. However using only the solar heater and photovoltaic panel, you can design a world-class home solar power system that can effectively gather energy from the sun for your household needs.

Continue Reading:

1. Build Amazing Home Solar Power Systems Used by Families Who Don’t Want to Pay For Their Utilities
2. Home Solar Power – Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Photovoltaic Generators to Power Your Home
3. 7 Different Ways of Using Solar Energy At Home and In Your Office

Dovetail joints can be held together by glue alone and its strength is marvelous. When damaged under strain, it is usually the wood grains that tear apart and give way. The joints remain intact. Thus there is usually no need for nails and screws to hold them together. When completed, it is also aesthetically pleasing.

There are three types of dovetail joints – the common dovetail, the lap dovetail and the secret dovetail.

The Common Dovetail

The common dovetail is the strongest. It is also the easiest to make. The lap dovetail and the secret dovetail are used only for the sake of appearance. Since you are making a solar panel frame, the common dovetail will serve your purpose. Solar panels, especially large ones, can be quite heavy and you do not want to compromise strength for the sake of beauty.

To construct a common dovetail, you may cut the pins and dovetails to be of equal width. Or you may want narrower pins and broader dovetails. For this design, pins are usually cut to a quarter the width of dovetails.

When you cut the pins and dovetails to equal width, you will get a stronger joint. This is because each part interlocks at equal interval and holds with equal strength.

The joint with narrower pins are however better looking compared to the equally divided (pin & dovetail) ones. These are used primarily for fine cabinetwork.

However if you must use this type of joint, remember that the strength may not be optimal. You can compensate for this by having a slightly longer width on each side of the solar panel frame.

Bear in mind that by using more material, your solar panels will weigh more. Thus better structural support may be necessary if you’re mounting your panels on your roof. (Do your calculations)

If you are cutting your dovetails by hand, you must first mark out where you want to cut on one piece. Then cut this piece first before moving on to mark out the other piece for cutting.

Do not mark out both pieces before cutting. This will ensure accuracy. And this will give you a tighter joint with fewer gaps. The result is a more reliable joint that also looks beautiful.

A Dovetail Jig

You can also use a Dovetail Jig to cut out the pins and dovetails with precision. After all, the art of woodworking takes time to master and making dovetails by hand is no easy feat. Most dovetail jigs have many templates for you to choose from. With this, you can make different types of dovetail joints in a jiffy.

Finally, you must put your solar panel frame on a flat surface while joining them. When you do this, you can easily know if the frame is warped as you put the wooden pieces together before applying glue to the joints. It is easier to take corrective action early rather than trying to plane wood off different parts of the frame to compensate for the warp.

Continue Reading:

1. Sizing Your Solar Energy Panels – Part 2
2. Building a Solar Panel Frame By Using Aluminum Angles
3. Homemade Solar Panels — Common Mistakes to Take Note Of When Building And Installing Photovoltaic (PV) Panels