solar heat from pop cans...

[Tonopah Pati]

My X build one 2 years ago. He cut the cans in half. Painted them black. He had them in a box frame type thingy. I did not get to see it operate but he used it for a year, in the mountains. Now he is working on a wind thing. He will set it up in a couple of weeks. Can't wait, till he gets here so we can test it out.

 

[country freedom]

Now this is very interesting!

 

[RevaVirginia]

Indeed...great find. Happy you ran across this and posted.

 

[sben451]

The best online info on these heaters is a YouTube video by Rich Allen about his 5th pop can heater. Really interesting. He has built several heaters in several different ways. But I'm not sure exactly how these would work for a chicken coop. They'd be great for a house, though.

 

[RevaVirginia]

Quote:
Check a physics term "Enthalpy of Transformation", should help you think it through to the best effect.

Great job on yours.

forgot to smile again...<sigh>

 

[thaokou21]

instead of using pop cans for heat, has anyone try connecting it with a copper pipe to there water source. What I mean by this is that if its blowing out heat, can I convert it to where its blowning heat to my water bucket so that it wont freeze during the day time.

 

[BlueLagoonRabbitry]

Im might just have to try that for my rabbit shed.

 

[patandchickens]

instead of using pop cans for heat, has anyone try connecting it with a copper pipe to there water source. What I mean by this is that if its blowing out heat, can I convert it to where its blowning heat to my water bucket so that it wont freeze during the day time.

The only limitation there is that you MUST have the outlet vent at the TOP of the panel, unless you are running a fan. You could probably bend the vent downwards a little bit after it exits the panel but I suspect not too much. Thus, this would work fine for a rabbit hutch 4' off the ground, but poorly for one 2' off the ground and not at all (unless you run a fan) for something like chickens where you are watering them basically at ground level.

It should not be too hard to connect up a little computer fan. The trick would be having it on a thermostat so that it only blew when the popcan heater was hot enough to be doing *good* (when the popcan heater is colder than the coop, e.g. at night or on very cloudy winter days, it's important that the inlet and output vents be SHUT and inactive, otherwise you are COOLING OFF your coop!

). Or I suppose you could switch it manually if you are always at home.

Good luck, have fun, post if you try it!

,

Pat​

 

[Germaine_11.20]

 

[Mr. Peepers]

Is this thing practical? It seems to me that it wouldn't work in the dark, in clouds, and at high latitudes...in other words, all of the times when it would be useful. I've never built one, so I can't say for sure, but I'd guess that if you need heat in your hen house, a nice ceramic bulb heater would be a lot cheaper and easier.