DIY Water cooler

[bobulak]

Hi Guys and Ladies

Ive got a plan for a DIY water cooler for my dwc buckets and Im hoping someone out there can point out whats WRONG with my plan.

Here we go:

1 small mini fridge. Picked it up for 30 bucks on kijiji
2. 25 feet 1/4 inch hose. 10 bucks
3. assorted fittings- 10 bucks
4. Water pump- 35 bucks
5. 1 cylinder of aluminum 12 inches long by 3.5 inches wide (free )

This is what i want to do. I'll drill 2 holes in the side of the fridge. Just metal and insulation there so no problems. 1 hole for intake 1 hole for outflow. I will coil the hose around the aluminum inside the fridge and connect the hose to my pump and the output to the buckets. All the buckets will be connected so the water will go in a continuous loop out the buckets, through the hose that's wrapped around the aluminum heat sink in the fridge, back to the the buckets to drain the cooled water in the system. Does this sound doable?

Any input would be welcome.

 

[HydroManster]

Sounds ok. I would use the freezer part of the fridge instead of just the fridge. Just make sure your materials are SAFE and will not leech any toxins as plastics do if not the right type.

YOu want to increase the amount of hose inside the fridge so the water stays inside the fridge to cool longer. You will need to play around with the lengths as well as the temp of the fridge to get the water "stable" in your buckets at the temp you want.

Using aluminum coils would work way better than plastic for the part that is inside the fridge. Coil up "x" amount of feet inside the fridge then connect your 1/4 plastic water line to the ends of the aluminum coil inside the fridge. I am guessing that what you listed is what you will use for your coil inside the fridge?

"1 cylinder of aluminum 12 inches long by 3.5 inches wide"


Cheers!

 

[bobulak]

Thx HydroManster. No I was going to coil the tubing around the solid aluminum cylinder and use it as a heat sink but I like your idea about the coiled aluminum better. All my parts are from my local hydro store but ill double check to make sure im not introducing any toxins to my water.

Will aluminum leach into my solution. I think copper does but I don't know about aluminum tubing?

And thanks again for your input. Ive already changed my design a little because of it.

 

[HydroManster]

Check out this link to Hydro Inovations, they actually make one for this specific purpose. It is actually stainless steel.

A 12" stainless steel coil that is designed to be used with a water-cooled system. Chilled fresh water is pumped through the coil which should be submerged in the nutrient reservoir. The fresh water used to cool the reservoir does not mix with the water in the reservoir. Includes 20` of 3/8" heavy duty tubing, 1/2" and 3/8" brass hose barb adapters, and stainless steel hose clamps.


Hydro Innovations | Products | CoolCoil - Nutrient Reservoir Chiller

Cheers!

 

[IndoorHaze]

Pumping cold water through a heat exchanger in the res is the best way to do it, but I think for less money you could build something equally nice.

Adding one of these thermostats to control the pump will make it even better.

JLD612 Dual Display PID Temperature Controller

Program for the desired res temp. The controller will "learn" over time how effective the cooling system is and will use predictive logic to prevent thermal swings in the res due to hysteresis.

Manual here:
https://www.lightobject.info/download/file.php?id=736

 

[bobulak]

Thx springy. Ive been doing a lot of research and Im currently refining my cooler design. I like the thermostat. I'm currently checking this out to see if I can modifiy it to suite my purposes.

Arduino based room controller

I'm thinking of modifying a stainless steel wort chiiler (Used in home brewing) 3/8" x 50' Stainless Steel Immersion Wort Chiller, Immersion Chiller
in my design. I trying to keep my design as low cost as possible. Probably under $150 to $200 bucks. The damn things are sooooooooooooo expensive if you buy them retail.

Thanks for your input. I really appreciate it.

 

[StonerJ]

in my design. I trying to keep my design as low cost as possible. Probably under $150 to $200 bucks. The damn things are sooooooooooooo expensive if you buy them retail.

I just bought a brand new Active Aqua 1/10 hp chiller for $269. I was looking at making my own but finally gave up deciding it was just going to be "rigged" no matter what I did. I was advised by numerous 420 folks that even though they are expensive, they're well worth the cost given the reliability & performance as well as the results in quality of the harvest.

Good luck though.... it's always good to try to DIY things. Especially since so much of hydro is DIY'd anyway.

 

[PrairiePoet]

I built and run one of these types of chillers, over a year now. It keeps three 15 gallon tubes right at 68F, no matter how hot the grow room gets. I'm planning on an expansion to the grow area, and I'm fairly sure this system could keep ten tubes cool.

The design so far is as follows:
5/8 hose in the fridge, wrapped around the freezer section (I unscrewed it to do so). I have small bottles of water in the freezer section to help keep the hose coiled and not pinch. They wil end up freezing, so that helps in keeping more cold surface area against the hose. Before exiting I have a male to male connector on each hose before it exits the fridge. This makes pulling out and clean up much easier. I also have the same connectors right inside the grow closet.

From the fridge I put that grey foam pipe insulator over the hose, as the fridge is about 15 feet away from the tubes. It also helps in I have to worry less about how much the hose wraps around in the grow room, collecting heat from the lights. The distance was to put the fridge near an air exhaust so the heat coming from it wasn't coming back into the room where the closet could pull it in.

One hose goes to an inline pump ( sitting inside closet, but not where the lights can shine on it), which then feeds the first tubs wort chiller (found at a brewing section of local garden store). From the outlet of that tub it goes to the next tubs inlet. From tub two to the third tub. Where the outlet feeds back to the other hose from the fridge.

My grow area is very small and heats up quickly. The fridge runs at number 2 on the setting (1 being the warmest setting), and all three tubs remain at 68F. So for my grow the fridge isn't on very often. At starting up, it will take a day or so to get everything down in temp, running on level 10. But after that, easy to dial in and get the temp where you want it.

Total cost was around $200US, but 2/3 of that was the wort chillers. A single tub would drop the cost by close to half. I think my design works great for several reasons. First, the hose in the fridge is dumping heat right to the freezing unit. Two, the use of the wort chillers. They have multiple coils giving a lot of surface area in the tubs.

I would be cautious on putting aluminum into a reservoir filled with salts and nutrients.
Hope that helps.

 

[bobulak]

I built and run one of these types of chillers, over a year now. It keeps three 15 gallon tubes right at 68F, no matter how hot the grow room gets. I'm planning on an expansion to the grow area, and I'm fairly sure this system could keep ten tubes cool.

The design so far is as follows:
5/8 hose in the fridge, wrapped around the freezer section (I unscrewed it to do so). I have small bottles of water in the freezer section to help keep the hose coiled and not pinch. They wil end up freezing, so that helps in keeping more cold surface area against the hose. Before exiting I have a male to male connector on each hose before it exits the fridge. This makes pulling out and clean up much easier. I also have the same connectors right inside the grow closet.

From the fridge I put that grey foam pipe insulator over the hose, as the fridge is about 15 feet away from the tubes. It also helps in I have to worry less about how much the hose wraps around in the grow room, collecting heat from the lights. The distance was to put the fridge near an air exhaust so the heat coming from it wasn't coming back into the room where the closet could pull it in.

One hose goes to an inline pump ( sitting inside closet, but not where the lights can shine on it), which then feeds the first tubs wort chiller (found at a brewing section of local garden store). From the outlet of that tub it goes to the next tubs inlet. From tub two to the third tub. Where the outlet feeds back to the other hose from the fridge.

My grow area is very small and heats up quickly. The fridge runs at number 2 on the setting (1 being the warmest setting), and all three tubs remain at 68F. So for my grow the fridge isn't on very often. At starting up, it will take a day or so to get everything down in temp, running on level 10. But after that, easy to dial in and get the temp where you want it.

Total cost was around $200US, but 2/3 of that was the wort chillers. A single tub would drop the cost by close to half. I think my design works great for several reasons. First, the hose in the fridge is dumping heat right to the freezing unit. Two, the use of the wort chillers. They have multiple coils giving a lot of surface area in the tubs.

I would be cautious on putting aluminum into a reservoir filled with salts and nutrients.
Hope that helps.

Hi Prairie

Thanks for that. Very informative. My wort chiller design uses beverage grade (304) Stainless Steel instead of aluminum or copper. Do you have pics???? Id love to see them

 

[PrairiePoet]

Hi Prairie

Thanks for that. Very informative. My wort chiller design uses beverage grade (304) Stainless Steel instead of aluminum or copper. Do you have pics???? Id love to see them

Sorry, but I do not have pics of the chiller setup.

 

[AIM-9]

Sounds expensive and like lots of things can go wrong?

Also the fridge only removes the heat, if you plan of letting this heat go out from point where your fridge stands, you dont want it in your flower room or close by.
Fridge removes heat from the inside to the outside, thsi means if placed in your room the heat will be removed on the inside but passed right back on the outside, meaning in the room where the cooled water will regain the heat.
Unless you place your frigde outside or away from the area it will probebly only have the effect of a rised powerbill.

Buy a thermocontrolled fan, ductfan or alike works.
Only needs to have a remote sensor.
Set it on the temp you want the res, like 68F, then the fan will power off when the water is cooled.
Fan is mountet to blow directly at teh watersurface.

The same princip we human do with hot coffe or tea, a blow will cool the top of the water, we now dont burn our lips. Or stick your arm out the window on the freeway.. In matter of seconds the fast moving air evaporates the natural water on the arm (sweat) and when that happens the transision from a liquid to steam/damp steals a bit of heat, this gives the felling of cooldnes on the arm.

Evaporation works, nature been using it for million of years.
So back to basic imo.
It worked for me 2 years in a row and the 3rd summer is just a few month away.

Her is my proof. Take it or leave it.
Fan to cooling uses 60W in full speed, but when water first is cooled down it only maintain it there, using about 10W.
PCfans will do but imo needs a coolingtower to work on a desent level.

Here goes..
My pipes (im running vert setup) where the water runs inside is 43-46 Celcius (109-114F)

In the room i got a average at 34C (93F)! (Up left corner)

The air on the floor at the collingfan intake is 29C. (84F)

The fan is thereby blowing 29C (84F) warm air, straigt down onto my watersurface in my nutetank! The white cord is the sensor!
Adjustet to 22C (71F)!

My water inside the tank falls 6-8cm (2-3 inch) from the exit of the pipes, this helps the cooling of water as any drop, regardles how tiny or huge, will help increase the total watersurface alowwing more evaporation to take place!
(You can actully se my water make ripples in the surface, just like when blowing into a pond or a cop of hot water for coffe or tea.

And voila, cheap cooling, slightly below 24C (75F) mark, just in the safezone of pyth among other bad parts like low DO.
Remember, this water is feed trough the tubes thats heatet to 45C (110F) at time constant. Meaning it suck up the heat as it travel along the pipe.

Last pic poor but it shows the done deal.

In short - it aint nuclear science, just place a fan to blow directly onto the water, and water will cool.
Only bad thing is the x-tra amount of water to be replaced. If not replaced PH and EC value can fluctuate like rocket any way, up or down.

Hope i dont brake rules, still not so active inhere.
But like i said.. Take it or leave it.

(The air in my room can peak 48C (118) during summertime, and by then with the lights on the tubes can come close to 55C (131F). This evaporative setup handles it, no sweat. My fan just increase slightly in power but keeps the watertemp at the good lower part of below 73-75F)

 

[bobulak]

No Aim. That's the whole point. Its much cheaper than retail chilling and Im positive it'll be a hell of alot more effective than a fan blowing on my res water. As for something going wrong well Im prepared for that but my proto type works perfectly with 2 buckets. Just waiting till I can go out and get the parts to expand it to a 1 res, 6 bucket rdwc system. And so far it has only cost me 55 bucks. The total cost of the cooling system will be about 100 bucks and it works great

Also your temps are to high. You should be shooting for 19 to 20 C. From the look of your plants they seem to be a little heat stressed.

Ive decided to use a water cooler instead of a fridge or freezer. It will cost about 25 bucks a year (power) to run it.

I like your pipe setup. Verycool