evilalive
New Member
Hello Everyone,
I'm new to this forum, while I lived in a hotter area of the globe, thus to allow me to kept cooler species like M. Jackson, I'd made this earlier. Hope you find it interesting
Vol 1: Conceptual
Everyone knows that Air conditioner is the best solution to combat heat impact for chameleon in summer. However, having only one or two cages of chameleon and serve by air conditioning for entire ‘room’ seems not very cost effectively and waste of energy. So, idea of constructing a mini/compact air conditioner has come to my mind back in 2003. With try and error, I have attempted several cooling method, which includes solid states cooler component known as “the Peltier Effect”. But none of them can give me a satisfy result.
Vol 2: Hardware Selection
With that, cooling using compressor type was adopted – While selecting the hardware, both compressor size and power consumption was put in consideration. On a very odd occasion, a small ice-cream freezer was spotted. Thereafter consult with A/C installer, modification of this unit could be made.
Original Ice-cream freezer
Vol 3: Test and Modification
To modify the existing unit and achieve the expected result was not easy. As cooling capacity and heat load has to be make balance. Questions like what volume of R134 cooling agent should recharge to the compressor become critical. Too much agent will leads to damage the compressor while too little agent will shorten life-time of the unit.
To balance the agent between vapor and liquid stage while achieve heat exchange, size of the cooling coil were concerned. Long story short, all problems have been finally overcome with many tests and re-test.
Mini cooling coil parts
Vol 4 : Temperature Control
Since there is no temperature control from the original freezer, to maintain a constant temperature output control of the device. Externally control circuit/equipment was used. With simple cable/circuit integration, this issue is easily overcome.
Vol 5: Power Consumption
As mentioned before, one of the concerns of having 24 hrs A/C may leads to high operation cost. With final setup of the unit, the overall power was only ~200W with compressor is put in operation. Thus, with compressor is idle (target temp is achieved), only few watts is utilize.
Vol 6: Conclusion
Cost of making/modifying this unit was high (you can buy a 3/4 hp A/C with only HK$1000=US$130 in these days), but I really enjoy the whole process and achieve my own idea of building the smallest and low cost A/C unit for my beloved chameleon……
Final setup with ordinary reptile cages
Compact unit with only size of ~ A3 paper.
Cooling Compartment
Evil
I'm new to this forum, while I lived in a hotter area of the globe, thus to allow me to kept cooler species like M. Jackson, I'd made this earlier. Hope you find it interesting
Vol 1: Conceptual
Everyone knows that Air conditioner is the best solution to combat heat impact for chameleon in summer. However, having only one or two cages of chameleon and serve by air conditioning for entire ‘room’ seems not very cost effectively and waste of energy. So, idea of constructing a mini/compact air conditioner has come to my mind back in 2003. With try and error, I have attempted several cooling method, which includes solid states cooler component known as “the Peltier Effect”. But none of them can give me a satisfy result.
Vol 2: Hardware Selection
With that, cooling using compressor type was adopted – While selecting the hardware, both compressor size and power consumption was put in consideration. On a very odd occasion, a small ice-cream freezer was spotted. Thereafter consult with A/C installer, modification of this unit could be made.
Original Ice-cream freezer
Vol 3: Test and Modification
To modify the existing unit and achieve the expected result was not easy. As cooling capacity and heat load has to be make balance. Questions like what volume of R134 cooling agent should recharge to the compressor become critical. Too much agent will leads to damage the compressor while too little agent will shorten life-time of the unit.
To balance the agent between vapor and liquid stage while achieve heat exchange, size of the cooling coil were concerned. Long story short, all problems have been finally overcome with many tests and re-test.
Mini cooling coil parts
Vol 4 : Temperature Control
Since there is no temperature control from the original freezer, to maintain a constant temperature output control of the device. Externally control circuit/equipment was used. With simple cable/circuit integration, this issue is easily overcome.
Vol 5: Power Consumption
As mentioned before, one of the concerns of having 24 hrs A/C may leads to high operation cost. With final setup of the unit, the overall power was only ~200W with compressor is put in operation. Thus, with compressor is idle (target temp is achieved), only few watts is utilize.
Vol 6: Conclusion
Cost of making/modifying this unit was high (you can buy a 3/4 hp A/C with only HK$1000=US$130 in these days), but I really enjoy the whole process and achieve my own idea of building the smallest and low cost A/C unit for my beloved chameleon……
Final setup with ordinary reptile cages
Compact unit with only size of ~ A3 paper.
Cooling Compartment
Evil
