A video on thermoelectric cooling and how bad it is
Added 2024-09-21 00:55:27 +0000 UTCHello hello hello,
Since the dehumidifier video's been shelved until next year, and many of you suggested making this its own video topic, I decided to make use of the Peltier fridge now and made this video:
It got delayed by roughly a week in part because the cube fridge wasn't initially part of the plan and once I had the idea I needed to do some testing with it, but also there was a snafu getting peltier elements for the video. Because of this, the next video's already well underway and will be done before the end of September.
And speaking of delays, I filmed some of the sights and sound video for Aztec but it's going to be a more complicated edit than I realized, so unless a miracle occurs that'll be the first thing of October.
Comments
Samsung is adding a Peltier module to its new hybrid fridge https://apple.news/A0ph4q-SxRSimJAzzvwIsOg
Nigel GremlinSix
2024-12-20 19:03:06 +0000 UTCHad no idea about these things existed, and sure enough the next day seeing them in a supermarket, cheap enough to have me had one unless i had seen TC, thanks a lot!!!
Aurin Ræder
2024-10-17 00:13:43 +0000 UTCAs someone mentioned, they can peltier devices can generate electricity from heat to run something like a fan. I think they're also used in cooled car seats https://youtube.com/shorts/YTinFrfJPrU?si=LdmwEqV9SfHE0r86
Richard L
2024-09-29 13:47:27 +0000 UTCAww, no mention of the Seebeck effect? Dammit! Love the video, though. I DO own one of those Peltier "fridges" but I bought it specifically to keep insulin cool while traveling. It was OK for that, but now I've worked around the problem by never going anywhere under any circumstances.
Circuitmike
2024-09-25 03:06:48 +0000 UTCGIT OUTTA HERE WITH YER COMMIE TEMPERCHER NUMBERS!!
Circuitmike
2024-09-25 03:03:01 +0000 UTCHoly hell! A million views in a day and #14 on trending. The things that resonate with people is such an enigma. I mean, I totally get it, I love watching Alec. It's just so surprising what clicks and what doesn't
Tony Drake
2024-09-24 02:27:53 +0000 UTCI'm glad you mentioned it at the end, because as I was watching, I was thinking about the little car cooler we got for specifically the niche application you mentioned. It's very convenient to use on road trips to keep already cooled drinks and some snacks cool, especially if you throw in a gel freeze pack or two. Saves me from buying ice and dealing with the melt. It's also nice for the same reason in a hotel room with no fridge. But yeah, these niche applications are pretty few in number.
Chris
2024-09-23 22:22:57 +0000 UTCLooking forward to watching this one. I have to say that the "AICE LITE" that Techmoan reviewed a few weeks back has been life changing as someone who often gets hot flashes due to a medical condition.
Erik Granlund
2024-09-23 18:31:21 +0000 UTCThat little cube fridge looks absolutely _identical_ to my IKEA TILLREDA mini fridge (except mine is white). I wonder if that is the manufacturer of the IKEA fridge.
Pepijn Schmitz
2024-09-23 16:55:32 +0000 UTCGreat video! Thank you! This is why TC is the only creator content I support. Alex never, ever disappoints!! And he is so freaking entertaining. Anyway, peltier elements are used big time in cooling diode pumped lasers -- as in laser modules used in RGB laser projectors for laser shows and other applications. Even though it's not as mainstream as most of your topics, I'd sure love to see a video about lasers and laser projectors. Sure, that's been covered in a thousand times in other YT videos, but never in a "TC" way. If you'd ever consider it, I'd be happy to help in any way possible (and supply some lasers, etc). :)
Hank Lloyd Right
2024-09-23 01:26:51 +0000 UTCOnce again , I laughed and I learned something! 😁 🥰 smart and funny as always
Shannon Ryan
2024-09-23 01:13:22 +0000 UTCSo, you here? 😍
Matheus Bitencourt
2024-09-23 00:48:05 +0000 UTCI'm watching the video right now on the YouTube and came here to suggest spray foam insulation testing.
Earl Plotner
2024-09-23 00:46:57 +0000 UTCSad to see the channel shilling for Big Ice and Orange Chicken...
TM
2024-09-22 23:38:31 +0000 UTCCan heat pumps and peltier elements be used together for greater efficiency? For example: use the peltier element for cooling the inside of the refrigerator, then use a heat pump and radiator to rapidly cool the hot side of the peltier element. Or is this just adding pointless complexity?
Tim Gouge
2024-09-22 20:54:19 +0000 UTCI have a little thermoelectric fridge on my desk at work. It does take about a day to chill a set of cans and I don't have it running year round, only when something is in it which is every few weeks when I buy a few treat drinks for myself. It's nice to know how terrible these are, I won't be running it at home as I was planning to when I end up bringing mine home. I'll keep using the one at work though because it's the only logistical solution for keeping chilled drinks at my desk, a whole mini-fridge would not fit on my small desk nor be sensible to transport to work. My thermoelectric unit does actually have insulation in the door / all around it (I disassembled it to check, it's a slightly nicer unit with removable panels in the door / chamber). I'm wondering if it would be a fun project to add a thermal probe and controller to one of these. Would you consider doing that as a followup?
ast_rsk
2024-09-22 20:02:42 +0000 UTCMany years ago I bought one of these modules thinking I was going to make a small, gun case size dehumidifier with it. Aborted when I realized how much electric it would use. I have an Iceco 14Qt powered cooler for camping and travel. Works really good despite some controller glitches it has developed after 4 years of use. It uses about 18 Amp Hour per day at 12V. (think your compressor is cute, you should see this baseball sized one)
Paul Malloy
2024-09-22 13:53:22 +0000 UTCNote: there are orientation-independent evaporative refrigerators. But they are very niche. They typically work by creating a turbulent airflow inside the pump, so that oil gets dispersed throughout it.
Aleksei Besogonov
2024-09-22 05:06:49 +0000 UTCI am starting to get the feeling that you might not entirely be fond of that tiny little blue fridge.
Honorary Octopus
2024-09-22 02:29:23 +0000 UTCThanks for the explanation. Digital cinema projectors use a few TECs around the prism (in addition to air and liquid cooling) and I'd wondered why they weren't more common.
Seth Adams
2024-09-22 01:34:10 +0000 UTCGreat video. I played around with these years ago and tried to make my own little air conditioner as a hobby project. I realized pretty quickly how inefficient they are. What's worse are all of these dumb ads I see where "genius 12 year old invents new air conditioner" or something baloney like that. Sometimes it is just a swap cooler, other times it is a Peltier device.
The 8-Bit Guy
2024-09-22 00:43:06 +0000 UTCNext video. “ In this video I will be adding spray foam in my exploratory holes to give this toy some proper insulation from the ambient room temperature and installing a thermostat controlled power source to greatly improve the electrical power consumption usage. Join me while I show how much better this little device could have been if the manufacturer put a little more time and thought into manufacturing. “
Jeff Andrews
2024-09-21 22:58:55 +0000 UTCA video about dehumidifiers? I'll be waiting for that! I have a constant stream of air that needs to stay below 65% RH. My cobbled together testing unit (Standard 12V peltier element at 12V, two heat pipe CPU-Coolers, two silent fans) was kind of working. It wasn't collecting much water but the RH was a few % lower than with a heater of similar power. I was looking for a compressor dehumidifier with about 50-100W power draw but they don't seem to exist. It would also have to be pretty flat as I don't have much height to work with (about 30cm/1ft). The parts are available on Aliexpress but I don't really know enough to build one and I don't want to pay what a licensed professional would charge me. I already did look into rotary dehumidifiers and sadly they don't make sense for me as my air is usually at about 25-30°C and 70-80% RH when I need the dehumidifier.
David Zeller
2024-09-21 20:20:16 +0000 UTCWell, since you're talking about dehumidifiers... I tested a couple of Peltier dehumidifiers for the dehumidifier video and they are absolutely useless. It generated just a few ml of water over 2 hours in an 80% RH room. Granted, that's a commercially-made product but in all seriousness the only reason Peltier dehumidifiers exist at all is so there can be a $30 result when you search "dehumidifier" on Amazon. Depending on your design needs it still might make some sense, but if it's anything room-sized it's gonna need a bonkers amount of power to do anything productive. You might want to look into rotary desiccant units, but in the testing I did water removed per kWh was barely better than the Peltier models. That might improve with cooler temps, and that's part of why the dehumidifier video was shelved (so I can do that testing)
Technology Connections
2024-09-21 19:42:09 +0000 UTCI didn't want to imply that the peltier mini fridge is any good. It's probably running the peltier element at 100% power, the heat sink sucks and we know it has about 0 Insulation. I would like to see what's possible with better design and a little bit of electronic control but then it probably wouldn't be cheaper than an actual fridge.
David Zeller
2024-09-21 19:27:38 +0000 UTCThank you for clarifying, I didn't see the "LBP" in the chart. (The 55-190W might not be for that model as the listing has multiple models.) Damn, now I might have to rethink my project idea. (I need a small, low power dehumidifier that will run 24/7 but it has to be 100% silent so I was happy to rule out compressors)
David Zeller
2024-09-21 19:21:58 +0000 UTCAnd for added context, remember that the peltier fridge draws slightly more power than the mini-fridge. In my testing, the rear wall never got cold enough for ice to form on the element whereas the evaporator in the actual fridge builds ice on its entire surface right away. It's really a night and day difference when it comes to actual cooling power despite both having similar input power.
Technology Connections
2024-09-21 19:20:06 +0000 UTCIn a freezer, it might be that low. But the COP depends on the application more than the specific compressor. It's hard to parse the data available there but a little above the chart with COPs there's a reference saying the same compressor can do 55-190W of refrigeration, and that chart only displays the COP in low back pressure situations (like freezers).
Technology Connections
2024-09-21 19:02:19 +0000 UTCEuropean here. Alec this time you've outdone yourself😂😂. Especially at 14:30. Also the "you commie" part made me laugh like a mad and the "this stupid thing" voice you made made me laugh even more and fall off the chair. Boy do I like the humor in this video
Fer
2024-09-21 18:00:58 +0000 UTCI seem to remember reading about peltier CPU coolers, but it was many years ago when CPUs were generating a lot less heat than they do now.
Michael Dunn
2024-09-21 15:36:53 +0000 UTCI think your theory on the short cycling minifridge is true. I have one from the 80's and it doesn't and even at lowest thermostat setting stuff on the top shelf start to freeze.
J Ruonti
2024-09-21 15:25:29 +0000 UTCI don't think your mini Fridge has a COP of 3. Not even close. I found an Alibaba Listing: https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/R600a-LBP-Mini-Deep-Freezer-Refrigeration_260733759.html It claims the DFB30DF compressor can do a COP of 1.25 which is about what I would have expected from such a tiny compressor. So a Peltier run at optimal Power (~30% for 20°C difference), could do the same according to this source: https://www.meerstetter.ch/customer-center/compendium/71-peltier-element-efficiency#COP
David Zeller
2024-09-21 15:15:45 +0000 UTCGreat video as always thanks! I'm ordering a couple of Peltier elements just to play with :) What, by the way, is the can of Coconut [something] doing next to your mini fridge compressor??
Alan Of Wales
2024-09-21 14:14:34 +0000 UTCI’m excited for the future of the Heat Pump Cinematic Universe!
Chris
2024-09-21 14:13:30 +0000 UTCThat sounds like there may be a market (of at least one) for split refrigerators.
ascii158
2024-09-21 13:08:40 +0000 UTCCool!
JockeTF
2024-09-21 12:56:21 +0000 UTCI have one of the peltier "fridges" for my office desk for beverages; I'd love to switch to a more efficient true refrigerator, but none of them are desktop size. If someone can point me to one that's about 6 six cans large (for sale in the US), I'd love a link!
Nicholas T.
2024-09-21 12:42:08 +0000 UTCEuro here. We got him. We finally managed to troll him into a rant. You can see us opening a bottle of Champagne, from the Champagne region of France, not mere sparkling wine. Thanks for the centigrade measurements on screen, but could you do them consistently? It literally means nothing to me when you say 40°. Also, we use bar in most countries and MPa in all the rest, so better give both when you talk about pressure. 😛
RTT12
2024-09-21 12:31:24 +0000 UTCI only ever used a peltier thingie to run a small circulating fan on top of a wood burning stove. Looked nice but doesn't really do much.
Jim Hewlett
2024-09-21 11:57:17 +0000 UTCNot really good idea https://youtu.be/sWrqyQWfhrs?si=H4kswRA7hGbwcUrb
Radek Věchet
2024-09-21 10:05:27 +0000 UTCHell yes!
christie
2024-09-21 09:11:43 +0000 UTCI use a peltier cool box in my car (which has no heat pump*) So the heat output from the coolbox warms the cabin. All the power for the coolbox is power not used for the PTC cabin heater. I live in a Northern European country and heat my car for most of the year. In summer I just add Ice packs from my home freezer. * The car does have an AC heat pump. Is it really that hard for car manufacturers to make the AC heat pump reversable so it also heats the cabin? Time to look for a 12v heat pump portable cool box!
DrumBrakes
2024-09-21 07:16:44 +0000 UTCThat's sorted what I'm settling down to watching during my morning coffee!!
Arif Ghostwriter
2024-09-21 07:16:17 +0000 UTCExactly! We use them in our medical instruments to keep very small amounts of liquid (less than 1 mL) at very precise temperatures, and of course thermocycling in PCR machines. There is one little downside though: Peltier elements don't particularly like fast cycling. When during development, the PID controller is not configured correctly and the regulator starts oscillating, after a couple of hours, you can replace the peltiers...
MrHammond
2024-09-21 07:12:16 +0000 UTCOne of the best videos yet.
Minecraft Chest1
2024-09-21 04:22:15 +0000 UTCI’ve heard of people doing that, but was never personally convinced it was worth it. Granted, I don’t run crazy over clocks and have ditched my AIO water cooler for the stock cpu one so I’m not a person who is one to chase the frosty dragon so to speak… Condensation becomes an issue REALLY QUICK if you try to cool your CPU below ambient so you need to take extra steps to make sure you don’t fry something.
dlshark
2024-09-21 03:52:39 +0000 UTCNice video, I stumbled across these things a few weeks ago when I noticed TEC current as a status parameter on some fibre optic modules I was using at work. I had no idea what that acronym stood for so I looked it up and it was thermoelectric cooler. I guess some lasers use these things to regulate temperature.
Samuel Gerhardy
2024-09-21 03:18:17 +0000 UTCI wonder if a Peltier device could be used to move heat away from a CPU (in conjunction with traditional CPU cooling hardware).
Peter Freese
2024-09-21 03:13:54 +0000 UTCI had to add a couple PC fans for mine, my use case is the standard cube minifridge stuffed inside my toolbox's locker, outside in my shop. Its cooling improved drastically with those fans mounted in front of the existing round holes in the back of the locker for cord pass throughs. Interestingly, it likes one fan pushing and one fan pulling more than both fans turning the same direction.
subaruanon
2024-09-21 02:39:38 +0000 UTCAlex, I have a continuous use case. Someplace such as an office desk where you don't have to pay for the electricity. :-)
WildMartin
2024-09-21 02:31:53 +0000 UTCPeltier elements get used in scientific instruments a lot because you can adjust the voltage (and polarity) with a fancy power supply controlled by a PID loop and get very accurate temperature control or rapid and very tightly controlled temperature ramps. The thermal cyclers that are used for PCR. Instruments stabilized to a hundredth of a degree C. That kind of thing. Efficiency isn't so important, and for that matter cost isn't, either. (We've got an old Orbitrap mass spectrometer at work still running that uses a peltier to keep the trap at 26.00 C with a vapor compression cycle cooled water loop on the other side that also cools the center electrode power supply and the turobomolecular vacuum pumps.)
Michaela Pereckas
2024-09-21 01:41:14 +0000 UTCTechnically, most refrigerators have two more moving parts: fans inside and outside to move are across the coils. Without these fans, convection is used to move air, which reduced efficiency quite a bit. The small "dorm style" fridges typically do not have these fans, but your large home fridge does, which explains its great efficiency.
Mark Lefler
2024-09-21 01:35:59 +0000 UTCAlways here for an enthusiastic heat pump discussion!!!
Lisa Boban
2024-09-21 01:33:17 +0000 UTCThank god for this. I hear SO much "why don't we use that peltiyay stuff! it's all electric! no moving parts" and now I have somewhere to point them.
Crash Cash
2024-09-21 01:10:46 +0000 UTCOf course Mr. Heat Pump himself isn't a fan of non-heat-pump-based cooling technologies... (I kid, of course.)
Randall Wald
2024-09-21 01:06:09 +0000 UTCMy first engineering job was interning at a company that designed a system to put these into car seats for active heating and cooling. It was and is a cool concept and I still think it makes sense for that application but damn they are so impressively inefficient
Grady Luyt
2024-09-21 01:05:28 +0000 UTCSounds like the exact sort of hyper-specific niche these things can legitimately be useful for!
Technology Connections
2024-09-21 01:03:41 +0000 UTCI'm so excited I get to make the first comment about something I know a whole bunch about. We use these in A protein determinator that combusted a sample and then used a small block the gas would flow through to condense out the moisture before the real chemical scrubbing occurred. It was extraordinarily effective as you can keep it down at 5c consistently with very little work. But the whole volume of that space was maybe 3 poker chips stacked on top of each other. . it was a very robust solution for that issue but makes absolutely no sense for any kind of volume.
Tony Drake
2024-09-21 01:00:52 +0000 UTCi know this doesnt have anythign to do with the video, but how many pinball machines do you have in total? what is the most expensive one you have?
Tdub23
2024-09-21 01:00:15 +0000 UTC
