thermoelectric generators

[ZEbbEDY]

anyone played about with these before?

could do a DIY biostove, when theres no sun for solar and are in the woods could easy keep feeding a stove twigs to generate power

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1A5qc872Ks

panels:
http://www.tegpower.com/pro3.htm
http://www.ebay.com/itm/310209561834

 

[Urban X]

Seen the peltiers used in water cooling systems for PCs but not what you're thinking of, reckon you'd need the power generated to run a cooling fan on a heatsink to keep the thing from over heating.


Si

 

[Donny732]

Urban, they're the same thing. If you create a difference in temperature on either side of a Peltier plate, you'll generate a DC current.

 

[ZEbbEDY]

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1203647021/the-powerpot

 

[Urban X]

Urban, they're the same thing. If you create a difference in temperature on either side of a Peltier plate, you'll generate a DC current.

Yeah I know Donny I was kiddin'


ZEbbEDY those pans look cool, a relatively small amount of juice produced but then as they say 5w powers quite a few gizzmo's these days. I'm not sure I'd use one camping but that's purely because of having to keep the fire going and the water topped up, for a remote villagers 'somewhere' though that might have a large family stockpot on the go all day or even a communal one, a much bigger version of that could power more?

I have no idea how big those things can be made or what output they can produce, I did look into them when water cooling PCs but the cost outweighed any benefits and the normal W/C system won out.

Nice 'outside of the box' thinking though.


Si

 

[bronskimac]

Watching the steam coming out of my new combi boilers vent, it did occur to me that the heat should be captured somehow...

 

[ged]

I've been waiting for these things to mature into reasonably priced, usable products for a while now.

They're starting to appear in motor vehicle exhaust systems to charge the batteries, so it might not be too long before you can pick them up in scrapyards. That will make me happy as a pig in, er, mud.

 

[Gailainne]

I've been waiting for these things to mature into reasonably priced, usable products for a while now.

They're starting to appear in motor vehicle exhaust systems to charge the batteries, so it might not be too long before you can pick them up in scrapyards. That will make me happy as a pig in, er, mud.

Tell me about it, we need a high temperature seebeck unit that can handle 650 deg C plus, the cheap ones available are peltier, run at 150 deg C, some at 300, I've popped quite a few playing around with a Seebeck powered TLUD wood gas stove. Theres a company had a Youtube video out for a while for a camping type stove but the release date goes back a year, every year . There's a quite a few posts on here as well as on the hammock forums about d wood gas stoves and using peltier/seebeck units.

 

[Teepee]

These guys make a Teg kettle. It was taken to Antarctica in the 'race to the pole' on TV.

Like Gaillaine, I've popped them testing and gave up in the end. The normal peltier units arent tuned for power generation, the Seebeck tuned units are more efficient.

This technology will take off before long, its only a matter of time.

FWIW, I've followed the development of the Biolite stove from when it was first shown as a prototype. The first ones were made out of tea tins!
Keeping the Tegs at the right temperature was by far the hardest thing to achieve for the developers of it.

 

[Gailainne]

.......FWIW, I've followed the development of the Biolite stove from when it was first shown as a prototype. The first ones were made out of tea tins!
Keeping the Tegs at the right temperature was by far the hardest thing to achieve for the developers of it.

Well well, Biolite have finally sorted it out and are taking orders, I've ordered one order id 12188 !!! I wonder if thats how many people have shown an interest.

Pete that's where I got to, with the available cheap units, the only way was using water as a heating medium for the TEG, any kind of flame, even from a tea candle was enough to pop a peltier

It was fun though , these guys must have access to high temp Seebecks, when it comes, if it comes I'll do a review.

 

[Teepee]

Brilliant mate, I'm glad you ordered one, looking forward to the review! I've been tempted for ages to get one ordered.


I popped a teg on a tea light too, that one was rescued from a cooler. I remember getting 3 odd volts from them(40mm unit) but with not enough power to run a 40mm fan

I'd love to start playing around with them again but know it'll consume too much of my time...

 

[Gailainne]

Sooo many projects, sooooo little time

 

[Woody110]

I made a cooler for the landy with one of these, a thermal switch and a fan from Maplins, and a butchered PC tower unit. It works ok but kills the leisure battery.
I did a LOT of ready and you tubing before building it, and could see the amount of people trying to get power from them. Some did rather well.

Rigged up in the correct was in front of the fire may charge your phone/ipod.