ampsucker
Platinum Member
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Homemade Pool Heater
- Thread starter Ivan1547
- Start date
- Views: 102157
gaero e3
New member
from the looks of it > doesnt add up to 100' of 1/2" copper...nice to know it heated all those litres - musta been a log spitting day eh?
pat32rf
Veteran Member
We had a 12x20' above ground that we used for one summer. Had 4 - 4x8 solar panels on the roof heating it, but we only had 6 hrs of morning sun, which wasn't enough to keep the water warm all day.
If I could have found a decent wood fired boiler I would have gone that route as we cut our own wood.
Doing it again I would insulate the bottom and sides, weither it was above or below ground.
If I could have found a decent wood fired boiler I would have gone that route as we cut our own wood.
Doing it again I would insulate the bottom and sides, weither it was above or below ground.
gaero e3
New member
the insulating part > pat32rf > a std. above ground 16' x 32' oval pool > we didnt buy into all the accessory pool deck and ladder stuff the pool dealer had to offer, instead excavated it for the nominal 4' depth about level with the threshold of the sliding glass door off the family room...so maybe it was roughly 2'10" submerged (a slight gradient away from the house...). the old school gas fired pool heater was a constant chore - or i should say the overly sensitive flow sensor (pressure switch)...water isnt all that compressible but air bubbles as a result of crud in the strainer bucket, even with the vacuum by pass gate open...a constant fidgiting nightmare...of course with a 200 yr. old oak tree also shading it part of the day as well as the leaf debris...a large piece of 'bubble wrap' material was cut to fit snugly (slightly upturned at the liner) and rolled away after the kids moved out.
gaero e3
New member
did i mention "it doesnt look like 100' feet of copper tubing"? i estimated the barrel diameter @ 2' x pi to a circumference of roughly 7' multiplied by the number of turn the (non) concentric (upper?) winding makes and came up much shorter than 100'.
Industrial Toys
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I had a stainless steel heat exchanger made that I installed in a small airtight stove to heat my hot tub during the summer. It was a dismal failure! Too little of the heat was transferred to the water. Later I put a sheild around the whole stove hoping to keep more of the heat in. That did not help much. Oh, I had also painted the stove silver to try and minimize radiated heat.
It worked, but I had to feed it an awfull lot of wood, had to keep the windows of the house closed as it would fill with smoke and at the end of the day abandoned the project. Last year, I re-enabled the electric heater for the first time and fitted it with an hour meter. I was actually amazed how little power it used and did a cost study at the end of the year. It was insane for the amount of work involved to try and heat that thing with wood! Obviously, my design was flawed and inefficient. I had thought about making changes but then started to look for old wood boilers. I found many, some needing repairs, but without a doubt, I am sure they would have worked well and better then me spending any more time re-inventing the wheel. Most would have been overkill and I would still have the smoke issue to contend with.
I am now rebuilding a solar panel, because I had better luck with just rolls of black pipe lying on the ground then with the stove. What I don't like about solar, is on the hottest days, you get the most heat, but it is too hot! On those hot days, I prefer a cooler refreshing tub.
It worked, but I had to feed it an awfull lot of wood, had to keep the windows of the house closed as it would fill with smoke and at the end of the day abandoned the project. Last year, I re-enabled the electric heater for the first time and fitted it with an hour meter. I was actually amazed how little power it used and did a cost study at the end of the year. It was insane for the amount of work involved to try and heat that thing with wood! Obviously, my design was flawed and inefficient. I had thought about making changes but then started to look for old wood boilers. I found many, some needing repairs, but without a doubt, I am sure they would have worked well and better then me spending any more time re-inventing the wheel. Most would have been overkill and I would still have the smoke issue to contend with.
I am now rebuilding a solar panel, because I had better luck with just rolls of black pipe lying on the ground then with the stove. What I don't like about solar, is on the hottest days, you get the most heat, but it is too hot! On those hot days, I prefer a cooler refreshing tub.
sodamo
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I'm working on a solar pool heater, not quite finished but it is functional at this point. Here is a pic of work in progress:
View attachment 413824
About 500ft of 1 in poly divided into 4 sections. Fed by the 11/2 inch pool plumbing hooked in after the sand filter. Driven by 48vdc pool pump directly hooked to solar panels via a controller so basically whenever the sun shines it flows. Not looking for a big temp increase, would be happy with just a few degrees above air temp. Our temps range mostly from 60's at night to 70's daytime. Yearly low last year was 58° and high was 83°. Pool is 39k gallons.
Have installed any thermometers yet but hope to be able to measure both in and out temps.
David Sent from my iPad Air using TractorByNet
View attachment 413824
About 500ft of 1 in poly divided into 4 sections. Fed by the 11/2 inch pool plumbing hooked in after the sand filter. Driven by 48vdc pool pump directly hooked to solar panels via a controller so basically whenever the sun shines it flows. Not looking for a big temp increase, would be happy with just a few degrees above air temp. Our temps range mostly from 60's at night to 70's daytime. Yearly low last year was 58° and high was 83°. Pool is 39k gallons.
Have installed any thermometers yet but hope to be able to measure both in and out temps.
David Sent from my iPad Air using TractorByNet
NS Gearhead
Veteran Member
jwmorris
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clubthumer
New member
I built a pool heater a few years back, i have a 10000 gallon pool, it heats it from about 15 degrees C to 30 degrees in about 3-4 hours. Its all stainless with a 4 pass heat exchanger for flu gas.
