Home made Heater. Does this seem right to you?

[spdas]

Aloha, everyone. I found it hard to get the solar 20' heater off ebay shipped to Hawaii at a reasonable price, so I decided to fashion one of my own. Here it is.

1: 500' of the irrigation black pipe from home depot
2: It is coiled on the top of a 8'x20' container starting along the outside edge. Coil is held in place by "fingers" that are vertical, so the tubes are space 1/2 apart
3: Water comes from my return line of my filter pump and amount of water is adjusted/diverted to the coil by a valve. (but all the tube from the discharge line of the 1 1/2" pump to pool is tee'd off to the 1/2" x500' coil.
4: I can regulate the temp of the water coming back by the 1 1/2" valve.

How hot should I want the water coming back? It will vary according to how much water I am diverting and of course the weather. I am doing 20 degrees above pool temp and the water is flowing at about the volume of a 1/3 open water faucet, about 2 GPM.

I thought I would be getting more heat out of it. Am I expecting too much. (I can add another 500' x 2 lengths if needed

thanks
Francis

 

[JohnT]

You want to flow as much water as possible through the heater. Adding a little heat to a lot of water works more efficiently than adding a lot of heat to a little water, and the result in the pool is the same, excluding the efficiency difference.

 

[spdas]

Aloha,
What do you think the efficiency of the DIY system such as mine compared to the Ebay ones claiming 80%? I will suck up the $300 freight gouging if the factory ones are WAYYY lot better. I just tested in the 10:00 AM sun and at 1 gal per min and 500' of 1/2" I am getting 7 degrees. I will push more water to 2 gph for more flow?


thanks
Francis

 

[JohnT]

Aloha,
What do you think the efficiency of the DIY system such as mine compared to the Ebay ones claiming 80%? I will suck up the $300 freight gouging if the factory ones are WAYYY lot better. I just tested in the 10:00 AM sun and at 1 gal per min and 500' of 1/2" I am getting 7 degrees. I will push more water to 2 gph for more flow?

If you have a good place to mount them, the factory ones are better. I would go with the better quality ones, since they'll last longer. Talk to poolheatpumps.com, a supporter here, or bestbuypoolsupply.com, which is where I bought mine.

The panels are usually shipped rolled up in large boxes. It could be that shipping would be cheaper to you if a California company would ship them flat on a pallet, since space may be more expensive than weight coming to you.

 

[JasonLion]

If your do want a DIY solution, you need to make a manifold at each end, and cut your pipe into 20' foot sections and run them all in parallel between the manifolds. That will get you a much higher flow rate and far higher efficiency.

 

[spdas]

Aloha, I was able to "will-call" and pickup 2 x 4x20 Sunsaver panels from Oregon (not Sungrabber, that I understand are not as good), so hopefully will be installing Monday. thanks everyone.
Francis