It shouldn't clog the pump due to the radiators being downstream of the pump, and there will be a filter on the inlet to the pump. I'll have to draw up a diagram soon to show the physical placement of everything. However, I'd imagine just for performance sake it would be a good idea to blast them out with the hose at least. Perhaps even run some vinegar through it?

Another thing discovered by water coolers is that vinegar left in the radiator for too long will turn blueish indicating that it's eating the solder. So don't leave it in there for too long. honestly I don't know how one would go about cleaning a radiator out properly.

Haha, good to know! Perhaps I'll just flush it out with the hose and be done.

I did take a few minutes to come up with a diagram of what I'm looking at. The radiator is the only part of the system that will be upstairs. The rest of the components will be in the basement.

http://ecorenovator.org/forum/attach...1&d=1311348230

The pump you ordered has a flow of 120GPH, and since you'll have about 2x55+24=134 gallons in the system (2xbarrels+croc, not counting what's in the plumbing and radiator), then you'll pump your whole system throught that rad within 1.5 hours. I wonder how long it'll last, ie how many times it can go through the rad before the water is too warm? Maybe letting it cool off in the basement for the whole night will make up for working it for 4-8h during the day? It'll be interesting to see how it works out.

Well, at ~12ft/3m of head, we're looking more at 280LPH/74GPH. So, I should have a bit more capacity and I'm hoping that will help with keeping the drums cool. If I can get the 20F temp drop across the radiator I'm looking at a pretty decent 12,000 BTU/hr for around around 1.75 hrs.

http://www.swiftech.com/images/mcp355-32.PNG

Now that I look at the chart, I'm actually not sure what rev my pump is... I just assumed the newer one. I guess if I get the older one I just get a little bonus to the flow rate. :)

I should be getting the pump today. So, I'll be picking up the rest of the components on the way home from work tonight. One part I've had a hard time finding is the check valve to keep the pump primed. I want one with a really low opening threshold. I talked about this project with an engineer here at work and he suggested another solution the the pump priming issue. That is to stick the pump in a PVC pipe that is capped off on one end. Then, put the capped off end of the PVC pipe into the water to get the pump below the water level. Its a very simple solution and is probably cheaper than the check valve considering I have a pipe, so I just need to get a cap. It also doesn't rely on a mechanical device that moves and will eventually fail. The downside is that it will displace some water.

Well, work hasn't been progressing on this front very quickly. I did get one of the barrels setup earlier this week. However, lately its been dropping down into the 60s over night and thats plenty to cool the house down to a reasonable level. Still, I have all the bits for the project, I just need to put them together. I also really want to measure things and see what kind of BTUs this simple setup will put out.

Today is supposed to be pretty hot and very muggy out, so that gave me the drive to work on this last night. I got quite a bit of the setup in. I have the main tubing run from the radiator down to a single barrel and then back to the sump. The pump dry well is in place. It is 3" PVC with a cap on the end, but it looks like it is leaking. Does anyone have any good ideas on how to seal that up? Silicon? With the dry well leaking I didn't get a chance to prime up the pump and test it out.

I do have pictures, but I didn't have time to get them off the camera. I'll post them up tonight though.

How will the radiator be plumbed - cold input at the bottom and warm exit at top?

Yep, that is how it is currently done.

Any suggestions on plugging up that PVC pipe?

If it's just a glue on type cap, you can use PVC primer to soak it down some and then
add some of the thin version PVC glue.
But, there can be no pressure inside (water leaking), when you do this.
Thin PVC takes a bit longer to cure.

If it's a threaded cap, you could try using Teflon tape..

Yeah, I suppose I should have mentioned that. :) Its a glue on cap. I've taken it out of the sump and its drying off.

Here are the pictures:

Getting the barrel ready with all the fittings.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house452.JPG

http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house458.JPG



Here is the leaky dry well.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house453.JPG



Here you can see what I'm doing with it. At the time of the picture the sump is drained, but the dry well will allow the pump to sit below the water level and keep the prime. However, the cap has a slight leak at the moment.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house454.JPG



Here is the Piwoslaw home made filter. There is a piece of PVC tubing inside the sock to keep it from collapsing around the tube's inlet.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house456.JPG



Here we have the pump that will sit inside the PVC drywell.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house457.JPG



Upstairs we have the radiator with the two tubes running to it. I'll be constructing some ducting, probably out of cardboard, to adapt a box fan to blow through it.
http://ecorenovator.org/pictures/house455.JPG

Luv it.

Is the water source the same in the heating months? Where do you live?

I have often thought if the outside temp was several degrees cooler than the gound water temp. that you could gain in ambient air temp differencial were you to circ the ground water into the cool space of the home, which we heat anyways.

Lookng forward to comments.

Haven't read all the posts and just joining now but I see some problems:
piping is small and will provoke a big pressure drop
Piping is flexible and removing air out of your system will therefore be difficult. As long as there's air in the system, you will have no proper flow.
Pump seems too small for 4.000 BTU
The fan will bring in additional heat in the house.

Thanks for the comments guys.

zzz9395, the water source is the same in the heating months. I'm not sure how you would use this though as the ground water is around 50F and using my gas forced air its simply reheating air that is already ~68F. I do not have a HRV in my house, so I can't use it for preheating outside air.


daliti, that is what the hand calculations show. I'm sure real world will be different. To accurately measure BTU output I will be measuring the flow rate through the radiator. I will also measure the temperature drop across the radiator. With those two measurements I will have an accurate BTU output.

I just started to follow your project. I have been thinking about doing something similar with my well water. I think I have read all the threads but I did not see anywhere why you chose not to just send the return into the sump pump discharge line. This would recuce the on time of the sump pump and you would always be getting a supply of 50F water to go to your radiator. You would also get rid of the 2-55 gal. drums in your basement.

Welcome to the site.

The sump itself only holds about 20 gallons of water, and thats when its near full. Once the pump kicks in it probably gets rid of 2/3rds of that water. If there is no water, there is no source of cooling. I added the barrels to increase the amount of cool water. With only 20 gallons and a 20F temperature drop, the BTUs available for cooling is very small. If I had a constant flow of water to the sump and my sump pump ran really often, I'd definitely plumb the return to the drain instead of back to the sump. However, that is not the case for me.

Thanks for the welcome.

I had the impression that you had an unlimited source of water and your sump pump was running quite often. The barrels do make sense now. How do you plan on filling the barrels initially? When the sump pump runs how long does it take for the hole to refill? If I remember correctly your circulating pump would be running at about 75 GPH. Maybe the sump would be able to supply this. just a thought.

A few people have gotten confused, its probably my fault. I started the thread talking about my uncle's house who does have unlimited sump water to use. My setup is kind of a proof of concept of the idea, but I don't have the water he does.

I am not sure how long it takes the sump to refill after emptied. Just by me messing around building the stuff the other day its not quick though (unless it rains). The main problem is I don't have proper drain tile around the house. The sump is pretty much just a hole in the ground that water eventually makes its way over to. Its a pending renovation that I haven't gotten to yet.

Well, I got my first results tonight. I only have it hooked up with one barrel atm and am using the downstairs sink instead of the sump. However, it is working. Here is a picture of the setup.


Here it is in the basement.
http://ecorenovator.org/forum/attach...1&d=1312333487



Here is the fan setup upstairs. Yes, it is quite ugly, but it is sealed pretty good against the radiator. :)
http://ecorenovator.org/forum/attach...1&d=1312333487

http://ecorenovator.org/forum/attach...1&d=1312333487



I can say it does work, but needs work. Here are the measurements I took.

Flow rate = .7 GPM / 42 GPH
Radiator temp at the bottom = 60F (not sure why its so warm)
Radiator temp at the top = 70F
Ambient = 81F

That gives me about 3500 BTU of output.

Now, the box fan I'm using is pulling 120W of power and the pump is pulling 25W, so combined we have 145W of power used (measured with a kill a watt). 1kWh is roughly 3400 BTU. So, it looks like I have a COP of around 7.0! Not bad at all IMO.

However, I would like to improve the design. Mainly, I'd like to increase the output. I think the first thing to look at is either a new fan, or improving the ridiculously poorly slapped together shroud. There really isn't that much air flowing through the radiator. So, I'm going to take a look at a squirrel cage fan I have off a wood furnace. I'm curious how much power it draws, but I know squirrel cage fans can hold more pressure than axial fans, and that should move more air through the radiator. I also need to deal with the condensation the unit makes.

Suggestions are welcome!

I just turned the system off for the night. After a few hours of operation, the bottom of the radiator was up to 65F and the top was up to 73F. This brings the BTUs down to ~2800. The water in the sink was up to 66F. I'll take a measurement again before turning it on tomorrow to see how much it cooled off.

This project is coming right along!

Have you considered some kind of loop field?

Sixty feet of bore-hole would give you about the same cooling as you're getting now.

As I found out, 60 feet of bore-hole is greater than 4 boreholes of 15 foot depth, but I think you get the general idea...

It's amazing what a few friends, a case of beer and a post-hole auger (with extensions) can do.

-AC_Hacker

I can definitely say its come to mind to drop a few bore holes into the ground. Especially since I do have to add drain tile around the basement's inner wall. This will require busting up the concrete around the perimeter. It wouldn't be THAT much more work to bust up the entire floor I wouldn't think. Then I could drill a few holes. Would I do anything differently since I'm already ~8' below grade?

Anyway, for now, I'm going to keep it simple and see what I can do with it. When I get around to doing the drain tile I'll think about doing it.

I did check the water temperatures this morning before I left for work. For reference, the basement floor is roughly 60F/15.5C, the wall as you go up near the top is around 64F/17.8C. The water in the sink was 64F/17.8C and the water in the barrel was 65F/18.3C at the bottom and 66F/18.9C at the top. I'll measure the temps again when I get home from work to see what they're down to. I did measure the sump water temperature and it is at 59F/15C. Since its been so hot out lately, this has increased the temperature of the basement a decent amount. I had anticipated the basement being down around 55F.

You might consider making up a plenum to adapt the shape of your box fan to the radiator. You'll get better use of what you have on hand. Cardboard will probably suffice for a prototype.

I've wondered about something similar to this, a water tank buried in the ground.

mike

Yeah, I'm sure nicer ducting would improve the situation. I'm not sure if I wanna bother or just go to trying out the squirrel cage fan though.

I took some measurements when I got home last night. The sink was at 61F, about as low as it is going to get I think. The barrel was 60F on the bottom and 64F at the top. So, as we thought, cooling the water in the tanks off may be an issue if used repeatedly. However, I did not need to use it last night.

Looking good! Have you thought about using the "coolness" of the floor to chill the water even more before it goes into the radiator?

Daox mentioned adding a few coils of tubing on the return. Any other ideas?

Hi,
Maybe run the water through the A coil or a hydronic baseboard "heater", and then out to the yard to water the landscape.
The landscape watering could be like the systems they use for grey water landscape watering.

Seems like putting a Kill A Watt meter on the sump pump would be worthwhile to find out how much of a power hog it is. If the power usage is high, then maybe get a more efficient pump, and use the regular sump pump as backup. It could even be a solar powered pump with a car battery for night pumping -- maybe something line a TopsFlo or one of the small March submersible 12 volt pumps?

Gary

I have put a kill a watt on the sump pump. It uses next to nothing. While its running it takes around 300W I believe, but it really doesn't run that often.

A Residential Cooling Coil runs between 35 to 45 f . typically, depending on the load on the Cooling Coil . If your Sump Water is much higher than this, then youll get some degree of cooling but it will be muggy inside the house because it wont be dehumidifying like it would with a colder cooling medium .

If you are getting thru sump pumps every 1-1.5 years due to continual on and off...theres a good chance theres an underground spring nearby feeding water in , in large amounts . My friend had this problem and his electric bills were astronomical from the Sump Pump energizing about every 30 seconds .

One thing I've noticed living on the side of a hill, is long pipes running down hill,
from the sump pump, can cause a siphon effect.
If the water is coming in pretty fast, the siphoning action might keep up
with the in-flow, or run just behind it.

I got my neighbor across the street to add about 60 feet of hose to his pipe,
which was dumping on the grass, right beside his house.
(And going right back in to his basement).

I could see the hose jump when the pump came on, but water would still
be flowing for a long time after the pump shut down.
Depending on the speed water was coming into his basement,
sometimes the siphoning would go on for 20 minutes before the pump re-started.
When there was less flooding, the siphoning would run for a few minutes
and stop, without the pump coming back on.. For a while anyways..

Well, when I had the cooler running the couple of afternoons that I did, it was condensing a fair amount of water. Of course, the room was already around 80F and 80% relative humidity, so the dew point was quite high.

Also, I don't have the abnormally high sump pump use, my uncle does. We both came up with the idea while talking at a family get together. This was mostly a proof of concept. I think that you'd have to upsize the a-coil, but you could attain a fair amount of cooling with as much his sump pumps run.

Has your uncle built his house on a spring?

-AC_Hacker

Something like that. He lives in a subdivision. Him and his neighbor have the same issue.

Maybe a lawyer would be a more appropriate solution than a sump pump.

-AC_Hacker

Yeah, thats not going to happen. The house has been there for quite some time even before my uncle and his family moved in.

Back in the early 70s when we started house hunting, checking the water-line
in the basement was the first thing we looked at.
I recall one brand new home in Billerica, MA that not only had gallons of water
in the basement, it was raw sewerage water!
The road ran along the edge of a 40' high ridge, the newly occupied houses on the upper ridge road,
all had septic tanks. Gravity was bringing all the "water" down into the backyards on the lower road.

I asked if there was any homes available "up there", pointing up to the sources. :p

We ended up in an old (1956) house in Woburn, that only had a 4" water line on the basement walls.. :o
I was looking right at it, at the exact same time the owner was telling me,
"We Never get water down here".. :rolleyes:

But, the price was right and location isn't bad.. We knew there would be floods.
We just never expected so many 100 year floods, in so few decades..

If I had it to do over again, I would NEVER buy a house with a basement,
unless it was on the peak of a good sized hill and had no watermarks..

Cheers,
Rich

PS:
The sellers moved out after placing "Plastic" faucet caps on the leaky washing machine taps.
Hours later, the cheap plastic caps burst and flooded the basement.. :mad:

It was August 1973, I found the Ace hardware store nearby and started collecting water removal stuff.
Been collecting ever since.. I also learned how to solder 1/2" copper that day too!