Problem: I have a garbage picked dehumidifier, a month off of school, and some ambition.
Solution: Build myself a quick and dirty window shaker heat pump.
My first idea for this dehumidifier was to build a mini-chiller to use to use with a remote fancoil, built from a 10" fan and the condensing coil from the other dehumifier i garbage picked with this one that had no charge. Plans changed when I realized it would be difficult to hide while dealing with the exhaust air, and noise.
Decided instead to use a 7 gallon container with ice water circulated through my home made fancoil for dorm cooling instead. Worked well if it was pointed at you. Made sleeping much more pleasant.
Anyway here's that:
Started bending things around and this was my prototype. That white fan is the one I used for my fancoil. didn't move nearly enough air through this coil.
Final design. After much fanagaling of piping to get it to reach where it needed to and line up like I wanted it to here it is. All that's left to do is secure it to the base I have, and put an enclosure around it.
Currently it's running in my basement, keeping me warm,
which is about 59*F, drawing 470w(compressor) + 60w(fans) = 530w, putting out 96*(37*dT) air on the hot side and 42*(18*dT) air on the cold side. I wish there was an easy way to know how any BTU's of heat I'm actually putting out with this thing. I measured the CFM of the indoor(hot) fan with a 30 gal garbage bag and a stopwatch and got 96 CFM, though I'm not sure how accurate that is.
Notes: I originally had the fans switched around with the blower(from a 5000 btu window shaker) on the condensing side and the axial(original to dehumidifier) on the evap. This lead to about 74*F discharge temps hot side, aka not warm feeling when blowing on you, and cold side coils that froze even in 60* basement air. I switched these around to achieve a lower dT on the evap to reduce frosting/freezing, which it has, they don't even get cold enough to condensate where the air is passing over them, and to achieve higher discharge temps on the condenser side, so it feels nice to those who feel it.
I don't know how many BTU's this thing puts out at room temp, at actual outdoor temps, or if it's even anywhere near efficient, but I know it's a fun little project that gives me something to do.
The best test I'll be able to do is to heat a small room with a space heater and track the temp vs/ time, and heat it again with this hp, and compare, unless someone has a better idea?
Adam