Quote:
Originally Posted by Zwerius
...First of all, you need a quite deep vacuum (<0,1 mbar or < 10Pa) and that's not so easy to achieve with standard vacuum equipment...
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I would be interested in discussing this idea...
Zwerius, do you think that the phenomenon of vacuum insulation only occurs at <0.1 mbar? This would be what is known as a 'step function'.
It seems to me that there would be a gradient of insulation improvement as vacuum levels became greater.
For instance, a micron gauge is an instrument that is commonly used in refrigeration work to measure vacuum levels. The principle of operation is that there is a direct relationship between variation of heat flow across a variation of vacuum level. The micron gauge uses a very small heat source and a precision thermocouple is used to measure the changing heat flow as vacuum levels change.
As another example, taken from Aerogel technology, is a graph taken from
THIS_PAGE that illustrates this varying relationship.
My point is that a person who is working with relatively unsophisticated equipment actually can realize very useful improvements in insulation, even if they do not achieve the theoretical maximum.
In short, yes I do believe that it is possible to DIY your own useful vacuum insulation.
Best,
-AC