Finally got a weekend off and threw the little collector together. I did a worksheet on the solar electricity handbook dot com website for solar irradiance and it said 52 degrees back from vertical was optimal for year round. So the uphill side is that, the downhill side is 48 and change to get even flow from my header pipe. Made a quickie fence mount and put water in it this morning. Hose water was around 70 degF. It's about 4:30 pm and the thermometer reads 118 degF. Yayyy!
No automation yet. I found a little mag drive aquarium pump that only has about 4 feet of head pressure and filled up a Rubbermaid tote until the water just made it to the far side of the drip pipe. Earlier, the pipe was sweating hard, condensing water vapor from the hot air atop. Now that the reservoir has heated up, only the center pane of glass is fogging up.
Last edited by jeff5may; 08-08-21 at 04:25 PM..
Reason: Info and spelling
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