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Old 11-13-13, 08:10 AM   #26
Ross D
Lurking Renovator
 
Join Date: Nov 2013
Location: UK, Cornwall
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Hi just joined the forum, I found this thread whilst looking up solar air heating for my outside office/workshop/equipment store. The store is cold and damp and I was investigating making and using a beer can solar air heater to provide warm ducted air to the building. These are really cheap to make and when done properly actually look quite good.

However, I also want to dry the air entering the building to stop damp in the equipment stored in there. Hence researching solar dehumidifiers.

The beer can/soda can air heater (check it out on instructables) provides a free solar powered warm air flow, I was wondering if this could be fed through a silica gel bed to dry out the air entering the building?

Additionally whether a second air flow from the beer can air heater could be used to regenerate another silica gel bed. The silica gel beds could be periodically swapped over to regenerate one whilst the other is drying the inlet air.

Having read this thread I thought of possibly using a dessicant wheel such as the one posted by Daox so that the swapping over the dessicant could be automated/motorised.

Could a dessicant wheel be made to turn under gravity? The wetter side would be heavier and therefore, if the unit was angled correctly turn the wheel under its own weight, with the lighter drier side gradually moving up as it dried.

Ross
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