Using soda cans to help heat a home

[1monster]

[ballyhoo]

1. God.Insane! A boom for the poor who can't afford heat.

Brilliant.

[yeoman6987]

4. I would love to see my HOA's face

If I did this. I would be out of the community so fast, I wouldn't know which way was up.

[ballyhoo]

10. No doubt. Got to hand it to that dude.

[haikugal]

2. Thanks!

I'm sending this and additional information to my son...we need two of these!!

[valerief]

3. So will these be made illegal because the utility companies won't

be making anything from them?

[SoapBox]

6. Oh ya!

Or the soda companies will sue for reusing the cans...or the states with a per can "deposit" will say they can't use the cans.

Or some other kind of B.S.

[SoapBox]

5. O...M...G!

Seriously? That easy?

Spectacular!

Now, in Southern California (where we rarely ever, turn on the furnace) how can we get a water line to run through that, to either heat or preheat our hot water?!? And then, we need a reversal system to vent out hot air inside.

[Bonhomme Richard]

7. A fellow I know showed me this setup on his house a year ago.

He uses it to cut his heating bill.

[freshwest]

11. Yes this has been around for a while. Passive solar applications, there are some good ones.

[marble falls]

8. Low tech. Inexpensive. Green. What's not to like? I'm going to try to heat my workshop....

with one or two or three of these.

[passiveporcupine]

12. Inexpensive?

One panel costs almost 3K.

I think I could make my own for a heck of a lot less.

[marble falls]

13. I have a workshop. I will salvage cans, I can make a box and get a piece of PVC bent cheaper ...

than $3K.

[passiveporcupine]

14. I agree it might be inexpensive if you make your own

I still think there might be even cheaper ways to do this. Recycling aluminum cans sounds like a great idea until you see the labor involved in drilling them, cleaning, preparing for paint and painting them. I never did see how they put them together into a tube. But I wonder if you can find cheaper aluminum tubing that wouldn't require all that work. I like that they are so thin, you use very little aluminum. I don't know if you can find really thin aluminum tubing.

I am pretty sure you could build one of these for yourself for a heck of a lot less than 1K even.

[1monster]

16. Do it yourself instructions on Youtube

First soda can heater:

Second, bigger, improved soda can heater:

[JoeyT]

9. People have been making these for a while.

I've never seen one that size or that well made, though.

[whereisjustice]

15. I've seen lots of these exact designs, but I never see any real measurements of efficiency.

I'm guessing you'd have to record temp at intake and exhaust and measure airflow so volume can be determined. Has to be done at various points during day over a span of months so you could arrive at thermal gain per volume of air over time?

Not an expert in this area but something like this is necessary to determine the true value of this design.

[rickford66]

19. You make a good point.

I experimented with a similar design in the 70's. Under the right conditions, you can get some hot air, for a limited amount of time, but to heat a realistic sized area, the collector just can't keep up. You might heat a small room during a very sunny day, but a large double glazed window would do just as well. I built a passive solar home which heats up slowly and therefore cools down slowly. Lots of South facing glass. Lots of insulation. Lots of thermal mass. Without any added heat sources, without sunny skies, it never gets below 50 deg F here in upstate NY. It is also cooler in the Summer then a conventional home without A/C.

[RBInMaine]

17. Awesome ! We should be doing this everywhere ! :-)

[Bortman33]

18. How do you control the venting

at night when there is no solar input? Love the ingenuity.

[packman]

20. Could have a heat sink

blow hot air over any mass-rocks, water, concrete- which holds the heat. Then open that sink up at night to exhaust the built up heat. Seen this done many times, especially in greenhouses that use water barrels, tubs, etc. to capture excessive heat during the day and releasing it at night.