If you want to see crazy, check out my dead bug style foam core amp here: http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/class-d/219730-tpa3118d2-6.html#post3413886
I'm investigating several liquid cooling approaches but with closed systems that isolate for the "splash" factor.
The first one is very compact and probably best suited for the ACA. It is the concept that is behind my interested in the use of a single toroid to power the ACAs. Could lead to a nice cube design for a desktop.
BLAT 1
The second is for larger amps but does require the purchase of some HS material. Heatsinks USA is here in Michigan and the cost was ~ $30. It has been modified to an over/under format and a build thread should be posted by the end of the week. (Congo5 - couldn't do the phone setup cause I had to steal the toroid for this one. I'll get er done)
BLAT 2
The third piece is a vertical side-by-side format with heavier aluminum but at a size between the first two. No pictures yet.
And finally a monster for the house heater amps that uses the heater core from a Ford Mustang and a 150 mm fan
It will be at the base of a "tree" format.
But back to the ACA - the small heat exchangers in the first design (~ $10 from eBay) are just about a perfect size and efficiencyfor these little gems.
The first one is very compact and probably best suited for the ACA. It is the concept that is behind my interested in the use of a single toroid to power the ACAs. Could lead to a nice cube design for a desktop.
BLAT 1
The second is for larger amps but does require the purchase of some HS material. Heatsinks USA is here in Michigan and the cost was ~ $30. It has been modified to an over/under format and a build thread should be posted by the end of the week. (Congo5 - couldn't do the phone setup cause I had to steal the toroid for this one. I'll get er done)
BLAT 2
The third piece is a vertical side-by-side format with heavier aluminum but at a size between the first two. No pictures yet.
And finally a monster for the house heater amps that uses the heater core from a Ford Mustang and a 150 mm fan
It will be at the base of a "tree" format.But back to the ACA - the small heat exchangers in the first design (~ $10 from eBay) are just about a perfect size and efficiencyfor these little gems.
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I was thinking that if I collect the evaporated water and channel it up to a coil and let that condense and drip back down, I would have a closed system. It would look something like a whiskey distiller but the output goes back into the liquid via a tube under the liquid surface. The evaporated water comes from a larger surface area so vapor pressure forces it up to the condensor surface at the top. This then becomes a heat pipe - some vacuum will have to be applied to make this work as an optimal system. But a homemade heat pipe might be interesting. Passive no pumps, no liquid to spill or refill...
Have you thought about any if the liquid cooled solutions for overclocked PCs?
I'm investigating several liquid cooling approaches but with closed systems that isolate for the "splash" factor.
The first one is very compact and probably best suited for the ACA. It is the concept that is behind my interested in the use of a single toroid to power the ACAs. Could lead to a nice cube design for a desktop.
BLAT 1
The second is for larger amps but does require the purchase of some HS material. Heatsinks USA is here in Michigan and the cost was ~ $30. It has been modified to an over/under format and a build thread should be posted by the end of the week. (Congo5 - couldn't do the phone setup cause I had to steal the toroid for this one. I'll get er done)
BLAT 2
The third piece is a vertical side-by-side format with heavier aluminum but at a size between the first two. No pictures yet.
And finally a monster for the house heater amps that uses the heater core from a Ford Mustang and a 150 mm fan
But back to the ACA - the small heat exchangers in the first design (~ $10 from eBay) are just about a perfect size and efficiencyfor these little gems.
Fastbike1 - Those are essentially the pieces I'm using. A lot of stuff from the now defunct Danger Den and a few new parts from FrozenCPU. Trying to use more DIY and local hardware store items for builder convience and cost.
xrk, you are singing my song. I retired form a power company. You are describing the loop that turns the light on almost to the letter. Even though all the heat created by burning coal, oil or nuclear reaction makes lots of super-heated steam, the large condenser at the exhaust side of the turbine creates a vacuum that actually pulls the steam through the turbine blades - as opposed to the jet turbine principle. (Ninety percent of the pictures/videos showing what is described as pollution from power plants is actually of harmless steam from water/cooling towers in the vacuum creation - external to the heat source loop.)
There are two externals that would probably prevent the concept for use with amps. The first is a heat source to take the steam (vapor) to a high deferential quickly. Even if the heat from the amp was hot enough to evaporate liquid, the system itself will dissipate a percentage of the heat, eventually destroying the heat volume and vacuum differentials. In spite of millions invested in insulation the power companies can't establish the "perpetual motion machine" effect and thus an external heat source is needed. If you turn this on its head for cooling - an external heat subtraction factor needs to be introduced. Passive heat exchangers would help but then we are back to finned heat sink material or an electro-mechanical device. The best semi-passive system I have seen showed up on a Pass thread, but again may not be as practical as a small self-contained PC type system. Once filled and sealed these system only need occasional fluid replacement for purity factors only. I have had one that held its own for over two years.
I think your passive cooling is a possibility but if constructed, would probably be measured in feet not inches.
xrk, you are singing my song. I retired form a power company. You are describing the loop that turns the light on almost to the letter. Even though all the heat created by burning coal, oil or nuclear reaction makes lots of super-heated steam, the large condenser at the exhaust side of the turbine creates a vacuum that actually pulls the steam through the turbine blades - as opposed to the jet turbine principle. (Ninety percent of the pictures/videos showing what is described as pollution from power plants is actually of harmless steam from water/cooling towers in the vacuum creation - external to the heat source loop.)
There are two externals that would probably prevent the concept for use with amps. The first is a heat source to take the steam (vapor) to a high deferential quickly. Even if the heat from the amp was hot enough to evaporate liquid, the system itself will dissipate a percentage of the heat, eventually destroying the heat volume and vacuum differentials. In spite of millions invested in insulation the power companies can't establish the "perpetual motion machine" effect and thus an external heat source is needed. If you turn this on its head for cooling - an external heat subtraction factor needs to be introduced. Passive heat exchangers would help but then we are back to finned heat sink material or an electro-mechanical device. The best semi-passive system I have seen showed up on a Pass thread, but again may not be as practical as a small self-contained PC type system. Once filled and sealed these system only need occasional fluid replacement for purity factors only. I have had one that held its own for over two years.
I think your passive cooling is a possibility but if constructed, would probably be measured in feet not inches.
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Bob,
We are thinking alike because I was once upon a time, trained in themodynamics. What I meant by vacuum was not that the flow needs to create a vacuum but that a heat pipe typically operates not at ambient pressure internally, but a mild sub-atmospheric vacuum to balance the evaporation and the condensation rates of water. It can be made very compact - and you have probably seen the heat pipe technology used with PC CPU coolers. If you go that route, it can be made a lot more compact than plain slab of aluminum and fins. I think you can get them for $20 with a fan. I think they are rated to handle about 130 watts - but has benefit of a fan. It may be able to handle lower power with natural convection only.
For example: Amazon.com: Cooler Master Hyper TX3 - CPU Cooler with 3 Direct Contact Heat Pipes (RR-910-HTX3-G1): Electronics
I am just thinking of making my own large scale heat pipe. I have done it before with copper tubing filled with copper dish scrubber pads (for wicking), distilled water, evacuated to about 15 torr pressure and sealed with solder pinch tube.
Basically, the low pressure allows the water to boil at a lower temp than 100 C - say 50 C or whatever the boiling point you set it at for the pressure. The water vapor boils off goes to the top where it condenses and by capillary action, is wicked back to the bottom where the heat to start over again. Heat pipes have the highest power removal density per cross sectional area of any heat transfer method - better conductivity than a solid gold bar of same cross section.
I think that circulating water and drilled out aluminum heat sink blocks work very well and I have done that before too. Very effective and easy.
Regards,
X
We are thinking alike because I was once upon a time, trained in themodynamics. What I meant by vacuum was not that the flow needs to create a vacuum but that a heat pipe typically operates not at ambient pressure internally, but a mild sub-atmospheric vacuum to balance the evaporation and the condensation rates of water. It can be made very compact - and you have probably seen the heat pipe technology used with PC CPU coolers. If you go that route, it can be made a lot more compact than plain slab of aluminum and fins. I think you can get them for $20 with a fan. I think they are rated to handle about 130 watts - but has benefit of a fan. It may be able to handle lower power with natural convection only.
For example: Amazon.com: Cooler Master Hyper TX3 - CPU Cooler with 3 Direct Contact Heat Pipes (RR-910-HTX3-G1): Electronics
I am just thinking of making my own large scale heat pipe. I have done it before with copper tubing filled with copper dish scrubber pads (for wicking), distilled water, evacuated to about 15 torr pressure and sealed with solder pinch tube.
Basically, the low pressure allows the water to boil at a lower temp than 100 C - say 50 C or whatever the boiling point you set it at for the pressure. The water vapor boils off goes to the top where it condenses and by capillary action, is wicked back to the bottom where the heat to start over again. Heat pipes have the highest power removal density per cross sectional area of any heat transfer method - better conductivity than a solid gold bar of same cross section.
I think that circulating water and drilled out aluminum heat sink blocks work very well and I have done that before too. Very effective and easy.
Regards,
X
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That's above my pay grade. Sounds like a question for Andrew T.
Don't you need to know that to design the heat sinks and water cooling business? I am just guessing based on fact that power supply is typically a 60 W SMPS brick and the amp puts out no more than 5 W. So circa 55 W?
Sorry, No engineering in my approach.
My standards are quite simple - small/compact, no leaks and quiet. The tendency is to overbuild, but I've been informed some discrete devices need a minimum temperature for proper operation. That's new to me as there is no such thing as too much chill in PC applications.
My "lab" is just a laser temp gun and a thermocouple attached to a DMM. The scientific investigation phase is simply twisting the knobs on a pair of rheostats for fan and pump speed
"They told me there wouldn't be any math on this test"
My standards are quite simple - small/compact, no leaks and quiet. The tendency is to overbuild, but I've been informed some discrete devices need a minimum temperature for proper operation. That's new to me as there is no such thing as too much chill in PC applications.
My "lab" is just a laser temp gun and a thermocouple attached to a DMM. The scientific investigation phase is simply twisting the knobs on a pair of rheostats for fan and pump speed
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They told me there wouldn't be any math on this test" Attachments
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I am new here in this forum so this may be a stupid question. Has anyone considered using the heat of vaporization (h_fg in thermodynamics parlance) of water as a heat sink for hot burning class-A amps? Water is able to remove huge amounts of heat as a substance for heat transfer, it is almost without equal. I am not talking about sensible heat capacity like in a liquid flow heat exchanger but something really simple - a pot of water.
Thank God there are more crazy guys like me out there.
Love the idea, just remember to use destilled water. Also why don´t you try to cool down the water a little bit.
RGDS
PEMO
All fun to imagine, but the original comment by XRK971 was about the cost of the kit heat sinks.
If any of the previous mental experiments get implemented, I suspect they will be larger and more expensive than the modest cost of the heat sinks.
End result being a cheap, simple compact monoblock that is no longer cheap, simple and compact.
To each their own I suppose.
If any of the previous mental experiments get implemented, I suspect they will be larger and more expensive than the modest cost of the heat sinks.
End result being a cheap, simple compact monoblock that is no longer cheap, simple and compact.
To each their own I suppose.
That's correct - no disagreement there.
My major interest in the liquid cooling concept is best suited to the high power, high heat builds. As stated earlier, some of the massive heat sink amps have an aesthetic appeal that is attractive and visually impressive. 
Liquid cooling simply introduces a size reduction potential along with a bit of control over operating temps.
Not a world changer - but a fun, and hopefully useful approach to heat management.
I fear X and I have taken the conversation to a place that might not fit in the ACA world. I'll let it be and comment on more appropriate threads.
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