Have a look at this High School Peltier Cooling system, the bars make it look real high tech. Have a look here for more information about peltier devices.
“This little project is what really got me excited in engineering way back in High School. Two other students and I decided to build a computer cooling system that fit in 2 cd-rom slots and cooled he air entering the case. In the arrangement above the junctions are pulling heat from the center bars to the outer ones. The middle gets frosty and the outside will burn you. From there we had to design ducting to get the cold air in and the hot air out.”
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what a huge waste of energy – i already thought directly cooling stuff with peltiers was a waste due to their low efficiency, but this idea brings that to a whole new level …
… let me guess, you’re probably american …
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This really isn’t all that wasteful in that it doesn’t have to be run expect when teh user wants to. In cases where the peltier is between the CPU and a heatsink it always has to run at nearly full power trippling the power wasted by the CPU.
Also, at a large scale peltiers, while inefficent, don’t use that much energy. Take the spare tire out of any car and you will save far more energy overall.
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True, three years later, it wasnt the best idea I ever had…but this project went to completion and did what it was designed to do. Sure there’s alot of things I would do differently now, but at the time, with the 3 month design period we were given, I was very happy with the results. And as hello moto said it was designed so that it could be used only when you believe you require the extra cooling.
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yeah maybe i was a bit harsh, but think about this idea:
an optionally peltier supported water cooling with a passive radiator – as long as water doesnt get too hot keep the peltier off and if it rises too much then heat the water going into the radiator even more whilst cooling the cooler water coming from it down even further.
Like that you can increase the efficiency of the radiator when needed with the peltier.
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Very cool idea I like that. I’ve got everything lying around except for the separate water block to attach the cooling peltier to. Maybe I’ll give it a shot. When we were first brainstorming what type of cooling system we should design, a water cooling rig was our first idea. The idea was eventually shot down due to its lack of originality and the need to design a product that could be very easily implemented by just about anyone. While the idea of cracking the heatsinks off our PC’s might seem like a regular occurrence, to the other 90% of the world this can seem quite daunting. Thanks for the idea, I know what I’ll be working on in the machine shop tomorrow!
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I’d say this is a great project, especially for a high school student. When I was in high school, several years ago, this technology was pretty much unheard of. Kudos to you and your team!
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This is suxx! Cover ur mainbard with epoxy then put it into aquarium. And its done!
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Arni, peltier coolers are highly insulative when not powered. You can’t have an inactive peltier cooler sandwiched between your CPU and your heatsink/waterblock, unless you’re looking to cook your core.
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Set it up so you can use a small solar panel to power the cooler.
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or a small nuclear reactor, mr Fisson anyone?
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Nikita,
The idea is doable, if one hooked up a second waterblock to the existing system and attached a peltier with a fat air cooler to the second water block. (preferably housed outside the case) The water cooling system can then be ran conventionally or in high load situations the peltier could be turned on to pre-cool the liquid in the stage before it reaches the cpu/vga.
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There is no water cooler. The system was designed to cool the air entering the case. Not to directly cool any of the components. In retrospect the system does has many flaws. Lol it is good to see someone actually taking interest in this thing so many years after I made it.
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hmm … the criticisms surrounding the inefficiency of this device beg reference to low thermal conductivity and specific heat of air? this is why one cools cpu with direct contact to heat sink. for my system i run thick cable of isopentane cooled with N2, and top it with thick copper interface plus thermal grease.