I've been kicking around an idea for cooling off my dogs for a while. With this big heat wave recently I need to try it out. Might call it a doggie cold plate. While I would love to let my 5 inside, my wife would have a fit and my only male would probably get dehydrated from going around marking everyting as his.
I cool their water bowl with a swamp cooler device I made several years ago. The device is a 30 gallon galvanized tub which is also their water source. It is cooled by pumping the water with an aquarium powerhead to a spray bar (some 1/2" vinyl tube with holes drilled in it) that's sandwiched between a couple blue cut-to-fit ac filters. A 20" box fan forces air through it. The whole assembly sits over half of the reservoir. I can get a 12-27 degree temp drop on the water depending on the humidity and ambient temp. I tried reversing the fan and ducting the airflow into their doghouse, but I was only getting a 5 degree drop at best.
I'm thinking of trying out some sort of cool pad for them by pumping the cool water through some sort of pored slab, kind of a reverse radiant heat floor. If it works, and they take to it, I might do it in their doghouse. I don't want to spend much, especially on the experiment.
I'll probably pour a small section on the porch in front of their doghouse as a test. This area will get no direct sunlight, and it is 4' away from the edge of the porch slab. I was going to pour an inch and a half of concrete over a tubing network and pump the chilled water through it.
I need some ideas on what to use for the tubing, and if I should thermally decouple the plate from the porch slab. Copper tube would be nice, but it's not going to happen. I haven't looked through the plumbing sections to see what all might be available.
Hmm, I just had this thought. I might try using an old radiator core I have. It won't stand the pressure on a car anymore, but It certainly could work at the low pressure for this experiment.
I cool their water bowl with a swamp cooler device I made several years ago. The device is a 30 gallon galvanized tub which is also their water source. It is cooled by pumping the water with an aquarium powerhead to a spray bar (some 1/2" vinyl tube with holes drilled in it) that's sandwiched between a couple blue cut-to-fit ac filters. A 20" box fan forces air through it. The whole assembly sits over half of the reservoir. I can get a 12-27 degree temp drop on the water depending on the humidity and ambient temp. I tried reversing the fan and ducting the airflow into their doghouse, but I was only getting a 5 degree drop at best.
I'm thinking of trying out some sort of cool pad for them by pumping the cool water through some sort of pored slab, kind of a reverse radiant heat floor. If it works, and they take to it, I might do it in their doghouse. I don't want to spend much, especially on the experiment.
I'll probably pour a small section on the porch in front of their doghouse as a test. This area will get no direct sunlight, and it is 4' away from the edge of the porch slab. I was going to pour an inch and a half of concrete over a tubing network and pump the chilled water through it.
I need some ideas on what to use for the tubing, and if I should thermally decouple the plate from the porch slab. Copper tube would be nice, but it's not going to happen. I haven't looked through the plumbing sections to see what all might be available.
Hmm, I just had this thought. I might try using an old radiator core I have. It won't stand the pressure on a car anymore, but It certainly could work at the low pressure for this experiment.
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