I'm losing my mind - Temp issue in tower humidor

[interscape]

I think you should pursue larger Peltiers. If you go to evilbay and search for 545 Watt Thermoelectric you will find some pretty cheap. I could not find specs on the Coleman unit but I bet they are pretty meager as they are intended to operate in ideal conditions (in a cooler for cripes sake!) I built a test box/humi from a triple thick cardboard box with 2 x 1.5" square peltiers and was able to cool the box down 16 degrees room temp. I used a 450 watt computer power supply for the 12 volts.

OK so what do I do for the heat syncs (spelling)? Can I use the same ones from the Coleman units if I take them apart or do I need to buy them somewhere else. I already have good fans I can use and I am now a pro at the soldering gun.

Thanks!

What size are the ones for the Coleman? You will want to cover the TED as much as possible if not overlap, especially on the hot side. Plus buy some good thermoelectric paste like Arctic silver. I will not say it was a night and day difference but the copper heat sinks just seemed to perform better. The suck part of this whole thing is how much heat you dump back into your room. Plus once you get a TE that yields high performance you are guaranteed to get condensation which will disperse down the back of your humi making a mess of your wood. You might want to rethink your design and put the array in one place so as to simplify collection of the condensation. I hate to lead you on a wild goose chase because I have no proof that this will solve your problem but am quite sure it will give you better results that what you have found so far.

Les

 

[danarf1]

Les,

Thanks man. They are like 4inches by 4 inches. I don’t care about the heat they dump into the room. Down here in the Miami area its 78 in the winter all the time and extra heat from the humidor wont be noticed. My office is open to the master foyer and we have 5 ceiling fans in this area alone.

As far as condensation goes I have little plastic trays that catch all that and i just need to empty them every 3 or 4 days. No issue.

So I redid it a little today. I insulated the top part and installed a better TE from a TE fridge. I have that one and two from the Coleman coolers in it now.

Next steps will be installing better TED's and if that wont help then I am either going to buy a pro made one or tell my wife our house is losing a bedroom and build a walk in (dont need a smoking room because I can smoke outside year round)

But she was cool when we built the bar and I turned the game room into a nightclub with DJ lights and sound system (great for parties) I don’t think shell be cool with a walk in

I can try right? LOL.

 

[danarf1]

Here you go man, use this on your tower humi, it'll solve it all:

Good lord, it's gettin' worse before it's getting better!!! :angry: Well, I'm invested into this now, I want to see what happens....!!!

Nice HK. I have a nice collection of "hardware" as well. If I lose it and blow this thing away its gonna be with my Remington 12 gage or my Bushmaster AR-15

But I have like 50 hrs into this thing and my wife has about 20 helping. So she would not be cool with discharging rounds in the house.

 

[danarf1]

I guess I could buy this and line it with wood. It gives the wood look I want but will easily keep cool

http://www.vinotemp.com/bottle-portofino-l...wer-p-1019.html

And its cheap for a cooled unit only like 16-1700 bucks shipped. May be my next move.

 

[DePasta]

You could buy and run a window unit AC for a while for $1600.

 

[danarf1]

\Ok so here is the latest for anyone who cares...LOL

Right now I have the following installed. I have two TE devices that I pulled out of the Coleman Powerchill coolers and one TE device I took out of a TE fridge. This one is by far the coldest and most powerful of the three.

The house temp today is 77 and the humidor (been running for the last day and a half) is holding at 71-72.

It’s not ideal but its better then having my sticks at 78-80 all the time. Ron gave me a website that sells industrial TE devices and told me that he swapped the two he was using from the internet for one of these and it does the job no problem.

So for a couple hundred more I will buy one of them and keep the TE that I used from the fridge and also keep one of the units from the Coleman in there (I have to because there is a hole for it.

That way with a super industrial TED, a middle line one from the fridge and the low end Coleman the humidor should stay at 69 degrees. I hope.

I also used the insulation on the back and on top where the wood was thinnest and that has helped big time. Thanks to all for the advice and help. This has been a challenge to say the least.

 

[souldog]

UPDATE!!!! What's going on with your tower humi?

\Ok so here is the latest for anyone who cares...LOL

Right now I have the following installed. I have two TE devices that I pulled out of the Coleman Powerchill coolers and one TE device I took out of a TE fridge. This one is by far the coldest and most powerful of the three.

The house temp today is 77 and the humidor (been running for the last day and a half) is holding at 71-72.

It’s not ideal but its better then having my sticks at 78-80 all the time. Ron gave me a website that sells industrial TE devices and told me that he swapped the two he was using from the internet for one of these and it does the job no problem.

So for a couple hundred more I will buy one of them and keep the TE that I used from the fridge and also keep one of the units from the Coleman in there (I have to because there is a hole for it.

That way with a super industrial TED, a middle line one from the fridge and the low end Coleman the humidor should stay at 69 degrees. I hope.

I also used the insulation on the back and on top where the wood was thinnest and that has helped big time. Thanks to all for the advice and help. This has been a challenge to say the least.