I have 4 sous vide above heaters that are still slacking on their ability to maintain a consistent temperature and not drop an excess of 30-50 degrees in temp.
Trying to come up with ideas and solutions to solve my issue.
On the mindset that I am going to need to upgrade to a heavy duty heating recirculating bath from polysci but I would like to not have to spend 5k on a device to heat my damn water, let alone keep it hot… but damn… I already have 5 anovas… 4 in use…
I’m questioning whether or not a bigger vat to heat water in would play into what I’m talking about…
Currently, I have a 10gal sports cooler that o have 4 anovas hooked up to.
If I increase the surface area/ volume of liquid being heated up initially would that suffice for the amount of surface area I have needed to be heated up?
I have 3 - 6x36 jacketed spools along with a 12” jacketed pour spout that has water flowing through.
I have yet to see how many GPM the water pump I have can handle but I would say about 8-10gal minute. 5gal at the very least.
Again. If I can change a few variables to further increase my hearing capabilities with my current arsenal of sous vide heaters I would chose that route… but if I need to get a set in stone heating recirculating bath then so be it. I just need more heat!!!
Chime in if you have any ideas or can help me!
Much appreciation in advance.
Insulated container.
1500w bucket heater or two.
Inkbird PID controller.
Grundfos hot water pump.
SS bulkhead fitting.
Plumb the grundfos so its connected to the bottom of ur insulated container.
Return the flow back to the insulated container so that it flows in a circular motion. (Hitting the side of the container at a 45 degree angle, is one way)
Put a lid on the pot, you wanna watch water boil? Nope- seal your systems up and then once you’ve exhausted the cheap options move to a recirculating heat exchanger like a tankless on demand water heater pumped from outside your flammable area through insulated lines-
Moving to heat transfer fluid is also HUGE
Water takes a tremendous amount of energy to heat and to cool, it hates to take on energy and it hates to lose it- notice how fast oil comes up to temp but also how fast it loses it? Very efficient transfer
A pot of recently boiled water will take forever to get there and it’ll sit and stay hot for a really long time.
Switch to HTF, I have a good price on pails if you want some duratherm or dynalene or nutherm- just be sure to pay attention if you do use HTF to not let water contact it and to keep it as sealed up as poss because it does slowly degrade and open baths WILL eventually cause eye nose and throat irritation
Bucket tek FTW if in a bind grab 50gal ptfe bucket or something that can hold enough water to suffice gpm needed to create an even heat exchanger. Use pond heater 2-3 Of them & a temp probe hooked to a meter that’s wired by switch, set temp it will regulate the heaters. Use water transfer pumps to act as forward & return pump. Bingo. You can hit up to 100c easy.
I just put in my tankless water heater… But I’ve also used 2-500ft coils of irrigation line laying out it the sun with a pump circulating it. Off course, I do live in the desert😂
In the summer, they poly lines actually get to hot
Edit:
I have limited power and have to conserve in order to run my chiller
Here’s a few pictures of my big water bath. we use it to remelt 5kg metal containers.
It’s a $100 farm feed tank with 1.5” foam insulation on the bottom, sides and top, when set to 70c it will only drop to 50c overnight when turned off.
It uses a 220v 4500w heating coil, and i also wired a timer on it so I can have it start heating up in the middle of the night and be ready to use in the morning.
It is just used to recirculate the water and mix it to ensure the whole bath is an equal temp, that is why the intake for the pump is right next to the heating coil. If I want i could pump this through a heat exchanger or use it as a giant recirculating bath as well but as of now we just use it to melt up to 100kg of oil at a time.
Ah I didn’t see the second port where the line goes back into the bath, just thought it was resting there. Looks like you got it figured out. We use an 89L ThermoFisher recirculating bath but it can only fit 2 of our 20L containers…
Anybody using a propane home heater Outside of working space
That’s what I use
Plumb the whole system if open jacket or buket let the pump push
If closed system let it suck
I use the modulating type with temp control
It s the highest Kw heat for the cheapest $
Unit will cost new 300$ and gives 22kw of heat on demand shut the pump and system stops
Turn it on and it activates
Really easy
Just wanted to ask for a list of items I can find on my own time, as well as how you went about installing the immersion heater with a triclamp? As well as how fast/long it takes to heat up to temp in a vessel of such size.
You say you’re only using it to heat up and melt product but my concern for using this method as a recirculating bath for jackets is how well can the heater keep up with the returning fluid?.. Maybe for safe sake I could install 2 heaters. One on either end of input and output with the circular motion of h2o
We used a propane heater before it began to die and then we pulled the trigger on sous vide heaters… wanted to consolidate equipment to not have to walk outside to manage heaters… but now I’m left to figure this out again…
