I Have Invented A New Filter!

[dazza2123]

Could prove very expensive. However this is a good idea based on water evaporation & keeping water crystal clear. If you have lots of money try it lol.

 

[dazza2123]

Could prove very expensive. However this is a good idea based on water evaporation & keeping water crystal clear. If you have lots of money try it lol.

 

[snoopyfrench87]

I think its a nice idea, however it would proove rather costly.

and how would you go about keeping a constant temperature within your tank?

if you have a tropical tank, but you are chilling the water to make it turn in to rain, you will be cooling down the tank water?

I am very impressed that a 13 year old has thought this up and calculated everything... keep up the good work mate - you will be designing our aquariums of the future! x

 

[LauraFrog]

I like the idea in theory, but I'm thinking along the lines of instead of evaporating out the water, evaporate out and discard the impurities. It won't get rid of all your impurities - but nor will it totally distill your water.

Anybody know the evaporation point of NH3, NO2, NO3, CO2 and some other fish tank contaminants? Obviously if you have plants you don't want to evaporate out CO2, but still...

Good idea - love it!

 

[Bignose]

You're going to have to change the "dirty water" once in a while, too. It's going to get harder and harder to evaporate water out of the higher and higher concentrated "dirty" stuff.

Commercial water distilleries (like in Australia and other coastal areas low in fresh water) tend to use solar energy as a primary source and then usually some burning of fuel (like natural gas) to heat the water. If you can sit it over an old-fashioned light bulb and use the waste heat while the using the bulb for light at the same time. But, the energy costs to evaporate water is very high -- water is a good insulator that's why when the power goes out you don't have to worry about the tank for quite some time. And then chilling it? Lots of wasted energy. Now... if you could find a way to reuse the same heat energy like with a tube of oil that would take in the heat from the chiller and use it to help warm the water before the water gets to the evaporator, then you might see some savings (this how large chemical plants do it... they reuse the heat as much as possible). But, the energy costs are still going to be high. For most of us, water is cheap and clean, so I don't see it being a huge benefit.

Not a bad idea at all, and the theory behind the idea can work, but extra issues like the energy cost probably doesn't make it a very practical idea to put into real use.

 

[phillih2]

The "chiller", I guess, would be what we could call a condenser. You can actually get one of these easy, if you have a leftover fridge, you are set tank it out of there and you're set. But like mentioned above, you are depositing "Pure" water into the tank which not only allows for Ph swing dancing, but I believe the fish actually need a lot of the, for lack of a better word, 'crap' in the water. Not only that, but I believe you would be getting rid of a lot of the bacteria that would keep the tank happy. But then again, this wouldn't evaporate the water quickly, so by the time the new water came into the system the bacteria may have had enough long drunken nights to populate the new water. As far as the Evaporator goes, you could have a pressurized "pot" and a heating element in it or under it that would boil the water away and the cycle continues. A few problems is the "Pot" for the Evaporator would have to be close to seamless, because you wouldn't want it to have one because this would encourage wear to the "pot'. You would also have to A. Clean it fairly often or, B replace it. I figure for the size you are talking about you would have to clean the "pot" at least once a weak. Or replace it around once every two months. You could also go out and buy a device meant for this purpose.

 

[OldMan47]

The idea of using a still to purify water is not exactly new. Applying it to a tank is new as far as I know. With a Hfg of 970 BTU/lbm and a mass of about 8.3lb/gallon you are looking at about 8000 BTU per gallon for the evaporation. That is the bare minimum needed in an ideal system with no heat losses just to boil the water. Next step is cooling but you might be able to cool the condensate by running the steam through the tank on the way back to the tank, just run the tubing through the tank or even put the end of the tube under the water and let the steam bubbles condense as they rise through the tank. That would at least remove some of the need for a tank heater and save that much energy. If you piped it up right, you could even use the overflow water to help cool the steam and preheat the water on the way to the evaporator in some kind of heat exchanger. Might be able to save a hundred BTU per gallon by doing that but I would expect it to be less. As someone pointed out, the only way you are likely to be able to afford the heat energy is to use a solar collector, otherwise the operating costs would be very high. Like Bigmose said, not very practical but it would work.