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In this video, I want to give you an overview of the whole solar heating system
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So this is the evacuated tube collector array that I spoke to you about before
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These are the individual vacuum tubes that collect the solar heat, and they impart it to fluid that flows through them
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It can be water or an anti-freeze and water solution. This line here is the cool water returning to the tube collectors
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and this is the heated line coming out. So this is the heat engine right here
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The rest is how it's delivered to your space. The main thing to understand about these pipes is that they need to be insulated
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and in a very particular way. The insulation needs to be effective, but it also needs to be impervious to getting soaked with water
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I'm going to be explaining a little bit more about that. later giving you a close-up view of the best kind of insulated pipe for this kind of
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application. Most of this is shown open right now but insulated pipe that's
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completely shrouded is key to a system that works properly. So here we have the
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heated water going through this line and a circulator pump that keeps all of the fluid moving Now the fluid continues on here to this flat plate heat exchanger There are different ways to make a solar heating system but this is the one that I find works best
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And by the way, this drawing is something that you should be printing out and looking at from the course material
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There's a full page version of this particular plan. The purpose of the flat plate exchanger is to keep the flow of water from the
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tube collector side of things separate from the water that is in your home, both for domestic use and also for space heating
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Now, the thing to remember is that there's a division between the water that flows through one side of this flat plate collector and the water that flows through the other
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Now, in this particular design, the system is configured to create domestic hot water
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It could also be configured for space heating in a radiator or in-floor heating system
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But what happens is while the sun is shining and the circulator pump is working
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we have a constant flow of heated water through this side of the extraceous
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and whenever hot water is demanded for domestic use from here cold water enters the system and eventually into the tank from the cold water supply
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But in normal operation, this valve here is closed. So the cold water flows here and it flows through this side of the heat exchanger
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And as it does, it picks up heat from the other side of the exchanger
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The two water flows never mix, but heat is exchanged across the heat exchanger
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That's its purpose. So this essentially is functioning as an on-demand water heater in a sense because the water
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goes in here. It could be quite cold, maybe 50, 55 degrees Fahrenheit
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By the time it passes through this heat exchanger, which is not very big, you know, three by
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eight inches is a typical size, it could be 140 or 40 or something
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or 150 degrees when it flows into the tank. And that hot water stays hot in the tank
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and it's available to be used for domestic purposes. So that's how the system works in a nutshell
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and there are also some controls involved too to make it even more useful
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One thing to keep in mind is because this is a water heater
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could be propane fired or electric if the solar collector is not collecting enough heat to keep up with the demands of the hot water being used then the hot water will simply function just as it normally does
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So the heating element will come on and keep that water at a hot temperature in the tank
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So this collector does the job, but if it runs out of steam, then the water heater will take over
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Now there's some other controls here too. I go into them in much more detail than the course, but this item here, this is a solar controller
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And this is kind of the brains of the system. It controls the flow of the circular pump, depending on the temperature of the water involved
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and the temperature of the evacuated tube system. And down here, we have some temperature sensor wires that goes
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go to sensors in different parts of the system. There's a wire for energizing the pump. I'm going to be
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talking more about pumps and how to choose them later. And there's also a water tank temperature
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sensor, which is part of the whole solar controller and display assembly. So more detail coming up
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But that's an overview of the system. The collector, the pumps, heat exchanger, hot water tank
