Passive solar testing results

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This post will go into the Power and electricity sub-series of the off-the-grid main series of posts.  These posts can be accessed from a table of contents and watched individually or in series from beginning to end.

It has been a long time since I have updated this series of posts.  Since the last update, I have acquired all the hardware needed to run tests of the system.  Yesterday was such a test.  As usual, it was a mixed bag of success and failure.

For the success part, the water heated up nicely, but not real hot.  Wish I had a thermometer in order to get precise readings.  It was fairly warm, but not hot.  Probably over 100 degrees.   I don't think there were any leaks in this part of the experiment.

But when I wanted to see how much warmth I could get by diverting the water flow through the heater core, it did begin to leak, and no water got into the core at all.

So now I have a problem to solve.  I had to clean up the mess that the leak made, as it dumped maybe a gallon of water in the storage department under my bed.

Upgrades can be made in order to improve performance.  But these may have to wait.  Time may not permit a continuation  of the experiment. 

Update:

Did not fix the leak, but found a way to capture the water so that it doesn't make a mess.  In fact, it didn't, as I ran another test today.  It is now running, with water flowing into the repaired core.  Again, I wish I had a thermometer to measure the temperature of the water.  Instead, I will note how long I won't need to run the furnace or a heater for warmth.  After all, that's what it is for.

Update:

Looks like upgrades will be needed.  It just doesn't put out enough heat.  Last night was not that cold.  By the time to get up, temperatures were down below 60 degrees.  Gotta do better than this.