Chris Bryant wrote:
>
> Back in the '70's, a company made a rooftop gasoline powered A/C for
> conversion vans. Pretty neat idea- back then it was just a matter of
> hooking a lawn mower type engine to a car A/C compressor, with a small
> alternator for the fans.
> I imagine with newer technology, the motors could be made much smaller-
> someone mentioned the residential natural gas heatpump- there is one just
> south of here, near Orlando. It also harnesses (I think) the waste heat from
> the engine to heat water.
>
> As far as an absorption type A/C- I think you would have to scale it up so
> large, that it would not be practical- otherwise, you could just leave the
> refrigerator door open ;-)
I saw one web page referencing an absorption type unit with an output of
1700 KW cooling, 1400 KW heating. That's 4,750,000 BTU heating and
5,800,000 BTU cooling. That's a bit BIG for an Airstream. So absorption
works when scaled up.
One should harness the waste heat from the engine and compressor for
something else the energy efficiency is fairly poor.
There are 12volt compressors on the market, used in SunFrost
refrigerators for solar power homes. I thought they were stock items at
WW Grainger. We probably use propane absorption refrigerators in campers
because the energy density of propane is far greater than in storage
batteries.
Gerald J.
> ________
>
> Chris Bryant
> Bryant RV Services
> DeLand, Florida
> mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
