How much water was in those towels

Status
Not open for further replies.
Joined
Dec 12, 2002
Messages
43,887
Location
'Stralia
Those who've known me for a while on here would understand that I LOATHE tumble driers.

We turn coal into heat, into electricity at the power stations at 40% efficiency, push it down the lines, and the tumble the clothes in that electricity turned back into heat...unfortunately there's no coal fired tumble driers (not really it's smelly).

When nature provides the means to the evaporation of water from clothes for free.

Well the new house doesn't have the sun that the old place did (nearly full exposure of the line sun up to sun down at the old place), so I spent a few hundred $ to get a long line, and orient it the the best I can, but there's still only just enough sun to get most of the clothes dry (the bamboo socks never make it in one run).

So the freeby, inefficient clothes drier has been getting more of a run than I would like (I accept that zero isn't an option)...much more.

And it's dumb, you put the clothes in and set a timer...and it's easier to overset the timer to be sure they are dry than it is to go out and test them every now and then.

So resigned to that fact, Son and I went hunting for efficiency yesterday.

Heat Pump (to get that thermal efficiency back), and condensing to get/use the heat of condensation of the water that's been evaporated out of the clothes.

Miserable day yesterday, so did a full load of towels to replenish stocks, and this is how much water came out

 
2 litres, and it was cold as it entered the container.

2Kg at 2,264KJ/KG (latent heat) - 4,528Kj
2Kg at (lets say 70C Delta T) at 2KJ/KgK - 280Kj

So I got 4800Kj back from the condensing and cooling water, at 3,600Kj/KWh, that's 1.3KWh I got back in that part (condensing section) of the unit, plus whatever the heat pump coefficient of performance is (better than 1).

Plus it's "smart" so it won't keep running regardless of the doneness of the clothes.
And it's programmable, so when we get solar (after we sell the old place) I can set it to start at mid-day anyway (yes I know that's not my poor weather statement, but If I can power it free, why not).

Sorry for this last bit, that's just the efficiency engineer coming out.
 
This reminds me of a Panasonic dryer I saw recently when I was in Asia. Instead of using heat it used air plus a air conditioner type setup that removed the moisture from the clothes. It was supposed to be very efficient but I wondered why nobody else was doing this.

Coupled with a inverter compressor it might be very economical. I will never know.
 
Originally Posted By: PimTac
This reminds me of a Panasonic dryer I saw recently when I was in Asia. Instead of using heat it used air plus a air conditioner type setup that removed the moisture from the clothes. It was supposed to be very efficient but I wondered why nobody else was doing this.

Coupled with a inverter compressor it might be very economical. I will never know.


Hope that the link works
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Kue...othes-Dryer.pdf
 
Natural gas dryer with a humidity sensor solves a lot of those issues
smile.gif
 
There's only two gas drier suppliers in Oz, so I didn't look for them.

Plus requiring venting to the outside, and a connection plumbed into the double brick house.

(the simple one was outside to avoid the humidity in the house. The Condensing one doesn't add humidity)

Plus gas is as expensive per KJ as unleaded petrol these days. (yes electricity is twice that but with the COP of the heat pump, and the condensing function, the running costs are lower).
 
You could hang the towels to dry on a clothes line outside.Or if there was a way to create a vacuum and boil the water out of the clothes.
 
Originally Posted By: CT8
You could hang the towels to dry on a clothes line outside.


Did you read my post ?

That's what we always do...but sometimes we need to use the drier, and at this place a lot more than the old place.
 
So you are saying these dryers are not efficient as they are advertised or are you trying to be super frugal with your expensive electricity?

Another option would be to have a drying room or area with the clothes hanging and a large fan or fans to accelerate the process. I’ve seen this also in SE Asia on the tops of condo or apartment buildings. Each tenant had a chain link section and there were fans to help dry the clothes. Of course the sun had a part in this but the humidity was tops.
 
Originally Posted By: Shannow
So resigned to that fact, Son and I went hunting for efficiency yesterday.

Heat Pump (to get that thermal efficiency back), and condensing to get/use the heat of condensation of the water that's been evaporated out of the clothes.

Miserable day yesterday, so did a full load of towels to replenish stocks, and this is how much water came out




Doesn't your washer have a good spin cycle? Or did you wash about 50 big towels.

When my washer gets done spin drying the towels are just damp, couldn't squeeze anymore out, except with maybe an old fashion press roller.
 
8Kg washer
8Kg drier

Definitely can't squeeze any more water out after the spin is done.

It was full...three days of drizzling rain.

The drier will of course be harvesting humidity from the ambient air as well.
 
Originally Posted By: Shannow
Originally Posted By: CT8
You could hang the towels to dry on a clothes line outside.


Did you read my post ?

That's what we always do...but sometimes we need to use the drier, and at this place a lot more than the old place.
Yes I did and you still could hang them out instead of rant. My grandma would hang her laundry on a clothesline in San Francisco California.
 
A miserable day means rain? A miserable day means doing the laundry is the
U.S.
 
Interesting dryer Steve, didn't even know that existed. When we sold our old house the stacked front load washer/dryer stayed to my wife's delight. She fought the common mildew problem with that washer almost the entire time we owned it. Bought the most basic Samsung set, not an LED display anywhere, and she's a happy camper. Even at the cheap end it has moisture sensing and timed drying. Of course here the clothes you hung on the line first are dry by the time you get them up on the other end.

Does that have a normal vent or just a line draining the water?
 
Originally Posted By: Shannow
The drier will of course be harvesting humidity from the ambient air as well.


Would have been intetesting to weigh the wet towels before and after drying, then weigh the captured water to see how they compared.
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Natural gas dryer with a humidity sensor solves a lot of those issues
smile.gif



^ this

They work much faster to boot, and if you don't have natural gas you can get a propane model.

But since you like solar drying, I have a proposal for you.

Why don't you try tumble drying in the sun, using a transparent drum? You would only need a few square feet of sun-exposed area. I don't even think the drum speed would need to be very fast; you could probably solar power the rotator with plenty of gear reduction to compensate for a small motor.

Heat should be more than adequate but if not, solar collectors (mirrors; foils) could be (carefully) used. Just don't light the clothes on fire, which would be a distinct possibility if configured in a certain way.

#4783490 - 06/10/18 11:41 PM Johnny2Bad
 
Originally Posted By: CT8
Originally Posted By: Shannow
Originally Posted By: CT8
You could hang the towels to dry on a clothes line outside.


Did you read my post ?

That's what we always do...but sometimes we need to use the drier, and at this place a lot more than the old place.
Yes I did and you still could hang them out instead of rant. My grandma would hang her laundry on a clothesline in San Francisco California.


Line is chockers full today just like normal...three days of miserable weather meant that nothing was going to dry, no matter how long it was left on the line.

Given that the days are short and the sun low, the cuffs of clothes, and the hems of sheets etc. aren't dry, so they are in the machine for a finish off, as opposed to leaving them out for the frost to dampen again.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top