What can be cooked from squid: quick and tasty

The problem of using solar energy has occupied the best minds of mankind since ancient times. It was clear that the Sun is the most powerful source of free energy, but no one understood how to use this energy. According to the ancient writers Plutarch and Polybius, the first person to practically use solar energy was Archimedes, who, with the help of some optical devices invented by him, managed to collect the sun's rays into a powerful beam and burn the Roman fleet.

In fact, the device, invented by the great Greek, was the first concentrator of solar radiation, which collected the sun's rays into one energy beam. And in the focus of this concentrator, the temperature could reach 300 ° C - 400 ° C, which is quite enough to ignite the wooden ships of the Roman fleet. One can only guess what kind of device Archimedes invented, although, according to modern concepts, he had only two options.

The very name of the device - solar concentrator - speaks for itself. This device receives the sun's rays and collects them into a single energy beam. The simplest hub is familiar to everyone from childhood. This is an ordinary biconvex lens, with which it was possible to burn out various figures, inscriptions, even whole pictures, when the sun's rays were collected by such a lens into a small point on a wooden board, a sheet of paper.

This lens belongs to the so-called refractory concentrators. In addition to convex lenses, this class of concentrators also includes Fresnel lenses and prisms. Long-focus concentrators built on the basis of linear Fresnel lenses, despite their low cost, are practically used very little, since they have large dimensions. Their use is justified where the dimensions of the concentrator are not critical.

Refractory Solar Concentrator

A prism concentrator of solar radiation is devoid of this drawback. Moreover, such a device is also capable of concentrating part of the diffuse radiation, which significantly increases the power of the light beam. The triangular prism, on the basis of which such a concentrator is built, is both a radiation receiver and a source of an energy beam. In this case, the front face of the prism receives radiation, the rear face reflects, and radiation is already coming out of the side face. The operation of such a device is based on the principle of total internal reflection of rays before they hit the side face of the prism.

Unlike refractory, reflex concentrators work on the principle of collecting reflected sunlight into an energy beam. By their design, they are divided into flat, parabolic and parabolic cylindrical concentrators. If we talk about the effectiveness of each of these types, then highest degree concentrations - up to 10,000 - give parabolic concentrators. But for the construction of solar heat supply systems, mainly flat or parabolic-cylindrical systems are used.

Parabolic (reflex) solar concentrators

Practical application of solar concentrators

Actually, the main task of any solar concentrator is to collect the sun's radiation into a single energy beam. And you can use this energy in different ways. It is possible to heat water with free energy, and the amount of heated water will be determined by the size and design of the concentrator. Small parabolic devices can be used as a solar cooking oven.

Parabolic concentrator as a solar oven

You can use them for additional lighting. solar panels to increase the output power. And it can be used as an external heat source for Stirling engines. The parabolic concentrator provides a focus temperature of the order of 300 ° C - 400 ° C. If, for example, a stand for a teapot or a frying pan is placed in the focus of such a relatively small mirror, then you will get a solar oven, on which you can very quickly cook food, boil water. A focused heater with a coolant will allow you to quickly heat up even running water, which can then be used for household purposes, for example, for a shower, washing dishes.

The simplest schemes for heating water with a solar concentrator

If a Stirling engine of a suitable power is placed in the focus of a parabolic mirror, then a small thermal power plant can be obtained. For example, Qnergy has developed and commercialized the QB-3500 Stirling engines, which are designed to work with solar concentrators. In fact, it would be more correct to call them generators of electric current based on Stirling engines. This unit produces electricity with a capacity of 3500 watts. The output of the inverter is a standard voltage of 220 volts 50 hertz. This is quite enough to provide a house for a family of 4, a summer cottage with electricity.

By the way, using the principle of operation of Stirling engines, many craftsmen make devices with their own hands that use rotational or reciprocating motion. For example, water pumps for summer cottages.

The main disadvantage of a parabolic concentrator is that it must be constantly oriented towards the sun. In industrial helium plants, special tracking systems are used that rotate mirrors or refractors to follow the movement of the sun, thereby ensuring the reception and concentration of the maximum amount of solar energy. For individual use, it will hardly be advisable to use such tracking devices, since their cost can significantly exceed the cost of a simple reflector on an ordinary tripod.

How to make your own solar concentrator

The easiest way to make a homemade solar concentrator is to use an old satellite dish. First, you need to decide for what purposes this concentrator will be used, and then, based on this, choose an installation site and prepare the base and fasteners accordingly. Thoroughly wash the antenna, dry it, stick a mirror film on the receiving side of the plate.

In order for the film to lie flat, without wrinkles and folds, it should be cut into strips no more than 3 - 5 centimeters wide. If the concentrator is supposed to be used as a solar oven, it is recommended to cut a hole with a diameter of about 5 - 7 centimeters in the center of the plate. A bracket with a cookware support (burner) will be passed through this hole. This will keep the food container immobile when the reflector is turned in the sun.

If the plate is small in diameter, it is also recommended to cut the strips into pieces about 10 cm long. Glue each piece separately, carefully adjusting the joints. When the reflector is ready, it should be mounted on a support. After that, it will be necessary to determine the focal point, since the optical focal point at the satellite dish does not always coincide with the position of the receiving head.

Homemade solar concentrator - oven

To determine the focal point, you need to arm yourself with dark glasses, a wooden board and thick gloves. Then you need to direct the mirror directly to the sun, catch a sunbeam on the board and, bringing the board closer or away relative to the mirror, find the point where this bunny will have its minimum size - a small point. Gloves are needed in order to protect your hands from burns if they accidentally fall into the range of the beam. Well, when the focal point is found, it only remains to fix it and mount the necessary equipment.

Options self-made solar concentrator there are many. In the same way, you can make a Stirling engine from the materials at hand. And this engine can be used for a variety of purposes. How long will there be enough imagination, desire and patience.

For a very long time I wanted to make a solar parabolic concentrator. After reading a lot of literature on making a mold for a parabolic mirror, I settled on the simplest option - a satellite dish. The satellite dish has a parabolic shape that collects reflected rays at one point.

I looked after the Kharkov plates "Variant" as a basis. At a price that was acceptable to me, I could only get a 90-centimeter product. But the purpose of my experience is heat in focus. To achieve good results, you need a mirror area - the more the better. Therefore, the plate should be 1.5m, and preferably 2m. In the assortment of the Kharkov manufacturer there are these sizes, but they are made of aluminum, and, accordingly, the prices are exorbitant. I had to dive into the Internet in search of a used product. And here in Odessa, the builders dismantling some object, offered me a satellite dish 1.36m x 1.2m in size, made of plastic. A bit short of my wishes, however the price was good and I ordered one plate.

Having received the plate in a couple of days, I found that it was made in the USA, it has powerful stiffeners (I was worried if the case was strong enough and would not lead it after the mirrors were attached), and a strong orientation mechanism with many settings.

I also bought mirrors, 3mm thick. I ordered 2 sq.m. - a little with a margin. Mirrors are sold mostly 4 mm thick, I found a C to cut it easier. I decided to make the size of the mirrors for the concentrator 2 x 2 cm.

After collecting the main components, I started making a stand for the hub. There were several corners, pieces of pipes and profiles. Cut to size, cooked, cleaned and painted. Here's what happened:

So, having made a stand, I start cutting mirrors. The mirrors are 500 x 500 mm. First of all, I cut it in half, and then with a 2 x 2 cm grid. I tried a bunch of glass cutters, but now it is not possible to find at least something sensible in stores. A new glass cutter cuts perfectly 5-10 times, and that's it .... After that, you can immediately throw it away. Perhaps there are some professional ones, but they should not be bought in hardware stores. Therefore, if someone is going to make a concentrator out of mirrors, the question of cutting mirrors is the most difficult one!

The mirrors are cut, the tripod is ready, I'm starting to glue the mirrors! The process is long and tedious. My number of mirrors on the finished concentrator turned out to be 2480 pieces. Clay picked the wrong one. I bought a special glue for mirrors - it holds well, but it is thick. When gluing, squeezing a droplet onto the mirror and then pressing it against the plate wall, there is a possibility of unevenly pressing the mirror (somewhere stronger, somewhere weaker). Because of this, the mirror may not be glued tightly, i.e. will direct its ray of the sun not into focus, but near it. And if the focus is blurred, there is nothing to expect high results. Looking ahead, I will say that my focus turned out to be blurry (from which I conclude that it was necessary to apply a different glue). Although the results of the experiment were pleasing, the focus was about 10 cm in size, and around a still blurry spot of another 3-5 cm. The smaller the focus, the more accurate the focusing of the rays, the correspondingly higher the temperature. It took me almost 3 full days to glue the mirrors. The area of ​​the cut mirrors was about 1.5 square meters. There was a marriage, at first, until he adapted - a lot, later much less. Defective mirrors were probably no more than 5%.

The solar parabolic concentrator is ready.

When measured, the maximum temperature at the focus of the concentrator was at least 616.5 degrees. The sun's rays helped to set fire wooden board, melt tin, lead weight and aluminum beer can. I conducted the experiment on August 25, 2015 in the Kharkiv region, Novaya Vodolaga village.

The plans for the next year (and maybe it will work out in the winter) to adapt the concentrator for practical needs. Possibly for heating water, possibly for generating electricity.

In any case, nature has given us all a powerful source of energy, we just need to learn how to use it. The energy of the sun covers all the needs of mankind a thousand times over. And if a person can take at least a small part of this energy, then this will be the greatest achievement of our civilization, thanks to which we will save our planet.

Below is a video in which you will see the process of making a solar concentrator based on a satellite dish, and the experiments that were made with the help of the concentrator.

How to build a solar water heater. It would be more correct to call it a parabolic solar concentrator. Its main advantage is that the mirror reflects 90% of the solar energy, and its parabolic shape concentrates this energy at one point. This installation will work effectively in most regions of Russia, up to 65 degrees N.

To assemble the collector, we need a few basic things: the antenna itself, a tracking system for the sun and a heat exchanger-collector.

Parabolic antenna.

Any antenna can be used - iron, plastic or fiberglass. The antenna should be panel type, not mesh antenna. Antenna area and shape are important here. Remember, heating power = antenna surface area. And that the power collected by an antenna with a diameter of 1.5 m will be 4 times less than the power collected by an antenna with a mirror area of ​​3 m.

You will also need a rotary mechanism for the antenna assembly. It can be ordered on Ebay or Aliexpress.

You will need a roll of aluminum foil or lavsan mirror film used for greenhouses. The glue with which the film will stick to the parabola.

Copper tube with a diameter of 6 mm. Fittings for connecting hot water to the tank, to the pool, or where you will use this design. Swivel mechanism The author purchased tracking on EBAY for $ 30.

Step 1 Redesigning the antenna to focus solar radiation instead of radio waves.

All you need to do is attach the lavsan mirror film or aluminum foil to the antenna mirror.

This is almost as easy as it sounds. You just need to take into account that if the antenna, for example, is 2.5 m in diameter, and the film is 1 m wide, then you do not need to cover the antenna with a film in two passes, folds and irregularities will form, which will worsen the focusing of solar energy. Cut it out in small strips and attach it to the antenna with glue. Make sure the antenna is clean before applying tape. If there are places where the paint is swollen, clean them sandpaper... You need to smooth out all the irregularities. Please note that the LNB is removed from its place, otherwise it may melt. After gluing the film and installing the antenna in place, keep your hands or face away from the head mount - you risk getting serious sunburn.

Step 2 tracking system.

As stated above - the author bought a tracking system on Ebay. You can also look for rotary sun tracking systems. But I found a simple, penny-priced circuit that tracks the position of the sun fairly accurately.

Parts List:
(downloads: 450)
* U1 / U2 - LM339
* Q1 - TIP42C
* Q2 - TIP41C
* Q3 - 2N3906
* Q4 - 2N3904
* R1 - 1meg
* R2 - 1k
* R3 - 10k
* R4 - 10k
* R5 - 10k
* R6 - 4.7k
* R7 - 2.7k
* C1 - 10n ceramic
* M - DC motor up to 1A
* LEDs - 5mm 563nm

Itself can be made on the basis of the front hub of a VAZ car.

Who cares the photo is taken from here:

Step 3 Create a heat exchanger-collector

To make a heat exchanger, you need a copper tube rolled into a ring and placed in the focus of our concentrator. But first we need to know the size of the focal point of the dish. To do this, remove the LNB converter from the plate, leaving the converter mounting racks. Now you need to turn the plate in the sun, after fixing a piece of board at the place where the converter is attached. Hold the board in this position for a while until smoke appears. This will take approximately 10-15 seconds. After that, turn the antenna away from the sun, remove the board from the mount. All manipulations with the antenna, its turns, are carried out so that you do not accidentally put your hand into the focus of the mirror - this is dangerous, you can get severely burned. Let it cool down. Measure the size of the burned piece of wood - this will be the size of your heat exchanger.

Step 4. Putting it all together and trying it out.

Climate middle lane Russia does not indulge its inhabitants with an abundance of direct sunlight. There are few absolutely clear sunny days throughout the year. Basically, as a rule, partly cloudy, when the sun appears for a dozen or two minutes, and then hides behind the clouds for the same time and the intensity of solar thermal energy drops sharply.

All this has an extremely unfavorable effect on the prospects for using solar energy for organizing hot water supply in the country or in country house... Traditional solar collectors and water heaters are simply physically incapable of efficiently heating water. Because they are based on the principle of continuous circulation of water from storage tank to the solar collector and back. And a small solar collector with an area of ​​1-2 sq. meter is not able to quickly heat a large volume of water of several hundred liters. This is easily proved by the simplest calculations.

Almost the only way to organize a truly reliable hot water supply from solar energy is to build a concentrating solar collector with a small volume of water heated at every unit of time. The logic here is quite simple.

For every square meter of the surface, approximately 800-1000 watts of solar energy falls. Let's take the lower value (taking into account the reflection from the solar collector itself, it is, alas, not zero). So, the calorific value of our "boiler" is 800 Watt (or 2900 KJ). The heat capacity of water is 4.2 KJ / kg * deg. Now let's remember how long it took Electric kettle in 1.5 kW of power, bring those 1.5 liters of water that is placed in it to a boil. In minutes! And if you make him boil a barrel of water? He will only heat it up for 3-4 hours.

On the other hand, we don't need a whole barrel of hot water all at once. We need 2-3 liters in total every minute. To wash, to wash dishes ... And the following scheme of heating water suggests itself. With a relatively low-power "kettle" we quickly heat up 1-2 liters of water and pour it into a thermos. Then we heat the next portion and pour it back into a thermos and so on. And for our needs we use it from a thermos. Those. do instantaneous water heater with the accumulation of the result of his work. So it will be flow-through.

This scheme significantly reduces the power requirements of the heater itself and at the same time will allow you to have a sufficiently large supply of hot water of several tens of liters.

Judge for yourself, even for 10-15 minutes when the sun is shining, we will receive about 200 Watt-hours of energy from the sun. This is equivalent to 720 KJ. That will allow you to heat up to 50-60 degrees about 4-5 liters of water (almost half a bucket, among other things). In the next "exit" of the sun - another 5 liters, then another. And so on throughout the day.

Moreover, the smaller the capacity of our heater, the more efficiently it will use solar energy. He will manage to snatch the sun's heat even if it pops up for just a few minutes! As they say, from a black sheep at least a tuft of wool. And already if it is long, such a heater will turn into a boiler.

There are two ways to make such a low-capacity solar collector. The first is to make a very flat classic collector as much as possible large area... For example, with a thickness of 1-2-3 cm in total and an area of ​​1-1.5 sq. meters. But its capacity will be about 20-40 liters! Especially small it can not be called. And to heat all this water will take at least an hour of the sun.

The second option is to make a concentrating parabolic solar collector of about the same area and with a capacity of 2-3 liters! Then the water in it will heat up in just 5-8 minutes! Just half an hour of sun - and we have a whole bucket of enough hot water! Moreover, the concentrating collector is also capable of collecting scattered solar energy when the rays are scattered by haze and clouds.

Now let's move on to the construction. Many people are intimidated by the word "parabolic" and they think that making a parabolic concentrator is difficult. In fact, even a schoolboy can make a parabolic mirror. In addition, the concentrating collector is much simpler even in physical terms. No need to "bother" with a huge and brittle flat "canister". To achieve its absolute tightness, rigidity, to ensure minimum hydrodynamic resistance, etc. In a parabolic solar water heater - the collector is a simple flat finished metal profile or pipe! You just need to make plugs on the ends and cut in a couple of fittings for water inlet and outlet. All other fittings will be the same in both cases. The parabolic mirror itself is made of ordinary plywood and pasted over with ordinary household foil for baking. Its IR reflectance is 90-95%!

There is a fairly simple way to build a parabola. On a sheet of plywood, we draw a right angle. Then, on one side, we put marks in 1 unit of measurement (for example, after 100 mm, in the figure these are letters). And on the other - after 2 units (that is, after 200 mm, in the figure these are numbers). Then we connect the marks with lines a1, b2, c3, etc. The resulting intersections of the lines will give us the desired parabola. Naturally, it must be smoothed out with a piece. And of course, this is only half of the parabola we need. The second is a mirror image.

Now, what a concentric parabolic solar water heater might look like.

Well, something like this.

Water into the collector - the heater is supplied under low pressure from the pressure tank. And at the outlet of the collector, a valve is installed - a thermostat. Similar in action to what is installed in the cooling circuits of cars. Those. it opens when the water is heated to a certain temperature. When a portion of the water in the collector heats up, the thermostat opens and the water is drained into the tanks of the thermoses. Once all hot water will merge and cool water begins to flow, then the thermostat will immediately close and the collector will begin to heat the next portion.

So that the space behind the parabolic mirror is not wasted in vain, the thermos tanks are installed in free niches and are carefully insulated. Although, as you can imagine, this is just a variant of their location. They can be installed in any convenient place, but it is important to carefully insulate the pipe leading to them from the collector.

Generally speaking, a parabolic mirror has not just a focus, where all reflected rays are directed, but a so-called focal plane. Because if the rays fall on the parabolic mirror are not perpendicular, then they will be reflected not in the center of the parabola. Therefore, in devices with parabolic mirrors, heliotrackers are made, which always turn the parabolic mirror strictly towards the sun or move the collector along the focal plane (which, in my opinion, is simpler).

In gardening conditions, this, unfortunately, seriously complicates the design of a concentrating solar collector. Either you have to put some kind of automation, or periodically, manually, unfold the parabolic mirror strictly in the sun.

A definite solution in this case can be not horizontal, but vertical arrangement of the parabolic mirror. After all, the sun moves quickly enough horizontally, and very slowly vertically. Therefore, if you make a sufficiently elongated parabola and place the collector in its focal plane, then for several hours in a row the entire volume of reflected solar energy will fall on the collector. And the vertical adjustment will have to be done only once a week or two, depending on the angle of the sun above the horizon.

But of course, the most effective solution would be to make a solar tracker that turns the parabolic mirror directly into the sun.

Attention! If you are going to implement such a project, in no case try the temperature in the collector area by hand, "by touch" !!! The temperature in the heating zone reaches 200-300 degrees! It's like trying to touch the spiral of an electric stove. During my experiments, a piece of wood introduced into the heating zone flashed silently almost instantly. Quite a mystical sight, by the way.

Konstantin Timoshenko

You can ask your questions and discuss the design at

Published on 08/09/2013

An increasing number of great minds are interested in alternative energy. I'm not an exception. 🙂

It all started with a simple question: "Can a brushless motor be turned into a generator?"
-Can. What for?
-Make a wind generator.

A wind turbine for generating electricity is not a very convenient solution. Variable wind strength, charging device, batteries, inverters, a lot of not a penny equipment. In a simplified scheme, the wind turbine copes with water heating very well. For the load is ten, and he is absolutely not picky about the parameters of the electricity supplied to him. You can get rid of complicated expensive electronics. But calculations showed significant construction costs to spin the 500 watt generator.
The power carried by the wind is calculated using the formula P = 0.6 * S * V 3, where:
P- power, Watt
S- Area, m2
V- wind speed, m / s

The wind blowing on 1 m2 at a speed of 2 m / s "carries" an energy of 4.8 watts. If the wind speed increases to 10 m / s, then the power will increase to 600 watts. The best wind turbines have an efficiency of 40-45%. With this in mind, for a 500 watt generator with a wind of say 5 m / s. An area swept by the wind turbine propeller is required, about 12 sq.m. Which corresponds to a screw with a diameter of almost 4 meters! A lot of money is of little use. Add here the need to obtain a permit (noise limitation). By the way, in some countries the installation of a windmill must be coordinated even with ornithologists.

But then I remembered about the Sun! It gives us a lot of energy. I first thought about this after flying over a frozen reservoir. When I saw a mass of ice more than a meter thick and 15 by 50 kilometers in size, I thought: “This is how much ice! How much does it need to be heated to melt it !? " And all this will be done by the Sun in a dozen and a half days. In reference books you can find the energy density that reaches the surface of the earth. A figure of about 1 kilowatt per square meter sounds tempting. But this is at the equator on a clear day. How realistic is it to utilize solar energy for household needs in our latitudes (central part of Ukraine) using available materials?

What real power, taking into account all losses, can be obtained from it square meter?

To clarify this question, I made the first parabolic heat concentrator from cardboard (focus in the parabola bowl). The pattern of the sectors was pasted over with ordinary food foil. It is clear that the surface quality and the reflectivity of the foil are very far from ideal.

But the task was to heat a certain volume of water using the “collective farm” methods in order to find out what power can be obtained taking into account all losses. The pattern can be calculated using the Excel file that I found on the Internet from those who like to build parabolic antennas on their own.
Knowing the volume of water, its heat capacity, initial and final temperatures, it is possible to calculate the amount of heat spent on heating it. And, knowing the heating time, you can calculate the power. Knowing the dimensions of the concentrator, it is possible to determine what practical power can be obtained from one square meter of the surface on which the sunlight falls.

A half of an aluminum can, painted black on the outside, was taken as a volume for water.

A container of water is placed in the focus of a parabolic solar concentrator. The solar concentrator is oriented towards the Sun.

Experiment # 1

was held at about 7 am at the end of May. Morning is far from ideal time, but just in the morning the Sun shines through the window of my "laboratory".

With a parabola diameter 0.31 m calculations showed that a power of the order of 13.3 Watt... Those. least 177 W / m2 It should be noted here that a round open jar is far from the most the best way for a good result. Part of the energy is spent on heating the can itself, part is radiated into environment, including carried away by air currents. In general, even in such far from ideal conditions, you can at least get something.

Experiment # 2

For the second experiment, a parabola with a diameter of 0.6 m... Metallic tape purchased from a hardware store was used as her mirror. Its reflective qualities are marginally better than aluminum foil.

The parabola had a longer focal length (focus outside the parabola bowl).

This made it possible to project the rays onto one surface of the heater and obtain a high temperature in focus. The parabola can easily burn through a sheet of paper in a matter of seconds. The experiment was carried out at about 7 am in early June. According to the results of the experiment with the same volume of water and the same container, the power was obtained 28 Watt., which corresponds approximately 102 W / m2... This is less than in the first experiment. This is due to the fact that the sun's rays from the parabola fell on the round surface of the can not always optimally. Some of the rays passed by, some fell tangentially. The jar was cooled by the fresh morning breeze on one side, while it was warmed up on the other. In the first experiment, due to the fact that the focus was inside the bowl, the jar was heated from all sides.

Experiment # 3

Realizing that a decent result can be obtained by making the right heat sink, the following design was made: a tin can inside, painted black, has pipes for supplying and removing water. Hermetically sealed with transparent double glass. Thermally insulated.

The general scheme is as follows:

Heating occurs as follows: rays from the solar concentrator ( 1 ) through the glass penetrate into the can of the heat receiver ( 2 ), where, falling on a black surface, they heat it up. Water, in contact with the surface of the can, absorbs heat. Glass poorly transmits infrared (thermal) radiation, so losses due to heat radiation are minimized. Since over time the glass heats up with warm water and begins to radiate heat, double glazing was used. Ideal if there is a vacuum between the glasses, but this is an elusive task at home. On the reverse side of the can is thermally insulated with foam, which also limits the radiation of thermal energy into the environment.

Heat receiver ( 2 ) using the tubes ( 4,5 ) connects to the tank ( 3 ) (in my case plastic bottle). The bottom of the tank is 0.3m above the heater. This design provides convection (self-circulation) of water in the system.

Ideally, the expansion vessel and pipes should also be thermally insulated. The experiment was carried out at about 7 am in mid-June. The results of the experiment are as follows: Power 96.8 Watt, which corresponds approximately 342 W / m2

Those. the efficiency of the system has improved more than 3 times only due to the optimization of the design of the heat sink!

During experiments 1, 2, 3, the parabola aiming at the sun was done manually, "eyeballs". The parabola and heating elements were held by hands. Those. the heater was not always in the focus of the parabola, as a person's hands get tired and begin to look for a more comfortable position, which is not always correct from a technical point of view.

As you may have noticed, efforts have been made on my part to provide a disgusting environment for the experiment. Far from ideal conditions, namely:
- not ideal concentrator surface
- not ideal reflective properties of concentrator surfaces
- not ideal orientation to the sun
- not ideal position of the heater
- not an ideal time for an experiment (morning)

could not prevent getting a completely acceptable result for installation from scrap materials.

Experiment # 4

Further, the heating element was fixed motionlessly relative to the solar concentrator. This allowed us to raise the power to 118 Watt, which corresponds approximately 419 W / m2... And this is in the morning! From 7 to 8 in the morning!

There are other methods of heating water using solar collectors. Collectors with vacuum tubes are expensive, while flat collectors have high temperature losses during the cold season. The use of solar concentrators can solve these problems, however, it requires the implementation of a mechanism for orientation to the Sun. Each method has both advantages and disadvantages.