Fight the Fumes, Man!

[Darkerweb]

Hi, I'm Darkerweb, I'm newly registered, but have been lurking for a long time. It has occurred to me lately, that nobody has made up a cheap, easily built device to scavenge the solvent's nasty-smelling, and fairly toxic fumes, other than a few nicely done fume hood teks. Now those work great, if you have a bunch of construction materials and skills around, and have the space to be nailing and sawing. You could always open the window with a fan, that's easy. But in Central WI, during the winter, that's not gonna fly. So it's cold out,and I fall into the category of not being able to construct a nice fume hood, so I've devised a device that does the same deed. (Alliteration?)

It also acts as the fan to speed evaporation.

It is a small rubbermaid storage container, that snugly fits a 8x11.5 glass baking/evaporating dish in the bottom. Then the top had two cirlcular holes cut in it, roughly 2.5in. in diameter, using some kitchen shears. Then two PC fans were utilized, along with 4 pieces of 2" PVC Conduit glued to either side of the holes, forming much more effective, Ducted fans. These computer fans were also beefed up by utilizing a 15v 1.33A Output wall-wart to power the two fans in paralell, making sure if one fan dies, the other continues running and takes up the other's power, for constant flow. The fans' intended voltage is 12v with a very low current, so these fans have been 'turbocharged' in sort, which may lead to diminished life.

Then for effective use of the intake fan's airflow, a nozzle was created with some scrap cardboard.

Version 2 of my design also utilizes a Blue Magic waterbed heater, handily had one around.

The exhaust fan duct snugly fits 2.5" Dryer Exhaust hose, its flexible and versitile, letting you decide what to do with the fumes, lead outdoors, carbon filter, even a reclaimation device if you happen to have the knowhow and some old fridge components.

Everything was assembled out of fairly common household materials, using a hot glue gun to glue everything together. The device is quiet, small, discreet, and with the heater, extremely fast at evaporating solvents, especially the slow evaporating ones like toulene and xylol.

Overview, showing intake, exhaust, heater control and thermometer, and nozzle.

Closeup on Lid, detailing intake fan, exhaust ducting, and fan power supply cord.

Closeup on Lid Underside, detailing intake fan, exhaust uptake, and cardboard nozzle.

Closup on Evaporator Bottom, detailing heater pad, thermometer, and dish placement.

Closeup on heater control unit.

 

[lorentz5]

Very innovative design my friend. Welcome to the Nexus. SWIM has(d) a similar problem controlling fumes living in a dorm and may try this out.

Also, not sure if it's only me, but these massive 1824x1028 pics made this very difficult to read on SWIM's computer, having to scroll left and right repeatedly.

 

[Darkerweb]

All resized for easier viewing and faster loading

I might suggest this or a similar design to hook up to your bathroom exhaust/stove exhaust, if you have a bathroom to yourself. I have also heard of venting fumes down drains, but for some reason, pumping light gas into a system designed for relatively dense liquid does not seem like a great idea.

 

[MagikVenom]

Looks Good nice job. I would be sure to have a fire extinguisher handy however. You want to be sure no solvent fumes build up near the intake fan and thermostat a spark is all it takes sometimes. I would not leave it running when not at home and would keep a eye on it.
Running it out doors in a open area would be safest.

They make spark less fans maybe you already have one. Naptha should be fine but Diethyl ether would likely go KAABOOOM!

Welcome to the Nexus


Peace
MV

 

[69ron]

As one who makes similar things, I suggest putting the fans inline with the duct only and not on the intake. You will get better gas removal that way. With the fan placed on the intake, it's going to generate positive pressure in the box if the exhaust fan fails, causing gases to leak out of every possible unsealed location in the box. If you instead put both fans on the exhaust vent leading to the exhaust ducting, you will get rid of this problem. But this is only good if you use non-flammable solvents like DCM. If you use flammable solvents, having the fan in the exhaust vent could cause a fire if there are ever any sparks produced by the fan. A fan on the intake could also cause a fire, but it's less likely unless the sparks shoot very far. Also having the fans only on the exhaust vent creates a vacuum in the box, and that will lead to faster evaporation of the solvent.

So to sum it up:

* Fans only on the exhaust cause a vacuum in the box causing faster evaporation, and prevent gases from escaping out of the holes in the box. But this creates a fire hazard if the fans ever produce sparks and the solvent used is flammable.

* Fans only on the intake are less likely to cause a fire, but will force gasses out of both the exhaust vent and all leaks in the box. This causes pressure in the box and makes evaporation slower.

* Fans at both the intake and the exhaust help keep the pressure in the box normal. With no vacuum, increased vacuum evaporation isn’t possible, only normal pressure evaporation occurs. The exhaust fan creates a fire hazard if the fan ever produces sparks and the solvent used in flammable. The intake fan could also cause a fire, but it's less likely.

 

[69ron]

For the best fire safety, do not put a fan on the exhaust, and have the intake fan many feet away from the box, connected with ducting. This way if the fan ever makes any sparks, they are not going to reach the box and start a fire.

 

[Darkerweb]

I did simplify my description a bit, the fans are independantly powered, the exhaust fan having a more powerful power source, in order to keep a constant, but mild vaccuum in the box, the fans are brushless, and should not spark unless surged with power (use a surge protecter). Thanks for the input guys, I already have new ideas coming, and may have to re-build the box in a more professional and neat manner. More powerful, but remotely located fans should reduce the chance of fire to near 0.

Thanks a bunch for your feedback guys, I was hoping to get some.

 

[MagikVenom]

For the best fire safety, do not put a fan on the exhaust, and have the intake fan many feet away from the box, connected with ducting. This way if the fan ever makes any sparks, they are not going to reach the box and start a fire.

Yes I was going to mention this but he has fan on intake.

Nice precaution with the brushless fans well worth the extra cash!

 

[69ron]

In the picture above, the intake fan is too close to the box. It’s part of the box. It's a fire hazard if using flammable solvents.

All it takes is 1 spark to get in the box and BOOM. Not a problem with a solvent like DCM though. If the intake fan is many feet away from the box, this isn't a problem because it's got many feet of clean air between it and the box, giving a spark plenty of time to die out before it hits the box. To operate it safely, you run the intake fan before putting the solvent in the box. That ensures that there are no solvent vapors in the ducting going from the intake fan to the box. You don’t have an exhaust fan. You just have ducting for exhaust, that’s it, and you seal the box very well. Having an exhaust fan is a fire hazard. Again, that’s not a problem when using DCM.

If using DCM, it’s best to remove the intake fan and only have an exhaust fan. That will greatly speed up evaporation of the solvent. And with DCM there’s no fire worry so that setup is perfect.

 

[69ron]

Of course if the fan is SPARK FREE and this is guaranteed, then there's no fire concern. In that case putting the fan on the exhaust only is the best option in all cases (unless for some reason you don't want reduced pressure).

 

[69ron]

Darkerweb, your design reminds me of the mushroom growing chamber I made when I was a teenager. I used the same kind of box. I used an aquarium air pump instead of a fan, and 1/4 inch tubing instead of ducting. The air was pumped into the box. There was no exhaust really, just a few exhaust holes in the box at the other end of the top. The air pump, connected to the tubing, had a container of water in between it and the box. The air pump pushed air down the tubing into the container of water where the air was then dispersed under the water. The outlet of the tubing under the water had a handkerchief “balloon” on it simply attached to the tubing with a rubber band. This handkerchief “balloon” caused the air coming out of the tubing to produce micro bubbles of air in the water instead of large bubbles of air. The micro bubbles picked up water so that the air coming out of the water was humid. The air then traveled up the water, out of the water, and then out the exhaust tubing of the water container. This tubing then went into the box where the mushrooms were growing, providing a constant stream of clean filtered humid air.

It worked really well. I was surprised. The inside of the box was very humid. The mushrooms grew so much healthier and faster inside the box. There were far less contamination problems, and I no longer needed to water the mushrooms all the time. I just filled the water container once, and the humidity from it was enough to keep everything moist in the box while the mushrooms fruited.

 

[Darkerweb]

That's interesting, 69ron, because I helped some friends set up an edibles set-up this summer, these tote boxes work amazing for everything! great idea with the handkerchief for micro-bubbles, I do the same idea with a sponge partially submersed in water. Diffusers make everything better. It's funny how techniques designed for one field are often times transferrable to other fields.