Ethanol as coolant

[TheEvilMango]

Is ethanol a good liquid to use as coolant for a cooling loop or is crude oil/petroleum better? 

[Soulwind]

Ethanol has an awfully low boiling point for use as in-pipe coolant.

Situations where it might be good, but I think petrol is better.

On the other hand, I think the vaporization and recondensing of ethanol actually removes heat, so that could be useful as an environmental cooling medium.

[TheEvilMango]

Ok. And just to make sure I understand SHC and TC correct, SHC is how many DTUs per gram is needed to raise its temp by 1 correct? So a higher SHC means it can take more DTUs before changing temps? And thermal conductivity is lower numbers r insulators and higher r conductors?

[Rebrait]

1 hour ago, Soulwind said:

Ethanol has an awfully low boiling point for use as in-pipe coolant.

Situations where it might be good, but I think petrol is better.

On the other hand, I think the vaporization and recondensing of ethanol actually removes heat, so that could be useful as an environmental cooling medium.

The vaporization removes heat, but the recondensing put that heat again in the ethanol

Elements that change forever(like Regolith to Magma) are a very powerful way to creat/destroy heat, but elements that change back(like ethanol that evaporates and than vaporizate back to liquid ethanol) aren't that powerfull because the DTU change 2 times

59 minutes ago, TheEvilMango said:

Ok. And just to make sure I understand SHC and TC correct, SHC is how many DTUs per gram is needed to raise its temp by 1 correct? So a higher SHC means it can take more DTUs before changing temps? And thermal conductivity is lower numbers r insulators and higher r conductors?

Thermal condutivity is how much heat that can exchange with another element.

[psusi]

2 minutes ago, Rebrait said:

The vaporization removes heat, but the recondensing put that heat again in the ethanol

Except that the temperature where they change phase is 6 degrees apart to keep them from ping-ponging back and forth rapidly, and because of that and the change in SHC, repeated cycles of vaporization and condensation delete heat.

[caffeinated21]

Ethanol has a higher SHC than petrol, so if you need to go colder than polluted water in an aqua tuner prior to super coolant it’s your best option.

not sure what purpose you’d use that for though... as pw is cold enough for sleet wheat 

[suicide commando]

1 hour ago, caffeinated21 said:

Ethanol has a higher SHC than petrol, so if you need to go colder than polluted water in an aqua tuner prior to super coolant it’s your best option.

not sure what purpose you’d use that for though... as pw is cold enough for sleet wheat 

Not a coolant use, but on Rime I've used ethanol for liquid locks in areas where water would freeze and I didn't have access yet to crude oil.

 

[FSharpDotNet]

1 hour ago, caffeinated21 said:

Ethanol has a higher SHC than petrol, so if you need to go colder than polluted water in an aqua tuner prior to super coolant it’s your best option.

not sure what purpose you’d use that for though... as pw is cold enough for sleet wheat 

but it has terrible TC. so SHC sure, but I don't think it will make a good coolant.

[caffeinated21]

1 hour ago, FSharpDotNet said:

but it has terrible TC. so SHC sure, but I don't think it will make a good coolant.

With Radiant pipes I can’t imagine a use case where conductivity is an issue. SHC is king for aqua tuner efficiency.

[nakomaru]

It really depends on your use case. But PW is generally going to be the most useful coolant until you get supercoolant. In high temp ranges it's naphtha. Those three tend to cover most situations the best. Then you use metals for extreme temps.