Cooling polymer press?

[GoHereDoThis]

My current setup is a room with normal O2 atmosphere but the room is made of insulated tile.  The polymer presses (2x) sit on top of a gold metal plate.  What's the best way to keep these presses cool?  I tried having a layer of water on the ground but that turns to steam and overflows.  I usually have a liquid lock to the room and if I put water on the lock, it eventually overflows due to the steam the presses produce.  I tried having crude oil as the lock but again, it gets contaminated with water and I'm worried the room might flood later on.

How do you guys set up your polymer presses?

[JRup]

Hi!
Screenshots always help.

Anyhow, what's the temperature range you're aiming for? Are you building them with gold amalgam?
That will help, for starters.

I keep them in a relatively hot box under 125  and add water to cool them down at that point (plastic's melting is at 159/160 C so ...)

The steam I actually pump into saunas...

 

[mathmanican]

1 hour ago, GoHereDoThis said:

How do you guys set up your polymer presses

I have mine sit over a central solid tile, with two mesh tiles under the other edges (filled with water). I plop a tempshift plate behind the lower tile of the press, and then have water constantly drip onto this middle tile. The new water heats up, falls to both sides and joins a basin of water where a pump slurps up liquid and drops it back over the press. I use a valve to limit the water flow to be enough to keep things cold, without wasting extra power on cooling.  It's not a a permanent setup, rather stop gap till I get lots of steel.  

[Nebbie]

Ah, the polymer press. I think the last time I used them instead of waiting on glossy dreckos, I used a floor of mesh tiles, flooded a tank below up to it, and ran some radiant pipes behind and over some tempshift plates with a cool slush geyser's output. It still almost overheated a few times, likely because tempshift plates don't really do a whole lot without something ridiculous to touch.

If I was doing it again now to get just enough to get a steam turbine, I'd probably just sit one in a pool of water in a rust or cold biome; it's really not worth the effort early on to make them able to run forever.

As to later on in case you don't want to use dreckos: Radiant pipes inside metal tiles with tempshift plates against them and a thin pool of water on the floor (you want as many "layers" of heat transfer in each tile as possible; mesh tiles are just denying you the potential of metal tiles with pipes inside and extra water mass is only relevant for delaying as a buffer if your cooling is insufficient anyways).

[Steve8]

I seem to be able to run one sitting in a pool of water on granite tiles with an aquatuner cooling loop running through the tiles. The steam just condenses and add more water to the floor. Which isn't a bad thing for spreading around the cooling from the loop. If it gets too much you could mop it up, but it's not really a lot.

However, I don't really use it much, so I haven't tested that in heavy use. I like glossy dreckos. They produce more plastic than you'll ever need. To the point where I get rid of most of them later on.

[bobe17]

I cool the polymer press with the petroleum before it is consumed. The temperature of the steam and polymer press should stabilize at 25°C above the temperature of the petroleum. Usually I use steel to build the press, but if your petroleum has a temperature below 85°C, it may work with gold amalgam.

[Lifegrow]

The main point that seems overlooked is getting rid of the plastic asap - that's the main heat source. Have sweepers/loaders get rid of the plastic, or build your presses on a ledge so that the plastic gets spat out and falls away.

You guys have forgotten the old ways  

*edit* it used to be the case that the direction that the press was facing meant that the output would fall off the tile, or wouldn't. Can't remember, but I think it was leftward facing presses dropped, rightwards facing didn't. You'll need to experiment yourselves.

[Urist McPilot]

57 minutes ago, Steve8 said:

I seem to be able to run one sitting in a pool of water on granite tiles with an aquatuner cooling loop running through the tiles. The steam just condenses and add more water to the floor.

Same here. With a cooling loop around 30C, the surroundings of the press are cold enough that I never see any steam for more than a tick, and the water that collects on the ground conducts all heat away easily. I put a mesh tile next to the press, and collect the dripping water with a mini pump to avoid overflowing when it's left on for a long time. Never had any problem with the heat.

[GoHereDoThis]

Here's my current setup.  I've used similar setups before up to mid-game, it's just a set-it-and-forget-it deal.  I don't recall anything breaking.  My issue is that I need to have some sort of liquid on the floor to help cool down the presses.  I used to use water for both cooling and for the liquid lock but as the presses work, steam builds up and condenses and eventually, my liquid lock overflows.  Obviously that isn't the case when using crude oil but now the condensed water "contaminates" the liquid lock and it's messing a bit with my OCD.

Is there a way around this or do I just have to live with it? 

[JRup]

27 minutes ago, GoHereDoThis said:

Here's my current setup.  I've used similar setups before up to mid-game, it's just a set-it-and-forget-it deal.  I don't recall anything breaking.  My issue is that I need to have some sort of liquid on the floor to help cool down the presses.  I used to use water for both cooling and for the liquid lock but as the presses work, steam builds up and condenses and eventually, my liquid lock overflows.  Obviously that isn't the case when using crude oil but now the condensed water "contaminates" the liquid lock and it's messing a bit with my OCD.

Is there a way around this or do I just have to live with it? 

 

Hi!

A single liquid lock will exchange temperature with the environment outside it, therefore you'll get condensation. A way around this is to add a second liquid lock with a vacuum in between. 

Spoiler

Different liquids can be stacked for more compact locks. For example Naphta or Crude on the bottom and petroleum for top layer. The conveyor chute is in a vacuum here.

 

Hope this helps.

 

[GoHereDoThis]

Hmmm.... I've never played with vertical locks yet.  I have crude oil and petroleum access now, plus the usual H2O, pH20 and salt H2O.  Can you tell me how to make a vertical lockand which of my current liquids would be best to use?  Thanks!

[Baer]

Built some Steel/Ceramic and go for a hot Industriebrick. Search for Francis Jon on Youtube, he has nice tutorial for everyone. 

[JRup]

Hi!
The most important point about is that they will depend on the temperature of the environment they're "sealing". We wouldn't want the lock to evaporate or freeze at any point...

Second point is, no matter the liquid lock, farting dupes will have a field day with them.

So, then... Pre space materials locks then...

Dealing with hot environments your three options are from heaviest to lightest: crude oil, naptha and petroleum. (This means always add heaviest first and lightest last) There's not much needed for the lock to take shape, I'm more of a make it asap and mop up the mess soon... (if precision's needed then naphta helps. If you want quick naphta melt plastic...)

If you're using crude oil in the lock, then you have to stay below 400C, naphta and petro under 538C

You'll need a 2 tall "corridor" or basin and limit the size to your convenience. Do note that if you want to micro manage the bottle emptiers then all that's needed is about 350g per tile per layer to set up the locks...

Behold! A messy 2 liquid lock procedure... (space materials people only need visco-gel so all this is moot by then)

Here I just made 5 tile long basin and filled with some crude oil.

 

 

Then I dropped petro on top, the fluid will automatically stick to the second level...

 

Finally I just went ahead and deconstructed the tiles where the lock shouldn't be...

 

 

Re-seal and vacuum at leisure. "Mop up on aisle # ..."

 

[GoHereDoThis]

How hot does it get on the polymer press areas?

Thanks for that tutorial!

[JRup]

21 minutes ago, GoHereDoThis said:

How hot does it get on the polymer press areas?

Thanks for that tutorial!

Short answer: as hot as it goes before overheating and breaking down.

Longer answer:

You'll see that all buildings that take power do produce heat, if you build anything in a vacuum, for example, they'll heat up faster because there is no direct transfer medium to dump that heat into (there's a solution to that, bear with me for a bit)

The effect is similar if inside an insulated enclosure with just gas or liquid. Heat is just being accumulated into the whole room instead... (Even insulated tiles will heat up or cool down depending on what you built and the environment they're in.)

In any case, heat from a polymer press room will have to be removed somehow - eventually.

Finally: Polymer presses do produce lots of heat but the catch is that they have to be kept cooler than the melting point of plastic, unless you want to melt the plastic into naphta...  So the environment they're in should be kept below 160C and the plastic quickly removed from the room.

Q: How to recover the temperature transmission effect in a vacuum?
A: Using a liquid layer (or just a drop for a single tile) just like in the screenshot of your press room.

Spoiler

(Don't forget to use drywall or tempshift plates to protect liquids and gases if building in space...)

Regards.

 

[JRup]

So, I guess I'll show this build of mine... I'll gloss over some points, let me know if you're curious about anything.

Work in progress: sleet wheat farm as end point of the poly-press room...

3Kg of steam are kept at 123C at all times, any more gets sent to the saunas... 4 are actually overkill if the presses aren't running - 2 would have done just fine... Some of the 80C water gets sent to the hot tub...

The poly-presses are only activated if plastic is taken out of the smart storage bin within the liquid locks ...
The thermo regulator is on all the time, only stops if the hydrogen is cooler than -50c.

If the steam temp goes over 124 then cooling is in place: the presses are disabled and the liquid shutoff to the right activates and sends PW to cool down the room. There is no polluted oxygen offgasing on account of the 3kg steam pressure... (Over 1.8kg is fine but hey...)

Ceramic insulation was only used for the press box. Only the presses and the thermo regulator are steel... The rest of the contraptions are more common gold amalgam or copper.

That's my build for the press box. I guess that's the order within my chaos..

 

[GoHereDoThis]

Wow thanks!  When you said 320, I didn't realise it as grams and not KG.

[JRup]

3 minutes ago, GoHereDoThis said:

Wow thanks!  When you said 320, I didn't realise it as grams and not KG.

Therefore it is messy... just as the guide predicted.