Regolith Steam Generator(Failed)

[Oni Noob]

Hi Guys I tried using the heat from regolith to create steam then eventually power up my steam generator but it seems its a fail. Does anybody have tried it and made it to work? 

[Oozinator]

Dip the bottom of the U shape into magma and it will work, because magma is hotter then regolith.
You can heat up regolith that way and store it for later, because it's very rare!

[Neotuck]

given the low specific heat capacity, regolith holds little thermal energy.

In order to maintain a steam turbine you'll need a lot more regolith than the meteor showers provides

[Oni Noob]

26 minutes ago, Oozinator said:

Dip the bottom of the U shape into magma and it will work, because magma is hotter then regolith.
You can heat up regolith that way and store it for later, because it's very rare!

Sure thing ill try that, I really thought regolith heat would be enough sadly not. Thanks for the tip

[Sasza22]

I used regolith to heat up water for my steam rocket. I just manually (dupe hands) dropped some ice into a room and the filled it with random regolith from the surface. it took about 20-30 cycles to rise the temperature but it eventually broke 100^oC and i could pump it to my rocket. Now it has a steady temperature of 140^oC and 110 kg/tile.

So making steam this way is doable but it`s still too cold for the turbine (you need 230-250) so you`d need to pump it out through something hotter before you throw it into the turbine.

[StarSquid]

I've tested this pretty extensively. Regolith is technically hot enough, but you would need a lot of it; all of my designs have worked for mere moments at best. You've got a good idea there with dumping the powdered regolith directly into the water, but as far as I can tell, you have two options: Batch operation or a gargantuan collecting area. There might not be enough area to power one continuously at all, in which case you would be confined to batch operation; running only part of the time.

Ideally, you would be able to store the regolith cleaned from solar panels, store it until the next meteor shower, run off of steam while the solar panels are being shielded, switch back to the solar when you can, rinse and repeat. I'm not sure if this will work at all, but if you can even generate enough power to open and close the doors that would be pretty good.

 

[Oni Noob]

1 hour ago, StarSquid said:

I've tested this pretty extensively. Regolith is technically hot enough, but you would need a lot of it; all of my designs have worked for mere moments at best. You've got a good idea there with dumping the powdered regolith directly into the water, but as far as I can tell, you have two options: Batch operation or a gargantuan collecting area. There might not be enough area to power one continuously at all, in which case you would be confined to batch operation; running only part of the time.

Ideally, you would be able to store the regolith cleaned from solar panels, store it until the next meteor shower, run off of steam while the solar panels are being shielded, switch back to the solar when you can, rinse and repeat. I'm not sure if this will work at all, but if you can even generate enough power to open and close the doors that would be pretty good.

 

I am not sure if I will continue this project. I got another roadblock that prevent it from automating the project. The autosweeper that get hot regolith from the meteor is getting very hot that its getting damage. I'll check if there is possible other solution

[Neotuck]

11 minutes ago, Oni Noob said:

The autosweeper that get hot regolith from the meteor is getting very hot that its getting damage. I'll check if there is possible other solution

you can build it out of Thermium to increase the overheat to 975C, as long as it's exposed to the steam it should never get that high

[yoakenashi]

15 hours ago, Oni Noob said:

Hi Guys I tried using the heat from regolith to create steam then eventually power up my steam generator but it seems its a fail. Does anybody have tried it and made it to work?

 

8 hours ago, StarSquid said:

There might not be enough area to power one continuously at all

It is possible to run a steam turbine continuously with the heat from regolith, though it does require a good bit of surface area. My method was to run radiant liquid pipe filled with petroleum through bunker tile at the surface. Meteor debris laying on the tile would heat the petroleum to roughly 300°C. Then I would use that to heat my steam to at least 227°C to power the steam generator.

I also only used the regolith to to heat steam from 150°C to 227°C. I had a gold amalgam aquatuner placed in petroleum to generate and heat steam to 150°C.

[tzionut]

Another solution is to use temp shift plate, and rails to increase the heat surface transfer. And an therm sensor for command the sweep arm and dispose the cold regolith 

[StarSquid]

4 hours ago, yoakenashi said:

 

It is possible to run a steam turbine continuously with the heat from regolith, though it does require a good bit of surface area. My method was to run radiant liquid pipe filled with petroleum through bunker tile at the surface. Meteor debris laying on the tile would heat the petroleum to roughly 300°C. Then I would use that to heat my steam to at least 227°C to power the steam generator.

I also only used the regolith to to heat steam from 150°C to 227°C. I had a gold amalgam aquatuner placed in petroleum to generate and heat steam to 150°C.

Oh, that's clever. It didn't even occur to me to use an aquatuner; that way you can cool the base and extract some energy in the process. The heat pipes also help with my main problem, which was that it would take several cycles before heat from the regolith could even reach the water.

Would it be possible to use this system on a diamond window and bunker doors, so that you could use solar panels whenever possible in addition to this system?

[StarSquid]

Just now, Neotuck said:

depending on how many layers of water you have it will block light

I'm not suggesting the water on the surface, the water would be in a tank somewhere while petroleum gets pumped through radiant pipes alongside the glass.

[Neotuck]

Just now, StarSquid said:

I'm not suggesting the water on the surface, the water would be in a tank somewhere while petroleum gets pumped through radiant pipes alongside the glass.

oops I was thinking of someone else's post when I read yours, sorry