About a week ago, I have never heard of such a thing called a peltier cooler. When my housemate bought a CPU cooler that cools using electricity from lowyat, I was very surprised and amazed. I kept thinking to myself on the way back home how such a thing can work. I’ve heard of using compressors and feron gases to produce subzero temperatures. But using electricity alone? You can imagine my curiousity.

Subzero 4G for rm50 at lowyat.
The main component of this cooler is the peltier plate. It’s a plate that, when voltage is applied, creates a a temperature difference between its top and bottom plate. In short, when electricity is applied, the top plate becomes hot and the bottom plate becomes cold.

The peltier plate.
The peltier plate does this by transferring heat energy. And the interesting thing is that if you reverse the polarity, the hot and cold sides will switch. The more interesting thing is that if you apply more voltage, it gets colder.

Stuff that came in the package. Heatsink with peltier plate, casing fan, microcontroller to control the temperature.

The peltier cooler.
This thing is very cold when running. It’s not like normal cool, but it’s cold. It’s like touching ice. If you can’t take my word for it, look at the picture below.

You can see drops of water forming on the plate due to condensation!
This peltier technology has been around for a long time. It’s just that it’s not too pratical for some applications because it’s not very efficient. Anyways, some links for further reading:
Peltier coolers
The heatsink guide – Peltier cooler information
Peltier beer cooler
A really cool piece of gadget. Pun intended.
UPDATE: How to make ice using your peltier cooler.

Put something hot on it and ice will form. Continue reading →