War Of The Refrigerator

So with your new found information that refrigerators take the heat out of your food and push that heat out the backside (underside) of the refrigerator, I have a few questions for you:

What happens to your kitchen temperature after you fill the refrigerator with warm soda and close the refrigerator door?


1. The kitchen will stay the same temperature
2. The kitchen will get cooler
3. The kitchen will get warmer




Remember: the soda is getting colder. . .

Too easy? The answer is number three. The soda started out as warm, and within an hour or so the refrigerator makes it cold. As Newton describes when he stated "Energy can neither be created or destroyed," that heat has to go somewhere. As the refrigerator removes the heat from the warm soda (making it cold for your drinking enjoyment) it releases that heat into the kitchen, making the kitchen warmer.


What happens to the kitchen temperature if you leave the refrigerator door open?

1. The room gets colder
2. The room stays the same temperature
3. The room gets warmer




If you guessed that the room would get colder ask yourself: Where is the heat going? Heat cannot be destroyed so it must be going somewhere.

If the refrigerator was perfectly efficient at removing heat from your soda (the inside) the room would stay the same temperature. It would remove heat from the air closest to the walls of the refrigerator and push it out of the coils on the backside. The air would then mix together and go back to the same temperature as before.

But refrigerators are not perfectly efficient. In the process of moving that heat the refrigerator creates some of its own heat. Another way of saying that: as the compressor runs (the thing you hear kick on from time to time) some electricty is wasted (lost) as heat. Same as running any other kind of motor, there is always some loss (friction etc) that shows up as heat.

So, because the motor in your refrigerator gets warm when it runs (on top of moving heat around), any room exposed to an open refrigerator will actually become warmer, and not colder. Don't tell your parents.

Steve's Question #2

How does a heat pump work?

The basic premis here is to think about heat moving, whether that is you heating your house (bringing heat into your home from the outside) or whether you are cooling your house (heat being forced from inside your house to the outside).

So while it is common to think about a window air conditioner bringing cold air into your home, it is easier to understand the process if you think about heat being removed from the air. That heat is pushed out the back coils.

It may be helpful to think about your refrigerator. I am sure you have noticed that refrigerators tend to be warm on the outside. This heat is two part. One part is the heat created from the compressor (which is what you might hear click on and run from time to time). The other part is the heat that is being pulled out of the food. When you put a warm beverage in the refrigerator and close the door, the compressor pulls the heat out of the liquid and pushes it out the coils on the backside (or the bottom).

With the goal of keeping things short I will stop here for now, and pick it up again later.

Honeywell has a nice flash presentation here

Dear Everyone This Is The "ARTICHOKE"

Dear Artichoke,

This is everyone.

love,

Matt

Artichoke was designed by Poul Henningsen in 1958. It may look familiar since so very many lights have copied it's design since. Just thought you all would like to meet the original.