Product testing
Through the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009 Trinity College Dublin performed a series of tests on the Oxyvent Tank in their laboratory.
The tests were led by Dr Tony Robinson a lecturer at the university and specialist working in the College’s Fluids and Heat Transfer Laboratory.
As part of the testing a thermal imaging video camera was used to monitor the performance of the radiators under the test conditions:
In this video you can see that the heat distribution across the radiator fluctuates greatly and the temperature rises and falls as a result of the boiler cycling on and off
With the Oxyvent installed a dramatic difference takes place – the heat is spread much more uniformly throughout the radiator and the temperature is far more consistent – the Oxyvent Tank effectively damps out the effect of the boiler cycling on and off.
Three separate sets of tests were carried out in Trinity’s laboratory; the test reports are of a scientific and technical nature, below you will find the conclusions from the three tests.
If you are keen to learn more about the tests please email paul@Oxyvent.com
Test 1
Conclusions
The preliminary tests which have been carried out tend to indicate that the claims of the
Oxyvent system are apparently true with a lower operating temperature required, less fuel consumed, improved temperature uniformity of the radiators, a system that is ‘self-balancing’ and improved comfort heating. More in-depth testing would be required to elucidate the exact mechanisms which cause these effects.
Test 2
Conclusions
Further testing of the Oxyvent system indicates that the thermal performance is very different to that of conventional central heating set-ups.
Although the Oxyvent system with Tset=63°C dissipates on average less power than a traditional system with Tset=74°C, the later system suffers from higher fuel consumption and excessive fluctuations in power output.
Several figures of merit have been proposed to quantify the heat dissipation, physical comfort and fuel cost. Taking these into account, the measurements indicate that for the experimental setup in this investigation, the Oxyvent system outperforms traditional systems.
I suggest that the next phase of testing focus on the thermal performance of a single radiator under both configurations. This will require that a method of non-intrusively measuring the flow rate into the radiator be devised, possibly moving away from still thermal images to thermal image videos and performing more in depth heat transfer analysis to compare different modes of heat transfer.
Test 3
Conclusions
The Oxyvent system has the effect of dampening out the influence of large fluctuations in temperatures associated with the switching of the boiler.
As a consequence
(1) the inlet and outlet valves can be set fully open allowing for the maximum flow of water through the radiators resulting in superior heat spreading over the surface without excessive fluctuations in the power output
(2) the boiler temperature can be reduced without as severe a decrease in power output of the radiators with the associated benefit of a substantial drop in fuel consumption
(3) albeit difficult to quantify, it is logical to expect that very large variations in temperature/power of ‘balanced’ radiators can lead to discomfort, in particular if the room temperature varies as well: in this regard the Oxyvent system mitigates this by providing steady heat even though the boiler is continuously cycling.
