basskisser wrote:
James Sweet wrote:


Where did I ever say that the cold water didn't absorb heat to cool the air?
Of course it does dimbulb.




So long as it has ice in it, the temperature will remain quite constant.
The energy is absorbed by the state change from solid to liquid water.
As soon as all the ice is gone, the temperature will start to rise
pretty quickly, but it will never go over ambient air temperature.


Go turn on your A/C for awhile, feel the return line. It will be quite
a bit warmer than ambient temperature. And again, if you are pumping
warm water back into the ice chest, let's just say AT ambient
temperature, the insulation of the chest will do no good.



The return (suction) line is quite a bit cooler than ambient. A properly
charged system will return a small amount of refrigerant to the
condensing unit in a liquid state to help cool the compressor. The
liquid line however will be warmer than ambient, this is because when
the refrigerant is compressed it will turn to a superheated gas which
then flows through the condenser where it is cooled by ambient air and
condenses to a liquid, no matter how efficient the condenser it will
still never be dropped quite down to ambient temperature, nothing is
ever 100% efficient. When it gets to the evaporator, it is metered in
though either a fixed orifice or (ideally) a thermostatic valve which
allows just the right amount into the evaporator so that it absorbs heat
and boils almost entirely away, leaving just enough liquid to cool the
compressor without wasting energy flooding the evaporator. I'm a
certified HVAC tech and have done quite a bit of work on domestic stuff
so I'm quite familiar with this. We're talking about two different
things here, a closed loop phase change refrigeration system is not the
same principal as a bucket of ice water.