It’s been awhile since my latest update, and a lot has changed with the project.
I have a chamber completely built, at 12in by 18in x 4in. This size of chamber will be large enough to see many trails of particles while being portable enough to bring into a classroom. The peltiers are proving to be a very interesting engineering challenge, as my air cooling system is not powerful enough to keep up. I am using 12V, 60W, 5A peltiers, but will run them at 5V, 12A. Through testing, I found that a lower voltage and higher amperage increased the temperature difference, consistently reaching negative double-digit temperatures.
I am currently working on a water cooling system for the peltiers, using water blocks. I am going to use a 3 x 4 grid of peltiers on the bottom of the chamber to cool it, and I will have four 20cm water blocks going across the hot side of the peltiers, covering three each. This should remove enough heat to keep the temperature low enough. Additionally, I will be experimenting with using a lower powered peltier stacked on top of a higher powered peltier to increase the temperature differential.
All of these changes should allow me to build a larger area while keeping temperatures low.