Large TEC plates.. for very little money

[cybertoyz]

Thought I would run this by you guys to see if this is a good idea or not..

I recently purchased one of those USB powered drink coolers and decided to tear it apart so see what was inside. Much to my surprise there was a 1.5" x 1.5" TEC plate affixed to a Massive Heatsink. The device was direct wired to the +5V USB input with no regulation circuitry at all.

My first thought was to use this with my 445nm diode to provide Overkill Cooling. I hack sawed the heatsink to a more manageable size to fit the 1.5" TEC plate. Using thermal epoxy I affixed it to a smooth side of my diode heatsink. I screwed one end of the heatsink to my Diode heatsink and using stainless steel strapping, was able to get a really thight fit all the way around.

I already had a fan cooling my original diode but intend on adding one just for the heatsink because it does get kinda warm. The diode however remains icy cold.

Since this device was made to run all the time.. thats what I will do with it. No regulation circuitry.. just have 5V at 500mA available for it.

The chiller cost me $15 bucks on ebay.. Pretty cheap thrills.. I mean chills...

Any thoughts on this are certainly welcome.
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[taggalucci]

I'd imagine you could easily get condensation issues running this at 100% duty cycle. What is your experience of this?

[cybertoyz]

I thought of that as well, however with a constant fan blowing on the unit, it should remain dry.

I'd imagine you could easily get condensation issues running this at 100% duty cycle. What is your experience of this?