let's use thermite for the candles and liquid nitrogen for the cold water.

seriously not being hyperbolic when i say, you're probably the most enjoyable and genuinely usefully informative channels I've ever found on youtube. great vid man.

Customer Service Trainer 12yrs. You kept me interested. Good voice. Good brief construction delivery. Well done Lad.

Almost forgot for a minute that I was watching KZfaq and not how it's made with some of your edits. Fantastic work man!

Great video. I uploaded a video to my channel a while back showing this. Using ice water will give you very good current output, but the ice will not last long.

Love how simplified the design was and the lack of tools needed simple yet effective

when he started making hot chocolate I lost it

Good job picking sponsors I will actually use! Your DIY tutorials are super good looking, and their uses fit my lifestyle perfectly. Hopefully one day I will have the time to make one of them

Great video, thought at first it was the Peltier effect but reading about it I see there are 3 effects from the same device, very ingenuous!

"And you can make hot chocolate while your at it" I laughed so hard

Your channel is the best DIY channel I've found because it's stuff that's genuinely useful. Colin Furze and Grant Thompson are entertaining, sure, but I can never imagine actually making their stuff the vast majority of the time.

I've looked into the idea many many times over the years but this is the first time ive seen a Peltier DIY that is useful. Thx man!

Huh, I always thought that those thermoelectric plates were a lot more expensive.

Awesome project

I found this useful for campers to surviving in cold places. Great DIY!

the best quality DIY video of the WEB!! Man, you're the best

Great project! Nice concept, and definitely seems like a simple way to convert the temperature difference into electricity. But those so called "peltier modules" are pretty inefficient, but as you said in the video, cheap and simple.

Wow Matt this is really clever! Nicely made too. Always love the format of your videos, very clear and informative :)

Your videos are very very well made, and you definitely deserve more supporters!

Your voice is so relaxing and makes this video more enjoyable.

Thank you for yet another interesting video! Very much appriciated the time and effort you put in them to make it look so professional! Big thumbs up!

It may be worth insulating your water bath to keep it cool except for the contact pads. Also trapping as much heat as possible on the underside without smothering the flame. Currently, the candles are basically heating up the exposed water bath.

Hello sir, I'm very thrilled after watching this video and I'm glad I found it. The Surprising part is I wanted to do my final year major project on Thermoelectrics and after finding this video, my spirits were boosted. Thank you for this wonderful project. It helped me, to learn more about it.

You make great things and your native advertising is classy.

There is quite a bit to do on the efficiency side of this design. Firstly, all the thernoelectric generators are in series. This might not be that optimum of a plan. The issue is that the central element probably generate more energy than the side once. The aluminium heat spreeder really don´t spreed the heat that far. A solution to that problem could be to wire them 2x5 or 5x2 or 3x3 (and skip one) and for the case of the 5x2 or 3x3 use a step-up regulator in steed of a step down The second part is efficiency of the candles. Most of the heat is wasted. It´s not turned into electricity, and not even into heat in the pan. One way of making this... sure have to rebuild quite a lot of the design, is to make a funnel. That is collect all the heat of the candles, funnel it up a "chimney" and have the thermal generators. Could have 4x2 and have a upper and lower stack in parallell. Or make a really narrow chimney and have 2 facing each other and have them stack 5 high. The last problem it self is the peltier elements... they are simply not that efficient. A normal rankine engine is about 4 times more efficent... but of cause.. find a home size rankine engine might not be that simple.

I've just discovered your channel. The quality of video, sound and editing is just incredible. Thank you very much for the effort and sharing your projects with us! You deserve more subs, I hope you the best, and i'm already subscribed ;D Keep it up! Btw: ¿Where are you from?

This is actually quite simple and really fun! I may actually do this project myself.

Here I am contimplating creating a thermoelectric gen. and you've gone out abd done a diy project again. Best Monday ever, hello from the San Jose CA.

This is what my life has been missing. A phone charger that makes hot chocolate!

You trully make this look simple and easy. and it is a THERMOELECRIC GENERATOR! hats off to you. cheers

The descriptions is flawless

Thank you for this guide, very interesting, simple, and handsome build) Looks really great.

I just defended my PhD thesis about thermoelectric generation and I have a suggestion for you. Inside most TE modules there is a layer of graphite that needs to be compressed in order for the modules to work properly. If you would clamp the modules together also during use, the power output from the generator would increase signififantly due to lower thermal (and to some extent also electrical) contact resistances inside the modules. The modules I've been working with should have a contact pressure of 1.2MPa. Such a clamping device would cause the whole generator to be a bit heavier but the increased performance would make it worth it. By the way, thanks for all great videos! :) // Olle

Good video! The science behind peltiers is pretty cool/fascinating and the application is fairly easy to apply to just about any heat source. Unfortunately, the tricky part/catch22 is coming up with an ultra-efficient (no cost) way to heat the hot side, while also efficiently cooling/pulling heat away from the cold side. Attaching a bunch of peltiers to a free heat source, such as (ie) a "fire-ring" (while camping in the middle of Winter) would work really well... but very few people are going to want to sit around a campfire in the middle of Winter/single-digit temps to take advantage of the limited electricity being produced. On a side note, if a person had a free/unlimited supply of candles and ice, the device in the video would be great to have around... especially during a power outage.

Thank you for the video, but more importantly thank you for doing the research and providing those links

Hi I am abhilash and I am 13 years old and I like to do electronics and make projects. And u have made an awesome project and even I was thinking to make one earlier and I would now definitely make it. Keep up the good work. GREETINGS FROM INDIA .☺

I love the amazing quality of your videos!

Input 800 watt of heat,output 1.5 watt of elecricity :D:D

So awesome! We party on the beaches of Lake Powell (az/utah) and this will prevent people from firing up their gasoline generators to charge their phones keeping the lake quiet at night! Relatively inexpensive to make a few or 5 and a fun conversation piece that will help my friends!

Love your voice, your ideas, your video quality, I LUH U MAN.

Awesome idea!

Hi there! Quick question -- what is the reason to wait for the regulator to reach 10V before turning it on? Also, is the reason for using a larger bread tin like that one you've used in your video so that it can generate more voltage? Not being an electrical engineer myself, I can only assume that more bread tin = more time it takes to warm up the water = longer/more consistent charging time? In other words, if you used a smaller tin, would you not be able to generate enough voltage? Thanks for this awesome video!!

Good stuff. I'm even thinking of using those thermoelectric plates to make a mini-fridge.

Thanks soooo much for this video, I'm using it as my Science Fair project

another great video man hope u make more videos frequently :D :D

Awesome!

Great invention as always Matt!

Awesome! What about putting everything in parallel 3 by 3? In this way, you'll have a lower voltage (max 3 or 4 volts) and a quite nice current. You can plug the new set up to a DC to DC step up boost converter and maybe obtain a better efficiency. Another nice ting could be putting a temp sensor like a pt100 and create a sort of an arduino overheating protection switch so you can fine tune the assembly in order to maximise the efficiency. A versus between a couple of arrangements could be quite interesting! Nice job and keep on doing interesting things like these!

I'm really tempted to buy those thermoelectric things now, but I don't have a use for them. They will become one of those "I'll probably use them at some point" things lying around my house.

Fantastic video. So clearly explained too. Thank you.

Man I remember I've asked you to do this months ago and you did it! Many thanks!!!

I don't know if there's a video already out there but I'm really curious if liquid nitrogen or dry ice would just destroy them or if it will still work

I would love to see this at scale, say, over a fire pit. You know, an apocalypse version lol given we had as large a stockpile of thermoelectric plates as we do TP

My masters dissertation was on a project that included these Peltier elements, interesting little devices. When you put current in them one side of the plate gets hot and the other cold, when you switch the polarities the hot and cold sides switch places, and the whole process is reversible - meaning when you add heat, current is produced.

Thank you for sharing it would be awesome to have more peltier projects

i read thermonuclear generator :(

"This Sweepstakes is open only to those who are legal residents of the fifty (50) states of the U.S."... yeah, no chance to win for me.. But the video was good! :)

Love your vids and your personality man, keep up the good work!

Wow this project can be done in just around 30 bucks I can't belive it! I'm going to give it a try, thanks DIY Perks!:D

Next Radioisotope thermoelectric generator please ;)

**recieves a call** hey bro you won 10 tons of raw aluminum plates, tell us where you want us to deliver them

Could you increase the output by reversing the plates. So rather than having a cold surface on the top, you add another plate upside down on top of this, so there's a constant hot/cold difference between them?

Very well explained and narrated. You could get a job as a narrator if you don't have one already. I have got to do this. This is absolutely brilliant. What about making a bigger one to charge a 12v battery? Would that be possible?

A rather dumb question: You did show footage using the generator in a campfire, which could be a rather volatile and uncontrolled source of heat.... What prevents cables and electronic parts from melting? (simply put, i do not know the temperatures which, the components can withstand) ALSO: I saw a heat sink, can the generator work like providing the power for the heat sink with a little excess?

7:04 - good look? ;)

Wow really inovative, what made you think of this, candels, water, regulator and all. My oh my creativity and science, at its best. SOOOOOO COOOOOL

I'm pretty sure that I'm some years late to be in with a chance of winning the four Native Union cables haha And thanks for the video, it was a pleasure watching it :)

"Let's make a thermometric generator. Step one, buy a thermometric generator on eBay. Step 2... done..."

Imagine a camping pot made like this. Hang on. Someone's done this already right?

This is a great video. I love the creativity!!! :D May I ask how long does it take to get 100% - if you don't count the time it takes to refil etc. Thanks!

Absolutely loved this video. Very informative. I'm definitely subscribing.

should've use a TEG to make it even better. instead of TEC

I think I should let everyone know that, according to the terms and conditions of the giveaway, its only available to people who live in the USA

Great video and an even better description!!!

Awesome Project!

1:38 surprisingly inefficient as well

use a bonfire. Those candles cost more than a new battery.

for some reason I love your voice!

You saved me I couldn't find a project to do for my physics class XD

I love everything about the concept except for mounting electronics over a steaming pot. If not shorting it out, the humidity will corrode the metal. -Justin

Molten aluminum on one side and liquid nitrogen on the other? hmmm

cool project!

Its such a clever device i'm sure theirs a lot of devices that can be useful using thermoelectric generators , many thanks for an interesting and informative video. Thank you Mark Hodges

Great video. I own a thermoelectric pot, now I think I'll build one.

Hi. Great video, thank you, and it has given me an idea. Please can you tell me if there's a single thermoelectric generator (plate) that can generate 12v at 1.5amp (i.e. 18 watts) or enough to power a computer fan? If not, maybe a group that could generate enough power to spin three computer fans? Thanks.

Saved the vid to my apocalypse survival playlist

This is great. How much temperature difference does the TE plate require to generate a measurable current?

Nice vid but curious as to why not a combo series/parallel arrangement if the voltage is too high?

Looking to build my own outdoor wood furnace to heat our home and barn. while I'm at it I might as well build a TEG on the fire box. Thanks for the idea.

hey remember me? i commented on one of you videos when you had alot less subs saying you looked like a Game of thrones character! Its good too see how much your channel has grown!

That's a cool use of Peltier coolers. :)

nice idea thanks for sharing

Hey I did something very similar using old frying pan to hold water/ice and metal (probably steel) plate on the lower part. I heated it by placing on a oven/furnace. I was wondering how to arrange the TECs, in series or parallel. Once you get stable 5-6V you can step it down easily but to charge devices at any reasonable rate you need something around 500mA with 2-3mA being the ideal (Ipads and what have you)

I am short of words. But I can say thank you for the video. I am currently reading on that, but video clearly made me understand the concept. ❤🎉

This has to be the simplest TEG project I've seen. Good job....

That's really cool! Very interesting component. Maybe you could make some DIY chillers with it too?

very cool- interesting those thermo plates

Perfect idea - I'm looking for the demonstrated (cake) tray which is pretty flat on the buttom side - which one has being used in the video or where can I buy this one?

I'm going to use this when I build my cabin in the Yukon. A little furnace with some water boiling and my little freezer. ;)

That is brilliant Matt, nice one.