23V at 9 A or 17V at 9A?

[Miss_Man]

For a drift 0.8 172 watt peltier thats 24V @ 11A, would 23V @ 9A or 17V @ 9A be better? Which would cool better?

[Butcher]

You can't get either of those. Current is not independent from voltage, you pick one and work out the other you don't pick both.
At 23V you'll get 10.5A.
At 17V you'll get 7.8A.
To get 9A you'll need 19.6V
Optimal performance for a TEC is the 75-85% band - 18-20.4V on this model.

[Miss_Man]

So 7.8A is what it draws at 17V. Wish I could bring my voltage up to 19V, Either its 23V or 17V, I have no potmeters to adjust in the power supplies. Actually what I meant was if I give it 23V but only 9A since thats all I have, would it give better temps than 17V and giving it all the amps it can take which is 7.8A?

[futRtrubL]

What would happen if you attached it to a 23V supply that can give a max of 9 Amps is that the 23V might drop to a lower voltage (while stressing the power supply) or it might just blow a fuse or trip a breaker or if unprotected just melt the power suply, all ways a bad thing.

Edward

[PsyKoRealm]

Basically this is my motto:

1. Try it! With pelts you should not give it 100% power but hey, running it at different configurations is what peltier cooling is all about. Don't be affaid to experiment. Of course if you think you run into danger of breaking something then don't do it.

2.Peltiers are like woman.. everyone it unique and needs to be treated differently. So experiment with different configurations.

[Brad]

pelts aren't like women, they are hard as hell, and their main body is flat.


at 23v, your pelts wouldn't be too efficient, and your psu might have issues. at 17v however your pelts would be quite efficient, if not being utilised fully, and your psu would be under little strain

[kemical]

im no electrician so forgive me if this sounds dumb, but would it be possible to use a couple of large variable resistors in between the pelts and the power supply so you could use just the right amount of power? Or the opposite and use some voltage controlled amplifiers? If its possible, (just day dreaming here) could you then control the resistance/voltage from a rheostat of some sort that your pelt is getting the perfect amount of voltage depending on the temp of the cpu?

[Brad]

yes it would, but the resistors would produce a lot of heat, you'd need to cool them with a hsf, which would be sort of negating the purpose if you ask me

[decodeddiesel]

http://www.ohmslaw.com

you really should have a basic understand of electricity and how these BASIC princables work before you begin toying with something as complex and dangerous as a TEC. No with a TEC the resistance is not linear, it is dependant on a lot of other things but for approximations of voltage and current using an approximation of the resistance is good enough. Still, read up people this link will demistify a lot of things for you.