Fresnel lense ?

[1shotwade]

My DLP tv bit the dust a while back so I scrapped it. I keep hearing about the fresnel lense being valuable so I saved it. Now what do I do with it? Anyone know where I can just sell it for a few bucks? Is there a way to use it for something around the homestead?
Thanks,

Wade

[po boy]

Wade, you can do a lot with one of those including burning your house down. I've wanted to get one to play with...............Check these images for ideas.

[po boy]

Check this out.

[1shotwade]

Good one Po Boy! Thanks. I'm going to have to do some studying up on this!
Wade

[pengyou]

If you don't need such high heat, you can use a fresnel lens to distill water, if you have ground water that is questionable. You could use it to heat steel piping and blow air through it to make a forced air heating system. I can be used to power a sterling engine to create mechanical energy.

[Nimrod]

If you need a lighthouse in the neighborhood you could use it there. Back in the day they used a Fresnel lens to concentrate the light from an oil lamp to send out the beam.

http://www.tripadvisor.com/LocationP...Minnesota.html

How about building a telescope and putting it in orbit?

[MrSmith]

I've picked up a few free tv's to get these, there is a quality difference and how much heat you can get. The first one I had would barely fry bacon, my last one can burn a hole thru a pan. If you don't need your own personal solar powered death ray, a fellow enthusiast would probably buy it off craigslist. These tv's are going to get harder to find and the lenses more valuable in the next few years.

[Carl]

I've also picked up a few of these tv for free, off of craigslist.

Made a simple frame to hold the lens up, and put a table on a motorcycle jack, to have finer control on height..

My idea was to have the lens heat a steel ball, which would then in turn radiate heat through a copper coil around the ball, which water could be pumped through.

It put out massive amounts of heat, burning a hole though the stone on the table...

Problem is it's pretty finicky when it comes to focusing, and there is a very small optimal focus threshold. I constantly had to rotate and tilt the lens, while adjusting height of the table, to follow the sun.

I think the solution might be to have the heated object fixed, while moving the lens above with a solar tracker system, which can be purchased for $50-100, maybe even less if ya source the parts an put it together yourself.

Still I think there's potential.