Presenting: #BitcoinHouseHeater
Based on the #BitcoinWaterHeater, this system can fully heat House, Water and HotTub with Bitcoin Miners, and this cheaper than the original heating costs (possibly completely free) 1/13
The 4x S9 Miners produce up to 6.6 kWh heat power, are immersion cooled with Bitcool and sit in a drinks cooler for best heat insulation. The oil can be heated up to 160F/70C, enough for heating house, pool and water. 2/13
All automated with HomeAssistant, ESPHome, Temperature Sensors, Relays and motorized Valves. Charts by Grafana for historical data and debugging. 3/13
Each consumer has its own oil loop and control system, which tells the central brain (Home Assistant) about temperature and status. The brain turns on the miners and pump and decides which loop receive oil and opens the valves. Each loop can run individually or all together. 4/13
The House is heated through the existing two zone baseboard and radiator heating system, which circulates hot water throughout the house. A plate heat exchanger installed into the existing system transfers the heat from the Bitcool to the water and heats the house. 5/13
The Water is heated with circulating the cold water from the bottom of the existing tank through a heat exchanger back into the cold water inlet of the tank. The existing thermostats on the tank are used to know when the hot water in the tank is cold and needs heat. 6/13
The HotTub is located in the yard, the water is pumped to the house, heated through a heat exchanger and back out to the hot tub. A temperature sensor in the HotTub tells us when it's hot enough to be enjoyed. 7/13
The HotTub and Water heating is already cheaper than the original heating as both of them were based on resistive heating and the miners have the same amount of efficiency but also produce Sats. Getting paid to shower and sit in the HotTub! 8/13
The House was Oil based and we spent around $900 a year for oil. With $0.12/kWh electricity and current BTC price it costs us $12 for the 4x S9 to run for 24h, so 1800h heating ($900/$12*24h). 9/13
With currently 50F/10C weather, the house needs heat for around 16h a day, this would give us 112 days of heating for the same cost as the oil. 10/13
Next step is to upgrade to 2x S19s, they have the same power (6.6kWh) but a much better efficiency and are profitable at $20k/BTC or at $0.08/kWh, if we can get that we would heat the house for free. 11/13
Like always I will write in depth articles on how the system works, create explainer videos and open source as much as possible. Plus I'm available for podcasts to talk more about the system, hit me up! 12/13
Bonus: Some behind the scene building pictures and videos:
🧵 Libre Board - Why?
The Libre Board is a project by the @256Foundation to create a fully Open Source #Bitcoin Mining Control Board. Some folks asked: “Why do we need this?”
As the Lead Dev of the Libre Board, I’ll explain everything in this thread.
Let’s dismantle proprietary mining together.
How does the Libre Board fit into the 256 Foundation’s other projects? That form a complete open source mining stack. This hasn’t existed in years.
⚔️ The mission: Dismantle the proprietary mining empire.
🟧 The goal: Make Bitcoin + freedom tech accessible to anyone
Here’s the full stack:
🔹 Ember One by @skot9000
Open Source hash board — 12 chips, 100W power draw, USB-C instead of Antminer/Whatsminer ribbon cables.
Future versions will support other chips like Intel & Proto, higher wattages. You can also use it standalone via USB-C and any computer. 👉 emberone.org
🔹 Libre Board by @Schnitzel
Our Open Source control board. Connects multiple Ember Ones. Ethernet + WiFi. Runs the Mujina Firmware. Learn more below!
🔹 Mujina Firmware by @ryankuester
Runs on Libre Board. Connects to pools, gets hash work, distributes work to hash boards. Can also run on any Linux system. 👉 mujina.org
🔹 Hydra Pool by @jungly
One-click installer for a self-hosted Bitcoin mining pool. Full node + Stratum support. 👉 hydrapool.org
People have been asking how to prep miners for submersion. I've just added a second S9 to the #bitcoinwaterheater, so I used the opportunity to take some photos and videos on the process for 4x S9.
Step 1: disassemble the miners - yes some of them are filthy...
Step 2: clean them with compressed air
Step 3: Put some of Bitcool in a pan and wash each part in it, use a brush to get some of the stuck stuff off
#bitcoinwaterheater update: Back on track!
After a bit a downer thinking that Miner uses 2x energy, I'm happy to report that indeed most of the loss was towards heating the room and not a flaw of the system itself. 💪 TLDR: We're 69% as efficient and that's without any insulation
After talking to other home miners (big thanks to @Adrian_van_Wijk) its clear that the key is to insulate everything as good as possible. Plus also reduce the amount of bitcool that is used as much as possible, as it has to be reheated first before it can heat the water.
Here the actual data:
24h sampling, used 34.7l during shower, did two heat cycles, plus heating right after the shower. Total 6.71kWh. The electrical water heater used 4.66kWh also for 24h, this makes an efficiency of 69%. Now again, this is only a single day, need more data
#bitcoin Miner #Airstream heater build 🧵
Of course main question is: why even bother? 1. Heaters in RVs are propane based and can be a bit finicky (not work at all) 2. They are even on or off, creating temperature swings 3. If you are out of propane you are out of heat.
1/16
Using a #bitcoin miner gives a more constant heat (with Braiins we can control the exhaust temperature), plus it runs on electricity which at most RV Parks is included in the rent of the space (therefore "free" heating). So how it is built? 2/16
It's an Antminer S9 with a 12V squirrel fan (much less noise than the normal fans) in a plastic box. It sucks air through a dryer vent into the box and pushes the air out via the miner, through a hole in the box into the Airstream. 3/16