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Topics - woodman

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1
General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Another BTU question
« on: January 05, 2018, 12:57:46 PM »
I seem to have a lot of hypothetical questions this year. I know target delta t for most hx's is 20, but why? Does a delta t of 20 amount to a given amount of btu's regardless of water temperature?  For example, with everything else being the same (blower cfm, system gpm) are there the same amount of btu's derived from 180-160 as there is from 140-120? If so, and you disregard return temperature and had a delta t of 60 degrees would that be the equivalent BTU's to 3 times the gpm of a delta t of 20? The reason I ask is I am trying to get more BTU's through my 1" Thermopex lines, without using a larger circulator. It seems you hit a wall at 7.5-8 GPM with 1" pex.

I have been watching my water temps with this cold snap, (low teens for highs, lows 0-10 below) and am able to HEAT my house with 110 water, and MAINTAIN house temps down to 90-100 degree water. With 160 water and a delta t of 20 the temp at my registers is 130. What would the temp be at the registers be if I slowed the water down and pulled water temp from 160-100 at the hx?     

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Flat plate question
« on: December 03, 2017, 07:04:01 AM »
Hi guys. Will a flat plate hx have output water that eventually is the same temp as the owb input hot water if that same water is circulated through the hx on the domestic side. In other words if I am using 180 degree water from my  owb will the hx put out 180 degree water if there is no load, or is there a loss through the exchange that is not recovered in the water?

3
As the title reads, where can I buy a gallon of certified labs water treatment?

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Advanced Plumbing / Vocabulary lesson
« on: November 28, 2016, 06:22:35 AM »
Well the time has come for me to correctly re plumb the indoor side of my heat system. Back in 07 when I had no idea what I was doing and how complex my house would become, I simply ran my plate exchanger first in series with my forced air hx. Simple, 1 pump on back of the boiler and 2 hx's. Now I am up to 4 hx with the future plans of one more. You can imagine what the head loss is and what my return temps are. Believe it or not it still actually works quite well since there are rarely more than 2 hx's calling for heat at one time. Still, I am currently up to 4 now with the plans for 1 more for sure, and who knows where I go from there. Back in 07 if you would have told me how much I like all this stuff and how it has almost become a hobby I would have laughed.

I've got a pretty good idea how I want to do it, I just need to know all the correct names of the components. I plan on converting to a primary secondary loop. On the secondary loop each hx will be a separate zone, with each zone controlled with a zone valve. A single pump will take care of the secondary. That is where I get a little lost. What exactly do I need at each hx to tell its zone valve to open and how does that zone valve tell the secondary loop pump to turn on or off. I know there are relays and pump controls but I need to know what they are called and how they work and are wired.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Anyway to cheat a undersized boiler
« on: January 06, 2016, 11:12:44 AM »
Is there any good way to add some cushion to a undersized boiler. The thing is, it's not undersized 90% of the time. I run into trouble when it drops to near zero at night and multiple morning showers require more btu's than I have left after 12-14 hours. I know the easy fix is to go top off the boiler at 9 or 10, but I am lazy. I usually get home around 5 and load up the boiler and I don't want to see it again till 7-8 the next morning. From 8am til 5pm my heat load is considerably less than it is from 5pm till 8am. I was thinking about adding some buffer tanks in the basement, but I don't know how much or how to do it. The thought was charging during the day when the boiler spends a fair amount of time at idle.

6
This post is mostly just me venting and for any guys out there having a hard time with this deep concrete snow conditions. This is my 8th season with my owb and for a number of reasons I am struggling like never before! I knew this fall I was going to have trouble, and I knew it would be worse if the snow was deep during the home stretch of the burning season. The last couple of years I have spent a great deal of time finishing the last stages of my house, which left me little time to stay ahead on my firewood. This wood I am burning now, is complete crap! For the life of me I can not get it to build up a coal bed, it acts just like pine but doesn't burn as hot. Combine the crap wood with the coldest February on record, 2 feet of snow in the woods, add in what is now my largest heat load ever placed on my system between added sq ft and even more dhw demand, and I am having a little trouble. I am going to get through this and the weather is suppose to break a little next week, and I am looking forward to it! I will do everything I can to not fall this far behind again.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Conventional boiler loophole?
« on: February 02, 2015, 05:59:29 PM »
So if the new EPA standards are put into effect this spring, will there be a loophole for the manufactures that build "coal boilers" that could burn wood also?

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / 8 month heating season
« on: May 01, 2014, 05:06:50 AM »
May 1st and it might make it up to 50 today, mid thirtys at night.

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Portage & Main / true comparisions
« on: April 01, 2014, 11:16:49 AM »
Let me cut to the chase, in a true apple to apple comparison how much less wood will the bl series use compared to my Hawken, which is very similar in design to a conventional wood doctor. Then one step further how much less will the optimizer use compared to the bl series. Also, is this the last year for the bl's if the epa rules hold true?

10
Electronics / Multi speed forced air blower motor
« on: March 13, 2014, 08:24:45 PM »
Just to avoid any confusion, I am talking about the furnace blower in my basement. My current setup is a water to air hx in forced air furnace. I use a separate programmable thermostat to  turn the blower fan on and off. If I changed the single speed blower to a ECM variable rate blower would it be possible to make it operate like a 2 stage furnace? Here is what I would like, set point would be the slowest speed. If it was cold and could not keep up and temp fell more than 1 degree below set point it would go to medium speed. A difference of 3 or more would put the motor in high speed. Is this possible to do with just a thermostat or does the blower need to communicate with the furnace burner?

11
General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / -20 this morning
« on: February 28, 2014, 05:06:09 AM »
It's cold this morning. The house is 95 degrees warmer than the outside!

12
Wow! What a difference a year makes! Last year we had the earliest and warmest spring I can remember, and this year is exactly the opposite. It is miserable here in Michigan, stiff East wind, rain/snow with windchills in the 20's. The extended forcasts I watch show no real changes for the next 3-4 weeks! I started a fire in the owb at the end of September and she has been going since. Looking at a real 8 month heating season, if I didn't like burning wood I would probably be in a bad mood.  :thumbup:

13
Plumbing / High demand and return temp question
« on: February 02, 2013, 08:14:53 PM »
Ok plumming experts, here is my question. I have 3 hx's in a series. The first pulls 10 degrees, the second pulls 20 and the third pulls another 10. Not often do all 3 call for heat at the same time, but when they do how am I suppose to keep return temps up. If it was set up off a manifold it would be no different unless it would only allow 1 zone to circulate at a time, right?

14
We finally get a little cold spell to put our systems to the test. So how is everyone doing? After being in the single digits all day we went a little below zero last night in addition to a 15mph breeze. At last check we are up to +2*. I had to pull out of the pine I had been burning and switch over to some good stuff, oak, cherry. Filled her up at 5:30pm yesterday and today at 9:00am had a nice coal bed to start over with. House was 74 when I went to bed last night, set back to 71 at midnight then back up to 74 at 6am. That along with 1 bath and 2 hot showers, and keeping my garage 55* I have to say I am pretty happy. Hope everyone else is having similar results! :thumbup:   

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For Sale / Shark bite fittings
« on: December 30, 2012, 01:12:41 PM »
I have some new 1" shark bite fittings. I will list what I have and try to posts some pics and prices later on.

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