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[willieG]

rsi is the expert on those plate eschangers but i will throw an idea out there and he can tell us if it would work. i am guessing on gpm through that plate exchanger but lets go with it and rsi can tell us if it has a chance of working.

i will say that your taco 11 is capable of moving 7 or 8 gpm (likley close) and lets say your small plate exchanger willl only let 3 gpm pass through it (strictly a guess on my part) and this is the only line going to your water air exchanger in your furnace then you may not be getting enough water to  heat your home and your water.

lets say you were to use a header or a by-pass around your plate exchanger with valves on the lines..
you would have 1 feed line to your plate exchanger and one feed line to your water to air exchanger and after both your appliances the lines would join back into one return line to your OWB. this would allow the taco 11 to push its maximum amount of gpm...the 3 gpm would still go through your plate exchanger and the remainder of what the taco could push would go through your water to air exchanger. you would have valves on both lines that you could choke down or open to adjuct your flow

i currently use a taco 11, am 250 from the house and use a header system to heat my home via water to air exchanger in the furnace plenum, my domestic water in a home made water to water exchanger and a small loop of about 200 feet of radiant heat, and on occasion run a water to air exchanger in my fireplace. my thoughts are you rpump is big enough but you are holding the gpm delivered back because of yoru small plate exchanger. lets see what the fellas who know about plate exchangers think

[gandgracing]

I've only got an Armstrong Astro 30 pump. I think I need at least that taco 0011.

Astro-30 Circulator Pump - 1/25 HP - Single Phase, 115 Volt - Fluid Lubricated - Cast Iron Volute - Connection Flanged 3/4 To 1-1/2" - 6-3/8" Flange To Flange - 19 GPM At 1' - Max Head 17' At 1 GPM - Replaces Grundfos UP15-42, UPS15-42, B&G Red Fox NRF - Mfg #1102 23-305

[willieG]

I've only got an Armstrong Astro 30 pump. I think I need at least that taco 0011.

Astro-30 Circulator Pump - 1/25 HP - Single Phase, 115 Volt - Fluid Lubricated - Cast Iron Volute - Connection Flanged 3/4 To 1-1/2" - 6-3/8" Flange To Flange - 19 GPM At 1' - Max Head 17' At 1 GPM - Replaces Grundfos UP15-42, UPS15-42, B&G Red Fox NRF - Mfg #1102 23-305

yes, i tend to agree your pump is likley too small, i cant find your pumps "curve" but you should be sizing your pump so that (once you figure out your head loss) you land somewhere close to the middle of the curve. i would guess your needed water demand would be about 6 to 8 gpm and you may be (again guessing) getting 6 gpm at about 9 or 10 feet of head (and your system is likley more than that) these are all just guesses but from what you have provided and what you say is really happening leads to at least a too small of pump (and possably the plate exchanger guys could tell you what kind of head pressure your exchanger is adding) charts on the net can be found for figuring out head loss per foot of pipe but i have not been able to find one for the exchangers.

this is one of the reasons i went with a feed and return header. i can control the flow of water through each line with the valve on the feed header. i run most of them wide open and things seem to work out great.

[beeman]

if you do  trade it out why not make one like willie has this is my plan keep it simple

[RSI]

rsi is the expert on those plate eschangers but i will throw an idea out there and he can tell us if it would work. i am guessing on gpm through that plate exchanger but lets go with it and rsi can tell us if it has a chance of working.

i will say that your taco 11 is capable of moving 7 or 8 gpm (likley close) and lets say your small plate exchanger willl only let 3 gpm pass through it (strictly a guess on my part) and this is the only line going to your water air exchanger in your furnace then you may not be getting enough water to  heat your home and your water.

lets say you were to use a header or a by-pass around your plate exchanger with valves on the lines..
you would have 1 feed line to your plate exchanger and one feed line to your water to air exchanger and after both your appliances the lines would join back into one return line to your OWB. this would allow the taco 11 to push its maximum amount of gpm...the 3 gpm would still go through your plate exchanger and the remainder of what the taco could push would go through your water to air exchanger. you would have valves on both lines that you could choke down or open to adjuct your flow

i currently use a taco 11, am 250 from the house and use a header system to heat my home via water to air exchanger in the furnace plenum, my domestic water in a home made water to water exchanger and a small loop of about 200 feet of radiant heat, and on occasion run a water to air exchanger in my fireplace. my thoughts are you rpump is big enough but you are holding the gpm delivered back because of yoru small plate exchanger. lets see what the fellas who know about plate exchangers think

What size pipe to you have running to the house?
I have a similar setup. (did it almost 10 years ago) I have 2 water to air heat exchangers and a 10 plate all on a manifold setup. 1" Pex-al-pex is feeding it.  I have to restrict the flow most of the way on  the water to air heat exchangers to get enough through the plate. I used to have a 0011 on it but removed it after one winter because I didn't care for it. I had a Grundfos 26-96 on it till last year. Now I have a PL36 on it and it works better. If I were doing it again I would put a bigger plate first and run all the water through it. It works good enough the way it is so I never messed with it.

[RSI]

I've only got an Armstrong Astro 30 pump. I think I need at least that taco 0011.

Astro-30 Circulator Pump - 1/25 HP - Single Phase, 115 Volt - Fluid Lubricated - Cast Iron Volute - Connection Flanged 3/4 To 1-1/2" - 6-3/8" Flange To Flange - 19 GPM At 1' - Max Head 17' At 1 GPM - Replaces Grundfos UP15-42, UPS15-42, B&G Red Fox NRF - Mfg #1102 23-305

Did you mention if the boiler supply line to the plate is the top or bottom port? I didn't see if you did.
The reason I am asking is if it is to the top and leave at the bottom, there is a good chance it is full of air. If this is happening the water is just falling through and not making contact with the plate. That would explain why the water is not getting heated and why the boiler water is coming out hot.

[gandgracing]

It is entering the bottom. Since I switched the domestic lines around it is giving good heat off to the water for showers. I just think the air will be cool coming out of the registers. I'm looking for a bigger pump but don't know what to get. You really can't go to big can you??  So is the taco 0011 no big enough?  And does it have to be a bronze instead of a cast pump.

[RSI]

A taco 0011 might be big enough but a B&G PL36 isn't much more and will pump more but use less power.
If you stay with Taco, a 009 might actually pump more than the 0011 if you keep that plate.

You could also just add another pump like you have. You can just bolt them together to double the head pressure that they can output.

[gandgracing]

Do I need a bronze pump?  I have a taco 009 running my shop heater and the flow is really slow on that pump. I thought I needed something faster.

[willieG]

i just used the taco 11 as reference as i thought that is what gandgracing had (my mistake)  my current set up is 1 inch pex underground 250 feet from OWB to home.(one way) once in the home i drop back to 3/4 copper to the water to air in the furnace about 8 foot run one way..3/4 copper to the domestic exchanger about 30 feet one way, 1/2 inch pex 60 feet to my fire place,(one way) and 1/2 pex to my floor heat (entrance to the floor about 8 feet away((one way))) the loop is about 200 feet long. the only thing i restrict at all is the floor loop. the taco 11 has worked for 10 years now. I am sure there are better pumps out there now, as i  only used the 0011 in my post as that is what i thought the user had. i would recomend that he worked on finding his head pressure in his system before ordering any pump. and then finding a pump that could suppply his needed gpm and his estimated head pressure that would meet somewhere near or slighlty below the middle of his pumps curve. hope this makes some sense?

[willieG]

Do I need a bronze pump?  I have a taco 009 running my shop heater and the flow is really slow on that pump. I thought I needed something faster.

cahrts i read on the net put a 009 at 25 feet of head  at 4 gpm the taco 11 is just about double the gpm at the same head

bronze pumps are recomended for open systems i believe? but you should do your own search

as for pumps if you go to the taco web site i think you can look at a lot of pump curves for all inds of pumps (as i would think you could for grudsfos as well)  you really need to figure out how many gpm you would like to deliver and calculate your head pressure in your system before buying any pump

most folks that buy theses stoves are at the mercy of hte dealer and although there are many dealers that will help you a tremendos amount there are (i ithink) more that know nothing of what they are selling except the profit in thier pocket. that is why sites like this and owbinfo.com are so valuable. moving water is not so simple

[gandgracing]

Ok next question...  Just add up all the vertical lines and there is an uphill line back to the boiler.

[willieG]

in an open system you need to add up the total footage of your system and elbows, tees, valves, as they all have a "value" in calculating your head loss. you should be able to find charts on the net for these things. a valve "may" have a value of say, 1.2 feet of pipe and a tee may say .5 of a foot and so on then there are values for each size of line and type of material the line is made from. (what i am typing is not the true values as i am not looking at charts as i am at work)

lets say teh valur for 1 inch copper is 1.3. you would add up your total footage including the vlaues for your fittings. lets say that came to 200 feet yo uwould now multiply that by the value for copper  and that would be your head loss in that length of pipe

perhaps 1 inch pex would be 1.5 and that would change the head pressure in the same lenght of total pipe because you would now multiply by that value

these values change for each type of material and each size of pipes

now the lazy mans way of doing all this is find someone on this site that has the  approximate size of system as you and aske them how their system works and what size of pump they have. i am sure most on here would tell you.

like i said earlier moving water is not so simple

there are other values you need to use and i have just touched on one to show you that it is not so simple. there are things to consider like what delta temp you would like to use, how hot your water actually is (this would determine the btu value in each gpm) and so on

those hvac guys dont just show up and plop a furnace in your house..they have to do their homework (if you get a good one)

[gandgracing]

I just bought this pump from menards. Stiebel Eltron 577003 CP3S26-110BFC. What do u think

[willieG]

i never found the actual pump curve but i think i found a comparison chart and in teh middle speed it matches a taco 11 and the 3rd speed is higher yet. so i would make a guess (according ot that) ....you have a good pump (if it can hold up)