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[american-pacemaker]

How deep should the logstor pipe be buried. My ground is nothing but wet clay and rocks ? Should the pipe be laid in a
bed of compacted sand before being covered ?
Thanks

[slimjim]

Logstor asks for 18 inches of cover under a driveway to protect the pipe from damage, you will need to be about 3-4 feet deep to make the bend up into the back of the boiler, surround it with some decent bank run sand and you'll be fine

[american-pacemaker]

Slimjim, you had said on the phone that the logstor is not very freindly to bend or work with. Is 36" radius an absolute
minimum to bend ? I have to turn 90 degrees twice to get into the house.

[slimjim]

Yes, to make a 90 you will need 3 feet.

[Sprinter]

Heat or sunlight can be your friend when making those bends. Pea stone and sand provide great drainage, can't use enough of it

[Sloppy_Snood]

Heat or sunlight can be your friend when making those bends. Pea stone and sand provide great drainage, can't use enough of it

Good suggestion Sprinter. 

I was watching a YouTube video where the televised Canadian handyman (forgot his name) installed an Optimizer 250....

...he had a crew there helping him but the worker making the 90° bend up for connection to the OWB used a couple 2-inch ratchet straps to bend the pipe in the ditch and backfill to keep the pipe in the correct orientation during backfill. This method seemed to work well for the Logstor installation (this is what I am going to try).  Where the ratchet strap wraps around the piping, use a scrap piece of rubber inner tube (or similar) in order to prevent the strap from abrading the Logstor's outer casing. 

[Cabo]

After trying to bend Logstor at Slimjim's this weekend, I can tell you the stuff is stout.  Granted the piece had been laying in the snow so it was very cold.  A couple of thoughts come to mind if you can't wait for a warm sunny day to install.  An conduit blanket used for electric pipe(pvc) may help.  Easy to control but will only warm a 2' area at a time.  Another way could be to use a Salamander heater (kerosene) to heat a section.  You would want to be very careful as to not overheat a section with this method.  It seemed to me that the outer casing was the main issue and possibly with it being warmed, the foam/pipe would follow fairly easy. 

[Sprinter]

Never direct flame heat on any of these pipes. They are all a poly something and even a few seconds above 313 degrees ruins the pipe. It just takes a while for it to show up in some cases.  It doesn't take much to tarp it and let the hot air do its thing without direct heat. After 160 she comes around. And the strap is a good idea I will surely use from now on. Damn it's those simple details that help out a lot.....

[Sloppy_Snood]

Yes, to make a 90 you will need 3 feet.

Not sure if anyone posted the following information on this forum but while determining what length of Logstor I needed, mathematics struck me in the brain again. 

A 3 feet minimum bending radius does not mean the bent length of pipe is 3 feet long! (this is probably why some guys come up short on the length of their purchased Logstor.... just a guess).

Mathematics:  Circumference of a Circle

If one acknowledges that a 90 degree bend is basically 1/4 of the circumference of a circle, the actual length of Logstor piping that is needed strictly for the bend can easily be calculated.


Circumference of a Circle = 2 * pi * (radius of the circle)

For a circle with a radius of 3 feet,

Circumference = 2 * pi * 3 ft. which equals 18.86 feet circumference length


A circle consists of 360 degrees but we only need to make a 90 degrees bend.

90 / 360 = .25 or 25% of the circumference of the circle with r=3.

25% of 18.86 = .25 * 18.86 feet = 4.71 feet


In short, for each 90 degree bend of Logstor piping with a minimum bending radius of 3 feet, one needs to purchase 4.71 feet of length.

[mlappin]

dang that pesky math.

Off the top of my head I would have guessed five feet.

I have unfair advantage though, have 4" blower pipe that is a 3 foot radius but measures roughly five foot as it has about 3 inches of straight on each end for connections.