Outdoor Wood Furnace Info
All-Purpose OWF Discussions => Plumbing => Topic started by: muffin on January 30, 2012, 07:14:24 AM
-
I have a single pump and loop for my house. On that loop is my DHW, 3 water/air exchangers and one water/water exchanger for my pool. I think this is causing some bad things since it is frequent that 2 items are on at a given time, 3 a lot of the time since the pool kind of comes on and stays on for the better part of the day. This is causing my returning water to be very cool. Like 110*F. I think this is causing my thermostatic valve to pretty much keep my system choked down almost all the time since it is set at 150*F.
What I was thinking of doing was splitting my system into 2 loops.
1st loop = DWH plus two of my house exchangers
2nd loop = my 3rd house exchanger and my pool water exchanger
I only have the one set of 1" lines coming into the house though. Can I simply tee it off and go to the two loops and then recombine it again? I was thinking I could install ball valves to control the flow rates to each loop. It doesn't seem to make sense to put a manifold in since that reduces the pipe size and all my exchangers are 1". I was hoping that my pump is capable of much more flow and is being limited by the long loop and all the valves. So I was thinking by splittting it they would maybe still get about the same flow; plus the returning water will hopfully be above the 150 so my thermostatic valve doesnt kick in.
Thoughts?
I have a Grundfos UP26-99F pump. It should be capable of 34GPM
-
you can do what you want any way you want..with tees and such or a manifold. why do you think a manifold will reduce anything? you could put your 1 inch feed line into a 6 inch pipe (just an example) with as many outlets as you wished and do the same thing with your return manifold. using valve at the manifold would give you control of all your devices from one handy spot
it would be a very good idea to control the flow to your pool for sure, if left unchecked i am sure it could still draw your temp down to where it may cool the OWB to below the 150 that shuts your lines down. (if your heat exchanger at the pool is big enough)
-
you can do what you want any way you want..with tees and such or a manifold. why do you think a manifold will reduce anything? you could put your 1 inch feed line into a 6 inch pipe (just an example) with as many outlets as you wished and do the same thing with your return manifold. using valve at the manifold would give you control of all your devices from one handy spot
it would be a very good idea to control the flow to your pool for sure, if left unchecked i am sure it could still draw your temp down to where it may cool the OWB to below the 150 that shuts your lines down. (if your heat exchanger at the pool is big enough)
I meant the bought manifolds. All the ones I see with 1" inlets have 3/4 or 1/2" outlets. It would seem bad to reduce to that and then go into a 1" exchanger. Do you think I will get enough flow in both loops? The line to my house is only 50', not sure how much resistance the thermostatic valve adds. I was thinking it should be pretty low resistance so maybe I could get about 10-15GPM in each loop. I think that would be sufficient for the exchangers. They are saying the pool exchanger should get 12-15GPM to work correctly.
-
i dont think you would have any problem except you may need to starve the pool exchanger (depending on what size it is)
if you can move the water fast enough through your pool exchanger not to draw it down below the 150 and your stove can recover that would be fine.
if your pool draws the temp of your boier water down too far you may have to slow down teh GPM goin gthrough the exchanger from the pool. this would slow the heating of the pool but also keep the return to the boiler higher
i think it would be a trial and error thing if you needed to do it.
i think you are on the right track of trying to seperate your exchangers
-
It can be done, different senario but my DHW is tee off separetly from the oil burner feed. Have 1.25" pex up to the house they tee 3/4" for DHW and 1" for oil burner, post exchanger they combine and 3/4" DHW line has a ball valve to control flow.
-
I don't know if your pool is in ground or above ground. Have you eliminated as much heat loss as you can from your pool?
I had a above 6ft wooden hot tub (gas fired 250k btu heater) and I cut my gas consumption down by 30% by floating a 1" thick piece of Armaflex foam insulation right on top of the water under the cover also I built a enclosure around the tub and lined it with 2" blueboard.
You should be able to get a roll of aluminum foil bubble wrap and piece it together to make a floating blanket you can roll up when you use the pool.
just a thought
Clyde
-
I don't know if your pool is in ground or above ground. Have you eliminated as much heat loss as you can from your pool?
I had a above 6ft wooden hot tub (gas fired 250k btu heater) and I cut my gas consumption down by 30% by floating a 1" thick piece of Armaflex foam insulation right on top of the water under the cover also I built a enclosure around the tub and lined it with 2" blueboard.
You should be able to get a roll of aluminum foil bubble wrap and piece it together to make a floating blanket you can roll up when you use the pool.
just a thought
Clyde
It is indoors and inground. I would lov to insulate it from the ground, but at install no one ever mentioned this and I am not sure if there isa product that would work and be reasonable cost wise. Now it would be a bit of an effort as I would have to drain the pool and pull the liner out.
I think I am going to try the splitting. Again I wish I had siome flow meters so I could see what was happening.
-
i read somewhere on line a while back in apool thread on another forum (or on the net) that a pool cover can save you up to 50 percent of your heat loss if your pool is outdoors. im not sure how much it would save on anindoor pool
i think you would need to slow the flow of water from your pool going through yoru exchanger to limit he amount of btu it draws. this would limit the amount of btu being drained form yoru stove and you could keep the level where the stove could recover. this would heat the pool slower but also be easier on teh water temp of your boiler so it could also keep up with the rest of the home