OK, I did cheat with 6 inch pipe, my dad had some for free. I also added a “Majic Heat” in line with the 6” pipe to try and catch more heat for the garage. Any way that hurts much?
I am trying to figure out how you mean to place the fire bricks as you say. They have been there as they were when I bought it from Zenon. Do you mean turn them 90 degrees each? They are directly under the nossles right now. A third piece of cupped brick lies in the rear with the cupped end facing the front. Should I put this at the fron door then?
If I exchange heat at the bottom of the tank, will the top of the tank over heat? Will it not get to a temp over 180? I have a gauge in the middle, it reads 180 when I idle.
I just fired up and cleaned everything, even the upper chambers ash. Probably 6 inches thick with packed ashes, except around the nossle area where it was loos ash.
I cut my wood from timbered trees. they were down a year before I sliced em up. I will to try and cut earlier this year.
Keep it commin guys.
Thats what I get by letting my fingers do the thinking. What I should have said was; With your pressureized tank you can pipe the hot water from the boiler to the top of the tank and get the return from the bottem. That way you will heat the tank from the top to bottem and use all the storage. Take the house heat from the top of the tank and return to the bottem. That will give you good stratification. To keep from having low water return to the boiler you need to either have an automatic system or you can install a manual valve from the hot to return. Once you have your tank up to temp and you fire it reg. you shouldn’t have a problem with low water temp. I installed a manual valve that I open and close off the tank untill I once get it up to temp. and since I keep my tank up on temp it’s no problem.
leaddog
If you look at this thread at the pic that eric posted you will see the refactory u-shaped bricks. They are to all be facing the way his are. You should have three on the 60 and there is 4 on the 80. They are to be stacked end to end so you can see the u all the way to the back. They are loose so you can take them out if you want but they must weigh about 50 lbs. http://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/12102/
Also these pic give you a good view of the air adj. read this over good as there is some good advice and a warning of a problem with the air tubes.
I think that useing 6in pipe and THEN using the majic heat will cause you some draft problems. You are only getting a draft temp of a bout 400f or less and alot of the time it is less, so if you start pulling off more heat it will lower your draft and you might start to condense the water vapor and that will give you ceosote and corosion problems.
leaddog
Happy new year and clean burning to all. I have been a bit tied up with work the past weeks and just been following threads, just no time to respond. I think you are getting most angles covered here already, and the new picks show a nice flame, but if I’m right I just see one.
My question is related to the Laddomat, I see it in the one pic, but can not see how it is set up. I think a piping and control diagram cam be helpful here. I am wondering if it may be part of the issue as well.
I am looking here and I dont see how mine are wrong. They are stacked as you described, but I only have 2 and then the U. My cousin, my unclle also only got 2. Should there be 3?!!!
One other problem I noticed. Your door seals are bad. It shows creosote on the edges of the doors so they must be leaking. You can tighten up the doors. The instuctions are in the manual. Its a good thing to lube them once and a while as that keeps them plyable.
That isn’t black paint on the inside of your fan housing. It’s creasote. once you get the idleing under control you won’t have that problem.
I’ve been looking at your work and it is great. I’ve always admired the barn art. My folks used to have a large barn of balloon contruction and we always wanted to have some art work done on it but never did. It went down in a bad wind storm a few years ago. It’s too bad the old barns are becoming a think of the past.
leaddog
Thanks Leaddog, I really love what I do. Something about painting the old barn I like.
I have leaks now around my upper door since I thought I would try and adjust the door to close better. Now I cant seem to get it adjusted proper. What is a good lube to use? I used to sit and try to read and read that “manual”. I may have used it to start a fire. Not really.
Does anyone think my laddomat is holding back some power?
I am looking here and I dont see how mine are wrong. They are stacked as you described, but I only have 2 and then the U. My cousin, my unclle also only got 2. Should there be 3?!!!
Maybe on the older ones they were different but the new ones have 3 for the 60 and 4 for the 80 all the same shape and they are put in back to back. You can ask zennon at newhorizon.com and he can tell you. I don’t know what the u shaped one is unless it might be a broken one??????
How are your relatives boilers working?
leaddog
Thanks Leaddog, I really love what I do. Something about painting the old barn I like.
I have leaks now around my upper door since I thought I would try and adjust the door to close better. Now I cant seem to get it adjusted proper. What is a good lube to use? I used to sit and try to read and read that “manual”. I may have used it to start a fire. Not really.
Does anyone think my laddomat is holding back some power?
I used high temp silicone, but a graphite spray will work also. Anything to help keep it from sticking to the metal. If the seal is too bad you can buy new rope seal at most stove or hardware. I got some at menards for about $8 for another stove and also some at a yard sale for .50.
leaddog
My uncle never connected his, and is willing to sell it. My Cousin has good burns, but he has to much demand and needs to load every 5-6 hours. He is looking to go bigger and might buy a central boiler. I on the other hand hope I can tweek mine and get more miles out of it heat wise. So if anyone know of someone looking for an eko, with storage, look me up.
leaddog--I rewrote that manual for Zenon. The one that came with my boiler was something I thought could be improved upon. It’s still far from perfect. Basically all I did was dress up the translation so that it wasn’t such a hoot. I’d love to convince Zenon to let me write up a comprehensive manual that covers all the stuff we talk about on this forum. You know, you’d think there would be some discussion of setting the primary and secondary air, stack temps, etc. Stuff you really need to know. I think that would be fun, and useful. Nowadays, the downloadable user/service manuals are sales tools. The better they look, the more boilers you sell. If I can talk the Z-man into it, maybe you guys can help me out.
barnartist: My 60 has three identical blocks in the gasification chamber. They’re all like the one you show in the front, and stack end to end, front to back. It looks to me like you have the two back ones in kind of a t-shape, which is a little strange. But you’ve got an older version of this boiler, and I know they’ve made some changes in recent years.
Are we helping you at all? I think all the points raised so far are legitimate, and you’ll seem some improvements if you address them. The pictures were really helpful. I think leaddog’s piping suggestions on your tank are a biggie. That and getting a good moisture reading on your wood. Everything else so far is just maintenance, I think.
I so agree to re write that manual. I wish I knew then What I know now. Help the next guy from jumping a bridge.
Just a few adjustments since I started here have made some differences. I need to lears about auquastats and how they work/plumb.
What is sad id I have had my system set up the way nofossel described, using pex, it was a matter of hours for a change. My problem then was my hand made ground line, I lost so much heat in the ground. I would keep changing my plumbing, get mixed advice from Zenon, and do it again. Now I have it all hard piped, and dred changing it, but i’ll take one for the team if it will help. Id love to have enough extra heat to restart my basement slab radiant again. More bad advice there, this time from a web site I found that sells stuff for radiant.
I was able to gasify within 1 hour this evening, building a fire from scratch. This is good. I was at an idle within 2 hours, so I will in fact need to figure out how to plumb to store and use my tank correctly. I dont like all the smoke though from building new fires. Its really bad, then forget any relations with wife until a shower is performed.
Does anyone think my laddomat is holding back some power?
It should not, but when it is plumbed in backwards it will, as it has one way valves inside. Also if the thing is in right it can be an asset to the system you have with the pressurised storage. It wil also prevent the the boiler from running cold at startup or when cold water returns from the heating zones.
I think you can greatly reduce or eliminate the smoke problem by putting going up to 8” on your chimney connector and getting rid of the heat saver. You don’t need that with 300 degree stack temps. And 8” compared to 6” is huge. I’m not surprised you get a face full of smoke.
