Trying to plumb nyle therm DHW heat pump

I have a thought but that doesn't mean I'm right.
I don't understand why one couldn't connect to the inlet dip tube and return to the outlet. It's no different than the path a sidearm would follow if you were able to install one.

What Fred said. Any kind of add-on heater should just be able to be t'd in to the tank inlet & outlet - I think? That's what I did with my sidearm, what I did with the fphx I put in last week, and what I left 2 stubs for when I did that - to add on a HP if I get to that point.

A couple flow checks should be able to prevent that from happening.

Here's a picture of how I plumbed mine to my amtrol. The bottom connection is coming out from the heatpump and enters the amtrol outside of the cold water supply. The top has a dip tube that I installed above the hot water outlet. Not sure if it's proper but it's been heating the dhw for about a month now with no issues.

Sorry it looks like my photos seem to be upside down.

JMac23 said:

A couple flow checks should be able to prevent that from happening.

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Not when the HWHP's circ pump kicks on. Trust me... been to that cold shower already!!

huffdawg said:

I recently purchased two Nyle Therm dhw heat pumps from Tom in Maine. One them will be no problem to plumb. the other not so.. The one I am having trouble with is a smart 40 if you look at this link it shows a pic of the piping configuration on it . Has any one here plumbed a nyle to a smart 40.. Tom has suggested to plumb it to the boiler water side ,anyone on here have any alternative ideas that might work.

http://www.triangletube.com/documents/2/SMART Literature.pdf

Huff

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No problem, insert a 3/8" of refrigeration tubing down the outlet hot water pipe to the bottom. That will be the hp's discharge. You will have to sweat it THROUGH a tee. We did that on my buddies Amtrol since the inlet connections were all curved and wouldn't pass the pipe through. Works great.

The issue is that if you tee into the DHW cold in and hot out, the tank will heat okay, but when you draw off hot water, the water flow tends to short circuit through the heat pump.
I cannot see check valves helping.
They might work on allowing proper draw through the tank but if they accomplish that, the heat pump circulator might not open them (it is small circulator that has some pressure drop to overcome with the heat exchanger inside the HP).
The Triangle tank does not show a drain or PR valve as an extra tap on the tank. If there was an additional tap, then it would be simple to tee into that tap that is not in the DHW circuit.
That is why I suggested using the boiler side. It does work.
I did also ask for some photos of the actual tank. I have not seen one in person in some time and was not paying attention to the tappings at the time.
That would answer the question.
Another alternative is to connect a concentric pipe to the hot side. The longer tube has to be long enough to get to the bottom of the tank.
This is not as preferable as the other ways but might be done if you have enough headroom to get that long tube in.

I made a mistake in what I posted last night.

My HWH has the inlet on the bottom. I T'd into that - but up top I didn't T into the hot-out, I T'd into the T&P fitting.

Not sure about the Nyletherm & short-circuiting, since I don't have one. Tom should certainly know what he speaks of though. But with my setup which has the sidearm still in place but now a FPHX also there, right above the sidearm - I think it splits flow between that side & thru the tank when hot water is being used. I have the temp sensor of my Johnson controller on the bottom T right outside the tank. So after short time of hot water use, it detects that & starts the sidearm/FPHX circuit. Once it gets going, it can make hot water faster than it's being used. So no issue with lack of hot water. Even if that circuit didn't start, with the 'short circuited' water entering the tank at the T&P fitting, which is down the side of the tank a bit, plus the 80 gallon capacity, there would still be a lot of hot water used before it ran out. I've only had this new FPHX in place for a week, but so far - it works great. I should be able to get full mileage out of my storage now when not burning for heat. But that remains to be fully seen since I'm still burning most every day - friggin spring just doesn't want to bust out here.

I think the key to decent add-on HP operation is lots of well-insulated tank capacity. Not sure what the pumping capacity is of the Nyletherm - but wonder if you choked down the size of that circuit some you could reduce the short circuiting but the Nyletherm would still be able to pump sufficiently through it? That might not be a good thing to try though.

EDIT: My slow fingers again, didn't see Toms post...

Donl said:

The way I would connect the heatpump is a follows:

->. Connect cold domestic water inlet to the HP inlet. That way cooler water will be drawn up through the dip tube.

-> Connect HP outlet to boiler supply between circulator and tank. I assume circulator has a built in check valve.

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That sounds like you'd mix DHW & boiler water? Might have misunderstood...

tom in maine said:

Another alternative is to connect a concentric pipe to the hot side. The longer tube has to be long enough to get to the bottom of the tank.
This is not as preferable as the other ways but might be done if you have enough headroom to get that long tube in.

Click to expand...

That's what I had to do on my buddies tank. Works great... more efficient than doing the boiler water side since you do not need to run the HP at a higher delta T to effectively transfer heat (run the HP at 120*F water output vs less efficient 140*F water output).

Hi Dale,
What I need to know is if there are any other DHW tappings on the tank. I cannot see any in the brochure you sent.
If that is the case (there are no other taps, and I think that is the case), then either a concentric pipe connection through the hot DHW outlet or a tie in through the boiler side is what will work.

If that goes into the DHW side, you can use that and one of the other tapping for DHW.

Yay! Glad you got them!

huffdawg said:

All connected and running since 4 pst

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Is that just pex that you used for your connections?

Nice.

Did you figure out your Triangle Tube? I was thinking it must have a drain on it? So you should be able to T your HP-in to that? That should eliminate the short-circuit thing - I would think.

Dale, Would you explain how you wired your nyle to a non-electric dhw tank. Mine is connected to an electric dhw tank and works well. I have closely monitored kwh usage before and after the install and have found that power usage has been cut by slightly more than half. For me this works out to about $27.00 per month savings. Almost a case of beer!