I have to purchase a control box for my Tarm boiler setup. I will have my house zone, a shop zone, a attached garage zone and domestic hot water. The BLT control box from Tarm is over $400.00. I have heard of many other systems. I am not very tech savy so simple is good. Anyone have options?
Which Control Box?
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Chris Hoskin
TarmSalesGuy
The BLT is not a zone control, instead it controls when your zones take heat from your wood boiler, storage or fossil fuel back up.
WoodNotOil
Minister of Fire
The BLT is one solution for multiple heat sources and there are others. If your just trying to turn zones on and off, then all you need are regular heating relays that connect to thermostats for each zone. If you have storage and/or a primary secondary piping scheme, then you will need some way of controlling which heat source is supplying the zones. In that case you have the BLT and the NFCS to choose from for out of the box solutions. Some have configured PID controllers to do this, but that requires some work for sure. Others have built their own controllers with Arduino and other types of boards. Let us know what your piping scheme is and we can be more specific with suggestions. It is also possible to control the whole system with enough relays and aquastats if you (or someone you know) is good at electrical work. Lots of options.
I will be using the Bioheat pressurized PT1 drawing. I dont know if this is considered primary/secondary or would this be simplest pressurized sticky? I will have a three tank setup plumbed in parrallel. My house will be supplied through a exchanger in my forced air propane furnace. I guess I thought that the Tarm box was a total control center ,but now I am confused?
I see Tekmar makes a lot of different boiler controls? Does anyone have any preference between the Tarm BLT box or Tekmar controls? I dont want to get fancy. I just want to control my forced air zone ,DHW, and infloor zone using my pressurized storage system to maximum potential.
ohbie1
Member
I have the BLT in use. I'll echo what others have said, but try to simplify. The BLT has some nice relays, transformer, and a neat hookup panel....some nice lights and switches too. The BLT controls WHERE your heat comes from: the Tarm, the storage, or the oil/gas boiler. It does this automatically. It senses when your Tarm is on and draws heat from it. If your Tarm is off, it checks the storage for a high enough temp. to draw heat from. If the storage is too cool and the Tarm is off, it will turn on your fossil fuel boiler. This all happens whenever one of your zones calls for heat.
Your different zones should already be under control with zone valves (or pumps) and TTs. These zones are controlled the way they always were before you had the Tarm. The new aspect is WHERE the heat now comes from.
If you are not well informed about relays and transformers, the BLT is a pretty simple way to hook up 3 heat sources, and have the correct one chosen (automatically) based on the status of all three. It does NOT control your zones (as BioHeatguy said).
Yor DHW system will not be controlled by the BLT. Depending on how you are getting DHW, you will need relay(s) & valves to switch between storage and fossil supply.
Your different zones should already be under control with zone valves (or pumps) and TTs. These zones are controlled the way they always were before you had the Tarm. The new aspect is WHERE the heat now comes from.
If you are not well informed about relays and transformers, the BLT is a pretty simple way to hook up 3 heat sources, and have the correct one chosen (automatically) based on the status of all three. It does NOT control your zones (as BioHeatguy said).
Yor DHW system will not be controlled by the BLT. Depending on how you are getting DHW, you will need relay(s) & valves to switch between storage and fossil supply.
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