Places to buy Hydronic supplies?

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jdboy9

Member
Jan 21, 2009
61
Burton Ohio
I posted earlier about a new slant/fin lynx boiler I am going to be getting for my new place. I am new to all of this type of heating and I am now at that phase of building. My questions are, is there a good book out there on how to properly do it? Websites, favorite stores, etc. where I can buy this stuff because so far I haven't had much luck on finding places to compare prices. I would hate to buy pumps and valve and find out I bought the wrong stuff at the wrong price... Any help would be appreciated.
 
jdboy9, I am relatively new to this stuff myself. Some of the sites I've seen on this site and looked at for hydronic supplies are Pex.Supply.com, Patriot Suppy, Graingers, Ebay, and PlumbersSurplus.com. I found a local supplier too, who has been able to beat some of the internet prices which I brought to him for comparison pricing. Good luck.

Ronmann, good to see a post from Long Island. Grew up there myself, back when there were still potato fields in Nassau County.

Mike
 
I've gotten stuff from both PexSupply and Patriot- in addition to local trade suppliers. Had mostly good experiences with all; some have reported difficulties and disappointments with PexSupply; I have not encountered those, although I will say that Patriot has been _wonderfully_ supportive with some needs for tech data/ background and with returns and exchanges that were "old" enough that they could have easily told me to get lost- but they didn't.
 
jdboy9 said:
I posted earlier about a new slant/fin lynx boiler I am going to be getting for my new place. I am new to all of this type of heating and I am now at that phase of building. My questions are, is there a good book out there on how to properly do it? Websites, favorite stores, etc. where I can buy this stuff because so far I haven't had much luck on finding places to compare prices. I would hate to buy pumps and valve and find out I bought the wrong stuff at the wrong price... Any help would be appreciated.

Your best source of info regarding the boiler you are getting is the I/O manual that comes with it. There will be details in there that apply specifically to that model which may be different than what you or your installer are used to dealing with. Most of the failures and problems with the new generation of boilers on the market are due to improper installation from what i have seen.
 
Thanks everyone for your help.

I am an electrician and I figure water follows the same principal in regards to pipe diameter? In other words if I have a long run and need a lot of flow I would need a certain size pipe. What sizes are commonly run to get from the manifold to rooms? My place is 30x40 with two full stories.
 
jdboy9 said:
Thanks everyone for your help.

I am an electrician and I figure water follows the same principal in regards to pipe diameter? In other words if I have a long run and need a lot of flow I would need a certain size pipe. What sizes are commonly run to get from the manifold to rooms? My place is 30x40 with two full stories.

More or less right on the flow idea, although the question you are asking us is kind of like us asking you what kind of wiring we should use in our house, without much more information...

The "bible" of hydronic heating is Modern Hydronic Heating, 2nd Edition by John Siegenthaler, P.E. - it's pricey and heavy reading, but has all the info you would ever need...

However we can try to help you out, if you can give us a lot more information - start with a room by room heat load calculation, and your proposed plumbing layout. (think circuit diagram)

If you need help with this, a couple of things that I have found helpful is to go through the old threads and look at what other folks have done for layouts (and what people have said good and bad about them)

I've also found some good information on the Caleffi website, particularly their "Idronics Magazine" which gives good coverage of a lot of different areas. Lastly the many different boiler manufacturers will have suggested plumbing layouts, which will tend to be fairly similar as the ideas stay the same no matter what the heat source is.

Gooserider
 
Here are a couple more places to check out. I've done business with them and have been satisfied.

House Needs

Design Heating
 
Thanks everyone for your posts.

I printed out a diagram from slant/fin on a heating system for zoning rooms. It has been very helpful and will work with that I'm doing. I plan to use 1" for the manifolds and then 3/4" for everything else. I have one floor I'm heating right now with a basement which I'm not going to heat but just allow the heat from the 1st floor to warm it. The floor I'm heating is 30x40 with one bedroom/bath and the rest is one big kitchen/living/dining room. I plan to use baseboards. I am pretty sure I have most of the concept down, I have looked at others systems and tried to get an idea of what I will need.

I am confused about a few things. What is the difference between these check valves?

http://www.pexsupply.com/Matco-Norca-521C05-1-Solder-Ends-Swing-Check-Valve-3000-p

and

http://www.pexsupply.com/Taco-241-4-1-Horizontal-Bronze-Taco-Flo-Chek-1990000-p


Also if I use an air eliminator do I need to use a air vent/valve also?

I'm looking at these http://www.pexsupply.com/Air-Eliminators-310000

then the air valves http://www.pexsupply.com/Air-Valves-300000
 
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