Effecta Komplett III, with a buffer and a modified septic tank store!

[tav]

Hi

I had a Effecta Komplette 3 light suction 35kw (installed and specced by Treco / Heat and Power http://www.treco.co.uk/) with a 500l buffer tank and an eco solar water tank. I was meant to get a Geo tank http://www.treco.co.uk/products/boiler/geotank-fuel-store for the pellets but for some un-explained reason a modified septic tank was provided instead.

I had a number of issues with installation and now 7 months in I am still having issues. So far, the suction motor, augur and bleaner (sp?) valve have all been changed! These are:

1. The spherical septic tank silo collects a lot of pellets up the sides as they are not steep. It means I have a large dead space of pellets that never get used.
A. is there a known angle that should have been used for the store base
B. What is the acceptable level of wastage in a store. I have over 15% of a 3.8 Tonne tank.

2. The boiler while on ignition one time filled the room with smoke and fired sparks around the room at high velocity. The smoke was coming from around the sides of the day hopper. I sent Effecta an email reporting this but never got a response.

2. I had serious issues with burner and ignition alarms that were put down to dust, that was attributed to engineers access the silo to unblock the vacum tube. A stronger vaccum had to be fitted to solve this problem! I am concerned that with repeat fillings and a low angled base dust will collect again and cause problems. Is this likely?

3. There was confusion at Treco whether a buffer tank or not was needed. I wanted a traditional buffer set up to reduce burns and avoid an on demand set up. I have a buffer tank but the system just appears to be working on demand. With minimum demand E.g UFH set to the lowest it will go the Boiler rags itself senseless chewing through pellets non - stop. It takes a day to get the buffer up to temp and it only stays this way for a short time. Another plumber rekons I should have had an accumulator with coils so that the tank could be indpendent from the demand. I see on the description for the Komplette 3 that it says it does not need a buffer and works on demand. my question is whether it can actually work successfully with a buffer as whatever it is doing it currently it can not even meet the demand of one small aspect of what will be needed from it. Have I been specced the right set up?

Any help on the above would be greatly appreciated as I am at my wits end and have no confidence in what Treco have specified, set up and now whether they can actually get it working as it should.

 

[Iankerry]

Hi tav

I wondered if you still had problems with you K3 boiler? Had mine for 2 years and still have issues - especially to do with 'dust'.

thanks

ian

 

[velvetfoot]

Hi to fellow pellet boiler people!

Way cool that you have a buried storage tank. First I've seen on here.

B. What is the acceptable level of wastage in a store. I have over 15% of a 3.8 Tonne tank.

If I paid to dig a hole and install a 4 ton storage tank, I don't think I'd be happy with 15%. While the spherical shape may be strong, the geotank looks like it has sloping sides like a hopper and they say it's internally reinforced with steel. I built a one ton hopper from plywood with no sloping sides and I figure that I get 25% 'wastage'. But I can lean over and redistribute the remaining pellets if I want to. How would you do that with your store? I'm not sure it's necessary in your case because of the spherical shape, but is there any harm in not totally emptying the store once in a while? The procedures for my boiler say that with a store, the dust should be vacuumed out once a year, or something like that.

2. The boiler while on ignition one time filled the room with smoke and fired sparks around the room at high velocity. The smoke was coming from around the sides of the day hopper. I sent Effecta an email reporting this but never got a response.

That sounds dangerous. Your boiler comes with a water tank and/or connection to douse unwanted fire in the fuel auger? Mine does. Did it operate? Could you track down the source of the smoke (burned pellets where they shouldn't be?).

As far as the buffer and modulating go, I think you have to consult the manual or the installer. It might be that Effecta prefers bufferless and the boiler has that programmed. Maybe you have to change settings to accomodate a buffer tank. Maybe the boiler is such a super modulator that it can adjust to a low demand. I've heard Effecta prefers low temperature constant flow distribution, so maybe with a low load, as long as it's constant, the boiler can match the demand. Is the solar tank integrated, piping & controls, and does the pellet boiler heat that too-how big is that tank?

Probably not much help, sorry.