Good Day

[Noggah]

Hello

I am very glad to have found this site. I have been checking it out for a few days, since I discovered it while looking for ideas on heat storage. Everyone here seems very knowledgeable and patient.

I built a new house last year, 3k sf cape with 1600 sf garage/shop all with propane on-demand radiant. I have added a Central Boiler E-Classic 2400 this year. I spent my summer putting up 21 cord of hard wood, four of which were felled last year. I am running the system through a 500k btu/hr double pass heat exchanger. I thought this would be way overkill. It does work, but could be better. I noticed that when the temp stays low the boiler works pretty hard all day. A friend suggested heat storage. The retailer says I don't need it, but I think I'm going to try it. I have 550 gallons of pressurized storage that I am going to install shortly. The sticky for the simplest design was helpful.

After all that I just wanted to say Hi and I look forward to learning more about this.

 

[Gary_602z]

Hold on for a second and I am sure someone will be by to help you out! And welcome to the crowd here.

Gary

 

[huffdawg]

Hello

I am very glad to have found this site. I have been checking it out for a few days, since I discovered it while looking for ideas on heat storage. Everyone here seems very knowledgeable and patient.

I built a new house last year, 3k sf cape with 1600 sf garage/shop all with propane on-demand radiant. I have added a Central Boiler E-Classic 2400 this year. I spent my summer putting up 21 cord of hard wood, four of which were felled last year. I am running the system through a 500k btu/hr double pass heat exchanger. I thought this would be way overkill. It does work, but could be better. I noticed that when the temp stays low the boiler works pretty hard all day. A friend suggested heat storage. The retailer says I don't need it, but I think I'm going to try it. I have 550 gallons of pressurized storage that I am going to install shortly. The sticky for the simplest design was helpful.

After all that I just wanted to say Hi and I look forward to learning more about this.

Welcome to the Boiler Room .What size line to and from your heat exchanger. Did you you do a heatloss calculation on your home.

If your boiler cant keep up now it might have a hard time keeping up with storage unless you have huge outside temp. swings.

Huff

 

[flyingcow]

My very uneducated guess would be storage won't help you in the cold times, might help in the shoulder seasons. But, with you're heat load(big house+1600sq/ft garage), you would need a huge storage. more than 550. To find this out, you need to do a heat loss calc. Just my thoughts.

 

[Noggah]

I have everything piped with 1 inch heat pex to the main loop that is 1.25 inch copper, so I am getting some loss there. We are having large temp swings this year. Everything works well until the garage calls for heat when it is in the single digits or teens all day. My thought is that if the garage dumped the 25 or so gallons of cold water into 550 gallons of 185 degree water the system would barely notice it. Especially since this is radiant concrete and dosen't call constantly. I surely am no expert. I plan to pipe the storeage I have in a manner that I can easily add another 550 if I need it. The first 550 was free, so I thought it worth a try.

Thank you for your thoughts.

 

[ecc_33]

how is the E classic doing as far as wood usage this year? Do you like that boiler? About how much wood have you burn't in it this year? Thanks, Eric

 

[James Ascherl]

Welcome aboard Nog! You have to post a picture of your boiler/setup before you get any advice. If that isn't available you have to post a picture of your wife.

 

[Noggah]

I just uploaded a photo to my avatar (I think). I plan to build shed over it this year. I spent too much time on wood collection last year. I started the stove on 10-28-11 and have used about 3.5 cord so far. I am very pleased with this. Temps in Maine have had large swings this year. I have good wood and get 12-14 hour burns on cold days and 24 hour burns on warm days (mid 20's and above) when filled about 2/3 full. Maintenance is very minimal and burns very clean. Could not be happier with the stove itself.

 

[flyingcow]

my neighbor has the same unit. Been burning with it for 3 yrs, I think. He's had good luck with it, but he did find out everything works better with wood seasoned a yr.

 

[Noggah]

I was very lucky that the neighbor to where I was cutting had his land cut the year before. The loggers that did that job left four cord of tree length Oak, Maple and Yellow Birch. The land owner wanted it removed, so I gladly helped him out with that. This gave me a leg up on getting dry wood for this year. I have the remaining 17 cord drying for use the next couple of years. I have not used any fossils this year and am very happy about it.

 

[huffdawg]

Well on the warm days you could charge storage instead of idling your boiler,more efficient and cleaner burning. I bet the 1" pex supplying your 1-!/4" copper is likely a part of your problem. is the 1" pex coming from your boiler?
How many btu's your boiler put out? Your boiler most likely wouldn't smoke that much either.

Don't worry we still havn't seen pics. of BB's wife.

Huff

 

[Noggah]

Manufacturer rating is 250k btu/hr. The feed and return for the boiler is 1in pex inside 4in corrigated pipe filled with spray foam. This seems pretty efficient. I lose about 5-8 degrees between the stove and house, 75 feet of pipe. I think being able to charge the storeage when the garage isn't calling would even out the highs and lows

 

[woodsmaster]

Manufacturer rating is 250k btu/hr. The feed and return for the boiler is 1in pex inside 4in corrigated pipe filled with spray foam. This seems pretty efficient. I lose about 5-8 degrees between the stove and house, 75 feet of pipe. I think being able to charge the storeage when the garage isn't calling would even out the highs and lows

you need 1 1/4 pipe to move them btus unless you have a very large delta t. 7 to 8 degrees is a lot of loss to the ground
in that short of a run.

 

[flyingcow]

Manufacturer rating is 250k btu/hr. The feed and return for the boiler is 1in pex inside 4in corrigated pipe filled with spray foam. This seems pretty efficient. I lose about 5-8 degrees between the stove and house, 75 feet of pipe. I think being able to charge the storeage when the garage isn't calling would even out the highs and lows

Is this Thermopex? usually classic's come with that. I bought Thermopex from Matt and it's impressive stuff. Should be for the price, but it's good.

 

[stee6043]

You're not moving 250k btu through 1" pex...this is for sure.

You have what sounds like a slightly above average heat load but that eClassic should still be idling a fair amount if it's running properly. Unless you are leaving your windows open and have zero insulation there is no way (in my opinion) you're even approaching 100k btu/hr heat loss.

I don't think your situation is a real fit for storage. The point behind storage is to enable a boiler to burn full bore, peak output, store the btu's and then burn out completely, no idling. In most outdoor situations this is not desirable.

 

[Noggah]

heat loss calculator online shows that I should be less than 40k btu/hr at a design of zero degrees. I went overboard on making sure everything was very tight and over insulated. The radiant has 2in closed cell under and around it. The E-Classic does idle alot. Especially on days like today. About thirty and sunny. I only find a problem when the temp stays in the teens or lower all day.

 

[salecker]

Manufacturer rating is 250k btu/hr. The feed and return for the boiler is 1in pex inside 4in corrigated pipe filled with spray foam. This seems pretty efficient. I lose about 5-8 degrees between the stove and house, 75 feet of pipe. I think being able to charge the storeage when the garage isn't calling would even out the highs and lows

Hi
i have dual runs of 1" running 120 ft,spray foamed in trench,i can't measure any heat loss with my IR gun.You may want to reviste your lines once the ground thaws.How are you measuring the loss in your lines?
I know thw IR gun isn't the most accrate,but i havn't had the time to hook up my guages

 

[Noggah]

I am using CB Thermopex. I don't see any melting snow in the area of the pipe. I am using a thermometer inline at the heat exchanger, but relying on the boiler control for temp at the boiler. I am going to get an IR today to do some more thorough checking. Gotta hurry up. Pats on at three.

 

[henfruit]

It is to bad that the people that sell these boilers dont tell you what size pipe you need to move the most btus to get the most out of the boiler or they just dont know??

 

[woodsmaster]

With thermopex you shouldn't be losing that much heat. That's what I have. Your boiler control probably don't match the outlet temp. 1" should easily move 40,000 btu/hr.

 

[stee6043]

heat loss calculator online shows that I should be less than 40k btu/hr at a design of zero degrees. I went overboard on making sure everything was very tight and over insulated. The radiant has 2in closed cell under and around it. The E-Classic does idle alot. Especially on days like today. About thirty and sunny. I only find a problem when the temp stays in the teens or lower all day.

Based on this I'd say you have some serious issues with getting heat from your boiler to your loads effectively. Your boiler output is massive by most residential standards. Properly plumbed it would heat a 10,000 square foot house and barely break a sweat at -10F outside all day long. Seriously.

 

[huffdawg]

Manufacturer rating is 250k btu/hr. The feed and return for the boiler is 1in pex inside 4in corrigated pipe filled with spray foam. This seems pretty efficient. I lose about 5-8 degrees between the stove and house, 75 feet of pipe. I think being able to charge the storeage when the garage isn't calling would even out the highs and lows

What size is your boiler circ pump?

 

[flyingcow]

With thermopex you shouldn't be losing that much heat. That's what I have. Your boiler control probably don't match the outlet temp. 1" should easily move 40,000 btu/hr.

+1 I have about 20ft exposed of Thermopex in my garage. It can be 0 or less temps in my garage, and you put your hand on the thermopex and you will not warm your hands up.

 

[heaterman]

When you say that the CB works hard what do you mean by that?
Does it fire constantly and fail to maintain temperature?
If so, does it eventually catch up?

 

[Noggah]

The circulator is a Grundos three speed. On hi I think it's pushing 11 gallons a minute. I thought about trying a larger one, but have not yet. When I say the boiler is working hard, it runs for long periords. It does catch up, but mainly when the garage is not calling. The retailer thinks I need to remove the heat exchanger, pipe the boiler directly into the loop and run everything at atmospheric. The boiler does have 310 gallons of storeage, so this makes scense. The plumber says that this will void the warranty on my new, New York Thermals propane boiler.