My Garn Jr is up & running

[mike van]

Last year I asked here about what to replace my Harman SF 260 with, and after debating all summer, this is what I got. I had to excavate a sand bank next to the garage, that fine sand that runs like water, hence the 'mafia' blocks. It was late Sept when I picked the Jr up in Maine, from board member Holley. Up & back in a day, 300+ mile round trip. The one I got was shown at the fair in Auburn, I couldn't get it till the fair was over. It sat here on 6x6's until I had enough of the barn finished to slide it in, about late October I think. I have an old '74 Chevy C60 with a Hiab crane, thats how it went in. On Thanksgiving day, the doors went on the barn - Now I could get to work plumbing and such. I did all the work on this project myself, but I did have some good tips and advice from Chris Holley, and another member T Caldwell [who lives about 20 miles from me] A local plumber Dean, who owns Ackerman Plumbing up near Tom C's was a help too, loaning me his Pro press to crimp all the 1 1/4" copper fittings. On the left side of the building, the soil is wet, spring water. A foot down, I hit water, even in a dry fall. 2' down, the ditch caves in. I decieded against the burried insulated Pex pipe and went overhead through the garage, breeze way, and into the house that way. 220 ft of 1 1/4 copper pipe, I had 8 ft left over. The nesxt pic shows the box/run I made for the pipe. Kind of hard to see the detail inside now, things king of get 'stuffed' in there. All my wood is on 1/2 cord pallets, I bring them down wth the payloader as needed. The Garn itself just has R30 fiberglass on it, I was really needing to get up and running as the small stove in the fireplace doesn't cut it below 20f. I'm pretty sure I'll do or get a closed cell foam spray job in the early summer. The rear of the Garn, I used 1 1/4" black pipe, through a 50 plate HX, a 007 Taco on it right now. On the back of the Garn is a simple aquastat, when the water gets to 135, it turns on this circ. plus the one [larger 3 speed grundfoss] in the basement, on the 1 1/4" copper. This probably isn't the most efficiant way to do it, but it has warmed my basement back up to 65, where it was 55 before. My unit sat a week between the pre-clean and the 'real' water, as moving water below 20f is a real pain. I got a light rust that developed inside the unit, and a week of running plugged up the HX with something like orange rubbing compound. I've flushed it twice now, the tank water has cleared up, and it seems to be pretty good. The first 1/2 cord I burned was some hard maple, stuff I put up back when I was thinking standard OWB - As a result, some was 12" dia., unsplit, 2 ft long. The unit burns it down to fine ash. I've been mixing some pine, poplar and spruce in this warmer weather, I've got a ton of it. So far, so good, I'm happy, wifes happy, no more fire up through the house, no more climping on a slippery roof to 'claen' a chimney so loaded with that hard glassy creosote at times I almost couldn't pull the brush down it. I didn't take many pics, no time, I was hoping to have it fired up for Christmas, only missed by 3 days...............

 

[jeffesonm]

Congrats! That is a lot of copper.

 

[huffdawg]

Awesome.... That'll keep the wife happy!

What are the dimensions of your Garn Barn?

Huff

 

[upnorth]

Whats the price of the garn jr?

 

[mike van]

The barn is 22 ft deep, I2 ft wide. It's a little tight on width now that the insulation is on the Garn, but I can get past it easy enough. I lost 2 ft for the concrete block side and rear. On the back I had to buy an extra 3 ft of the Duratech pipe. I found a 3 footer new on ebay for about 110.00 - Galvanized, so I used it right off the back & the stainless oustside.

 

[mike van]

upnprth - The Jr. is 11 thousand, plus some freight from the factory. All the plumbing is extra of course.

 

[NE WOOD BURNER]

Looks like a nice set up!
Wish it was a closed system Id jump a lot quicker.
What was freight cost?

 

[mike van]

983.00 from Minn. to Maine. The Harman was closed system, I liked that better too. Cheaper to set up without a HX. But, with no control over the fire in the Garn, [no auto control at least] You could be in for some steam blow offs. The Harman, when the water got to 180, the draft door closed. If it got to 190, my biggest loop in the house came on to cool it off. This happened a few times over the years when the draft door stuck open.

 

[NE WOOD BURNER]

I got a light rust that developed inside the unit, and a week of running plugged up the HX with something like orange rubbing compound. I've flushed it twice now

I was curious if the factory has a coating on tank for corrosion protection. I believe this forum had some discussions on that too.
I am concerned about HX plugging and clogging with the water quality I have but I think I could work around that.

Thanks for posting. Keep us updated.

 

[heaterman]

983.00 from Minn. to Maine. The Harman was closed system, I liked that better too. Cheaper to set up without a HX. But, with no control over the fire in the Garn, [no auto control at least] You could be in for some steam blow offs. The Harman, when the water got to 180, the draft door closed. If it got to 190, my biggest loop in the house came on to cool it off. This happened a few times over the years when the draft door stuck open.

Mike. You can literally get a Garn up to full boil but it will never "blow off". It is impossible to build any pressure in a Garn. The fact that you are working with 1000 gallons of water means that it would take a serious loading miscalculation to get it up to that temp in the first place. It's really not an issue.

 

[dogwood]

Mike. I need to make a box run like yours to enclose 40' of pipe in an uninsulated attic space. I was going to make it out of plywood, but your use of solid insulation is a much better idea . I've some questions for you about it. How thick is the solid insulation you used to make the box run?. What did you use did to cut the insulation into strips. And did you glue the seams, and if so with what?

Mike

 

[mike van]

Heaterman, I know, I boiled mine just a little one day - The post above talked about making it a closed system though - And I think boiling & pressure would be a problem then? Dogwood - The pipes are covered first with the slip-on pipe insulation, R 3.2 it says on it. The actual box is 8x8 made of 3/4" thick R4 it says on that. I ripped the 2x8 sheets on the table saw, it works good. Where the edges meet, all butt joints, I ran some 2" sheetrock screws in with a washer under the heads, and a few spots I used some duct tape. I think the closed cell foam will stick it all together. Just can't do that in this weather.

 

[heaterman]

You can't make a Garn a closed system without modifying it. Or are you talking about the closed side of the HX?

 

[Boil&Toil]

Mike. I need to make a box run like yours to enclose 40' of pipe in an uninsulated attic space.

I would suggest considering a drywall/foam sandwich (drywall on the outside) rather than the straight foam. But I admit to being moderately paranoid about fires staying where they belong, so when I see exposed foam I cringe a little. If you can find it, "ductboard" (a sort of fiberglass/aluminum sandwich product) is also good for an outer layer, and would add to the insulation value. I'm somewhat [boggled | impre$$ed | wondering why] at using 220 feet of copper with the relative prices of copper and PEX these days... [not wondering at all about going inside/overhead .vs. underground/wet - I undestand that perfectly well - just about not using PEX for the inside/overhead]

 

[mike van]

Boil&Toil - The price was 881.00 for the pipe, given the cost of the rest of this job, I didn't feel it was excessive. The 20' lengths where a snap for even me, [not a plumber] I had some fittings I had to sweat, and only one leaked at the end..............I just like copper, there's copper in the old part of my house from '62, still doing it's job. Can't say the same for one of the cast iron 4 inchers going out though, one rusted out, had to replace it.

 

[goosegunner]

One thing about using copper for the over head is it stays straight inside the box. Pex really grows, which might be an issue.

gg

 

[NE WOOD BURNER]

The Garn itself just has R30 fiberglass on it

yes that does the trick for a get it up and running! Heaterman had mentioned an insulation wrap that he uses maybe worth checking on.

 

[dogwood]

Mike and Boil & Toil, thanks for the info and advice on the box run, Mike,I was wondering whether you cut the 4x8 sheets on a table saw to get those straight edges, so thanks for that bit of info. I have slip on 1.5 in pipe insulation ready to be installed, so we were both thinking along the same lines there. Boil & Toil, I'll look around for the ductboard. They used some at work a while back, so I have seen it before, I wonder if it comes in 4X8 sheets. The stuff we had at work was pre-formed into ducts. I'll probably have to customize a non-standard size duct for my application like Mike did. Thanks again.

Mike

 

[MaineGuy]

I'd be very interested in how you make out this winter with your new Garn Jr. I plan on buying a new boiler this spring/summer for next winter. I've pretty much decided on a Garn Jr. unless I hear anything negative that might persuade me otherwise.. I would think they would be as dependable as the bigger garns but its a pretty substantial investment and I hope to have whatever I settle on for a boiler for many, many years.

Cpngratz on the start up and hope everything works out.

 

[flyingcow]

I'd be very interested in how you make out this winter with your new Garn Jr. I plan on buying a new boiler this spring/summer for next winter. I've pretty much decided on a Garn Jr. unless I hear anything negative that might persuade me otherwise.. I would think they would be as dependable as the bigger garns but its a pretty substantial investment and I hope to have whatever I settle on for a boiler for many, many years.

Cpngratz on the start up and hope everything works out.

plus you have a dealer in state.

 

[mike van]

maineguy - I know how you feel, the options out there are endless, and all are expensive. So far. so good with the Garn. Other than the rust I got in the HX [and the one leaky fitting I sweated] There have been no problems. I run it twice a day right now. 5 AM and 9 PM. easy to load, easy to light a fire [bernzomatic torch, no paper or matches] I've put some huge pieces of wood in, crotch pieces that wouldn't fit in any normal stove, some probably weigh 75 pounds, and they're gone within 2 hours. I've seen the stack temp over 500f. There are two sensors that go on pipes [return & supply] these are not very accurate, off by 15 to 20 deegrees. On T Caldwells advise, I put a thermometer in the 1 1/4" black pipe on the back of the unit - I used the one off the front of my Harman, nice big numbers you can read from 4 ft away - Much more accurate than a sensor on the outside, even one covered with pipe wrap. This morning I had 157 water in the Garn and 152 on the return side of the HX. Last night the wood load was mostly poplar, and a few pieces of cherry. After this coming Monday, winter returns, I've got some white oak & locust for it.

 

[maple1]

I'd be very interested in how you make out this winter with your new Garn Jr. I plan on buying a new boiler this spring/summer for next winter. I've pretty much decided on a Garn Jr. unless I hear anything negative that might persuade me otherwise.. I would think they would be as dependable as the bigger garns but its a pretty substantial investment and I hope to have whatever I settle on for a boiler for many, many years.

Cpngratz on the start up and hope everything works out.

I was thinking at one time that if I had the room for it, a Garn would be up at the top of my short list. A very simple and very proven all-in-one solution. But I think I have since decided that for me a pressurized boiler is preferred over a non-pressurized one such as this, and if I had to do it all over again I would still go with a pressurized boiler hooked to separate storage, all pressurized, no matter how much room I had.

Everyones situations & priorities are different though - and I don't think I've ever read of an unhappy Garn owner.

 

[flyingcow]

Garn----A wood boiler the size of a mini-submarine? Whats not to like.

 

[GENECOP]

Nice........Congrats...the Garn is in a Class of its own......

 

[bpirger]

My fourth season with the Garn 1500 and it has been outstanding. So far the water has remained crystal clear....and only once have I added chemicals. I wouldn't worry about the open system....as long as you keep up your samples and water chemistry (free samples tested every 6 months).....well, at least I hope I needn't worry. Heaterman tells of servicing some 20 year old plus units....

So easy to use....

Congrats on the Jr! First one I've seen online here...

Yeah, when $881.00 of copper doesn't seem too bad, you know you are in the midst of a serious install! Been there!