Pellet boiler help.

[Attilakara72]

I have been doing a ton of reading on this site. I am looking to put together a pellet boiler to run in parallel with my oil fired hot water boiler. If I have this correct, that means that the pellet boiler would heat the water in my oil fired boiler and the oil fired boiler would not fire unless the pellet boiler ran out of pellets or it could not keep up with the demand. Please let me know if I have this right.

I have been looking at the Harman PB105, only to find out that they are discontinuing them. Can anyone recommend a pellet boiler?

 

[Hydronics]

You have the general concept correct. There are guys on the site who speak highly of their Windhager and Kedel boilers, they will probably chime in. There are few PB105 owners also.

 

[Danni the Dane]

Hi guys,

I am a "n00b" on this site, but I have been in the pellets-bio-heat-geek word for over ½ a decade in my own house, and I have over a decade of experience in all. My experience with Bio energy comes from more than pellet boilers, but also from solar heating combined with pellets boiler and PV systems for electric as well.

My own setup is a KEDEL RTB boiler (RTB is the new advanced series from KEDEL) combined with vaccuum solarpanels combined with the boiler and a 500Litre buffer tank, the solar setup also from KEDEL (or NBE af the Danish producer is named)

It was quite common in Denmark (yup, I am Danish) to have the old central heating system in parallel with the pellet boiler due to the thought "it's is nice with backup," but please keep in mind, that the old boiler unit will lead uncontrolled heat from the system, this can be good if it gives heat to the room it stands in, but if this uncontrolled heat is of no use, the is only to make the heat budget more expensive. The pellet boilers are today so advanced and stable, that in Denmark, people remove the old boiler (there is an government bonus for this at the time) and I think I have read something about some discount at KEDEL in the US at this time as well.

Well, If you like to, please as questions, I am a privat Bio geek, with no comercial interest but the benefit of user2user experiece, and I have a love for the KEDEL products

have a nice day over there

 

[velvetfoot]

Hi! I can recommend my Windhager! Check out the link in my signature. It kinda of drags on, but I kind of documented my path. The Windhager doesn't have the fancy interface than Kedel has-I love that stokercloud.dk thing, but it is performing very nicely.

I have mine hooked up in parallel and such that if the pellet boiler doesn't fire when there is a call for heat and the buffer tank temperature goes down a little more then the oil boiler will fire. I don't have any supplemental heating action going on, although it might have happened by accident once . I do not pump through the oil boiler when the pellet boiler is on, hence the term "parallel" I guess, so there is no heat loss there as Danni noted.

While I understand that some people don't have to use buffer tanks because of the nature of their heat loads, I used one because I am still using a wood insert, so the boiler mostly heats the upstairs and domestic hot water, and kind of provides a heating base when not feeding the insert.

 

[PassionForFire&Water]

Douglas-MA
MassCEC has a $12,000 rebate right now for the installation of a fully automatic pellet boiler with a min of 3 tons of pellet bulk storage, AND
MassSAVE has a 0% Heat Loan for the remainder.
It really will not get better then this .... .

 

[Danni the Dane]

hi guys,

regarding the buffer/no buffer setup, then I guess it depends if tour boiler can modulate enough down in effect or not - my KEDEL can modulate down to 1kw/hour and up to approx 11kw/hour - This way the KEDEL only use the amount of pellets the house needs to keep inside temperature and therefore no need og a buffertank.

bascicaly a buffertank is only a good idea if tour boiler does not modulate om effect and/or you combine the boiler with solarpanels - my KEDEL effect gods directly into the centralheating system and only heats up the buffer egen the Sun does not perform (a buffer is an extra source of convection loss, so I hope you have sine idea og why a buffer not always is a good idea)

how do you connect in paralell, if no buffertank, without a motorvalve or so to control the water does not stream through ex. the oilboiler?

have a Nice day

 

[velvetfoot]

Wow, from 11 to 1 kw is, like, 90% modulation. My 15 kw boiler modulates down 30%.

how do you connect in paralell

I'm thinking check valves may be the key. Here is a crude diagram of my system; it doesn't have all the isolation valves. I'm sure it could be better, but it seems to work.
When the building calls for heat, and the pellet boiler is running, the water goes right to the building-the excess goes to the buffer tank. The thing is, the load can be quite low with the wood stove running, and that is one good reason to use a buffer tank. My buffer tank also has a coil in it for hot water, which has been working well.