Switch to portage and main or keep my central boiler

[chumscustoms]

I have a cb 6048.
It works good. It has served me well.
But, I use a ton of wood.
I have a 2000 Sq ft home with mediocre insulation and another home next door that is 600 Sq ft. I use right at 5 cord a month of good dry hardwood when it is 30 and lower out.
Last 5 years I've used a average of 22 cord a year.

I have a read that there are.more efficient furnaces.
My research has taken me to the portage and main 3444 .
Yes I'm aware of the epa rules.
This is not that arguement or discussion.

Will I save on wood consumption switch g to this portage and main. Bl3444.
Thanks

 

[warno]

If I was going with portage and main and could afford it, I would get the one of their optimizer line boilers. This is my first year with a "conventional style" boiler and I can say I would much prefer a gasifier in my location.

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

I owned a hardy h4 conventional boiler for 5 years heating a 220 year old 2800 sqft house in New Hampshire. Insulation is good at this point, I was going through 12-14 cords per 6 months of heating season. I was able to afford upgrading to a heatmaster g200 this year. WOW what a difference. I am burning just over 1 cord per month at this point. Your house must be really leaky if your going through 5 per month. Also you wood is likely to dry and probably spilt to small. Burning with my conventional for 5 years i found that around 30% moisture was the happy medium. To dry and it burns to fast. To wet it smokes to much and burns to slow. Best size was small splits around 3 inch up to half logs 10-12 inches in diameter. I frequent the owb forums and read about the bl series. I think they are well built boilers with good features to extract more heat but I don't think you will see any significant wood consumption reduction untill you go to a gasser. If you can afford a gasser I can't say enough good things about my g200. It just plain works. Cleaning is 5 mins every cord burned. Bridged out twice in 4 months f running and that was my fault both times. Tightly stack the wood when you load it and that's it. Good luck with your search.

 

[NateB]

Don't limit yourself to just out door boiler. Look at some indoor ones and consider an out building with storage and room for dried wood and the splitter and the saws and maybe a work bench. Might as well put a fridge in there, and a nice comfy chair and a TV, and a hammock for those nights you need to keep an eye on the boiler, but I digress.

A little building is nice to keep the weather off you while you are loading the boiler.

 

[chumscustoms]

Great info.
If I can't justify it through wood consumption, then I will wait till I can get into a gasser style.

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

I agree with the indoor boiler in an out building but the system will be more complicated and likely more costly. The indoor boiler gassers are cheaper than te owb gassers but when you add in the large concrete pad, building, storage and piping you are looking at more money. But you should save some money on wood and time processing wood. I think that if I was to do it again I would have a keystoker or other coal stoker boiler in an out building. 30 million btus per ton of anthracite coal and you can get 22 ton loose deliveries. 22 tons would probably last you 3 years plus. It doesn't take up much room, never goes bad, doesn't need storage like a gasser, load a hopper for days to weeks at a time without worrying about loading it.

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

On another note get an energy audit done on your home. You will save the most wood for probably the least amount of money there first. Second are you sure that your underground lines don't have ground water touching them? You are awful high on consumption for smaller sqft. Another question is how are you loading the boiler? Only enough wood to get to the next loading or filling it completely full every load?

 

[chumscustoms]

This is how my day with the owb goes.

7am ish depending on temperature outside I fill furnace to what I assume demand will be for the day.

4pm ish I get home, check and stir up coals/wood. Add if necessary

11pm check, stir and fill for the nights consumption.

My biggest hit is I only have 2 inches of cellulose in each homes ceiling.
That is being fixed as soon as tax return comes.
Also my basement is drafty.
I plan on having the top 4 ft of the cinder block walls spray foamed and the sill area.

All walls have been re sheeted with 1/2 osb. And new siding and tyvek and windows installed.

Pipe is buried no water contacting.
It goes through two forced air heat exchangers.
Half of my 2000 Sq ft home has no duct work to it yet.
So I am actually heating 1200 Sq ft ish and 650 Sq ft.

And when I saw 5 cord a month.
On Dec 14 I dropped two dump trailer off of decent wood. Staked and measured was right at 5 cord.
By January 13th I was 2 days away from being out.

That is very normal for me.

Peices are as large as I can handle or fit in door.

I know insulation in ceasing should help a ton, I hope.
I'm just tired of cutting and burning this much wood.

 

[JohnDolz]

Great info.
If I can't justify it through wood consumption, then I will wait till I can get into a gasser style.

I know it add a lot to the costs but if you combine a gasser with thermal storage I believe you greatly improve the efficiency of the gasser. I am not familiar with the outdoor gasser's only the indoor and I believe most if not all require that they run with thermal storage (it eliminates all idling time).

 

[Heat1285]

your not heating that much square footage IMO....that CB 6048 should be more than enough to easily handle the load you are putting on it....what is ur underground pipe like??? have u measured water temps leaving boiler and entering the homes??? sounds to me like you are loosing a lot of heat somehwere....that CB 6048 holds almost 400 gallons of water....2 of my neighbors are running the same stoves and both ehating over 5,0000 sqft and they dont even go through that much wood! i would check your system out before u pull the string on a new boiler.....if your lines are taking on water underground or u have plugged exchangers...ect a new boiler is going to run into the same problems as the one you currently have.

If your do end up getting a new boiler i would also look into a Heatmor 200 or 400 DCSS. I just upgraded to a 400 DCSS from a natural draft conventional stove like a CB. I have already cut my wood usage down by 30%. P&M Bl 3444 is also a nice stove and a heatmaster MS10,000E would also be nice for what you want....those are all conventional stoves as well.

But i honestly dont think its the boiler.........i would check the rest of your set up...the heat has to be going somewhere

 

[chumscustoms]

Well it just so happens I am a little slow for work today. I will grab the infrared and go take temps and inspect the heat exchangers.
I will report and maybe include a diagram.

My pipe is central boilers thermopex.

 

[chumscustoms]

Well I drew up a diagram of tge house pretty much to scale.

And also stated water temps in and out.

I will list here also.

Leaving furnace-179
Returning to furnace-136
That was taken on iron fittings outside at boiler

Entering heat exchanger-172
Leaving exchanger when on for 4 min. -126
Temps taken on pex piping

With small rental house not running the blower motor but still circulating.
To small house-165
From small house-158
Taken on pex fitting.

All duct work is in the basements

The south half has zero ducting it just stays anywhere from 60 to 70 depending on outside temps

Almost no insulation (2") cellulose in ceiling of both buildings.

The pink line is return and green is supply.
The dashed lines are duct work in basement

 

[chumscustoms]

House is
20 x100
Small house is 25x25

 

[Fred61]

I'm trying to picture two dump trailer loads equaling 5 cords. Must be a lot bigger than my dump trailer was.

 

[chumscustoms]

It is rather large. I believe it's 14long. With 4.5 ft sides.

 

[laynes69]

You should save a ton once insulated, but do it right and airseal before insulation. What's hard for me to understand is putting alot of money up front for a boiler knowing there's almost zero insulation. We did our 1200 sqft attic, ventilation, airsealing, and 14" of cellulose was around $500. A small investment for a huge savings. We went through 8-12 cord a year and it was almost too much to keep up. Now, it's 4 to 5 cord with insulation and a more efficient furnace. We've been heating 2500 sqft, and we haven't hit the 2 cord mark yet since september. Insulation and airsealing make a world of difference.

 

[chumscustoms]

You should save a ton once insulated, but do it right and airseal before insulation. What's hard for me to understand is putting alot of money up front for a boiler knowing there's almost zero insulation. We did our 1200 sqft attic, ventilation, airsealing, and 14" of cellulose was around $500. A small investment for a huge savings. We went through 8-12 cord a year and it was almost too much to keep up. Now, it's 4 to 5 cord with insulation and a more efficient furnace. We've been heating 2500 sqft, and we haven't hit the 2 cord mark yet since september. Insulation and airsealing make a world of difference.

I completely understand your point.
When I bought this place it was for rental property and we rented it for one year and then decided to move to one of homes for our selves.
I then realized the lack of insulation and how loose the house was.
I have since sided, re sheeted, tyveked, insulated the walls.
Went through tons of spray foam.
Now it is time for the ceiling.
The furnace was a route I was going anyway and it was a way to heat with out taking care of the remodel.
I try to pay for things as I go with cash

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

Am i reading it correct, you said that it leaves the boiler and when it gets to the heat exchanger in the house it has already lost 7 degrees??? That is not right. You should lose 1 degree for every 100 feet of thermopex or rehau pipe. Also how does the water leave the heat exchanger at 126 and return to the boiler at 136? You should not have more than a 30 degree drop, closer to 20 is best across your heat exchanger. You appear to have a 46 degree drop across the exchanger. What size pump do you have from the owb to the house? It appears to be WAYYYYY to small. If you really are losing 7 degrees from the boiler to the house you are sending a ton of heat somewhere. You are also shocking your boiler with 126 degree return temps, im surprised that it isn't sweating in the firebox.

 

[chumscustoms]

Like.it stated. I was unable to take a reading on the same surfaces.
I to think it shocks the boiler.
I have had my furnace at this location and also had it further away last year before I moved it.
I thought the drop across the cooler seemed excessive.
It is a grenfoss pump that was equivalent to the taco I took out that cb sized me for.
I do think I can turn this pump up another setting.

 

[chumscustoms]

Am i reading it correct, you said that it leaves the boiler and when it gets to the heat exchanger in the house it has already lost 7 degrees??? That is not right. You should lose 1 degree for every 100 feet of thermopex or rehau pipe. Also how does the water leave the heat exchanger at 126 and return to the boiler at 136? You should not have more than a 30 degree drop, closer to 20 is best across your heat exchanger. You appear to have a 46 degree drop across the exchanger. What size pump do you have from the owb to the house? It appears to be WAYYYYY to small. If you really are losing 7 degrees from the boiler to the house you are sending a ton of heat somewhere. You are also shocking your boiler with 126 degree return temps, im surprised that it isn't sweating in the firebox.

Do to the different surfaces that I was able to take readings off of. That gave me some different values.
But the heat exchanger drop was accurate.

Return to boiler, of you look at diagram it shows my piping to the small house. When it returns into the system at 156 it mixes with the 120 something giving me the 136 return temp.

I will try running the pump faster.
Is there any way to run both systems.

Would a manifold system work better. Than a tee off the main line?

 

[hondaracer2oo4]

Any way to measure the return flow to the boiler after flowing through the whole system? Can you measure th return temp to te boiler without the heat exchanger in your house running?

 

[chumscustoms]

Any way to measure the return flow to the boiler after flowing through the whole system? Can you measure th return temp to te boiler without the heat exchanger in your house running?

This morning when I went out.
I made sure no furnaces were running inside.
My furnace was a touch low on temp 151 at digital read out.

Leaving furnace on the pex, read 146, returning the furnace read 143

So I went in my basement and checked in and out of heat exchanger not running.
It read 145 and 145

I had my wife kick on the furnace and watched it drop the outgoing temp as it should.
When the installed some piping he recomend ed leaving the tee'd of exchanger ball valves half.closed.
Last night I was wondering if I was only filling half the exchanger or causing a cavitation inside that would possibly le assist in excessive cooling across the exchanger.

I then opened the valves 100% I watched the incoming temp stay the same as it should.
And the outgoing temp started to rise.

I don't know if that would cause a lot of wood consumption but regardless I think it needed deldt with.

I did check my pump.
It is set on high and before I had a taco 009.
The. Replaced with a grenfoss equivalent last year when my impeller broke.

Thanks.
I will keep checking everything out.
Insulation people came today for a estimate and hopefully that will.get done in neXT month.

 

[Heat1285]

definitely not the stove......that stove is plenty biig......u just got fine tining to do....you should have a 12-20° delta loss at full load....no more....if ur temp loss is really 30-45° you need a bigger pump

 

[Heat1285]

i dont even have thermopex and i barely loose 1° over a 80ft run. My water comes in at 185-190 and under full load (DHW,house and garage) my water leaves at around 170-175 usually. normally i have about a 14-20° Delta at ful heat load. Im using a B&G NRF-36 at the 2nd speed. Shop loop is only 15ft. i loose no heat and under full load it sits at a 12° delta. I am using a B&G NRF-22 for the shop......just play around a bit, you will get it narrowed down.

 

[maple1]

Do you only have the one pump pumping the whole thing? Size & length of piping?