Tarm, EKO or Greenwood

[gradwell]

Hey guys, Desperately need help. Dont know much but learning everyday from you guys. I am building a new home 2850 sq. ft. first floor slab. 1450 on second floor. 792 sq. ft garage plus 2000 sq. ft. pole building. Spray foam insulation in house and garage. Not sure about pole building insulation. Will house burner in pole building about 70 ft. from house. I will also install some type of 97% furnace or heat pump.

I am aware that I need to do a heat analysis and will, I am just looking for opinions on what brand to purchase. Probably like most others, I am looking for ease of use since neither me nor my wife have ever used a gassifier. Also longevity of the unit and warranty.

OK there is the rough set up now for the dumb questions. Due to economics, I will probably not be able to install storage at this time. Maybe next year. That being said, will I have any issues with heating these spaces? Can I still use the unit for Domestic hot water?

I know I have a ton of other questions, I'm just overwelmed at the moment. Any advice and unit suggestions are more than greatly appreciated. Research I have done outside of this site point to the Tarm, Eko and Greenwood. Seems Greenwood is a little negative here. EKO seems very popular. Tarm seems well liked but chastised a little for price. Again all help is appreciated. Thank you

 

[ISeeDeadBTUs]

1) Price has very little to do with this. Look at what you are spending to build your house. See what I mean?
2)Tarm and EKO are similar designs, and from all I've ever heard both are good.
3)Greenwood is designed diferently
All three mentioned have strengths and weaknesses.

You need to:
1)Accept the fact that as a newbie, you are facing a learning curve. Though the GW is probably a simpler design than the Tarm and EKO, the learning curve is a groan, nonetheless
2)Before you go very far, get an accurate heat calc and an objective, realistic measure of your fuel supply over the entire payback period.

Jimbo

 

[Eric Johnson]

Welcome to the Boiler Room, gradwell.

You can heat all your domestic hot water with any wood-fired boiler.

Very dry wood is the critical factor for success with EKO and Tarm. Makes everything else a lot easier.

I know the EKO runs fine without storage. I can't comment on the other two because I don't know.

 

[solarguy]

I've used both Tarm & Eko, Tarm's a dam good boiler but I'm partial to the Eko.
I think it's a better boiler & you'll get a much longer burn out of it.

 

[gradwell]

Thanks guys for the input. I am very willing to accept the newbie learning curve position. Have to admit however, it is very intimidating!

The stress for me really is that I don't want to expect more than it can offer and then become disappointed. At the same time I don't want to pass on the idea and regret it later.

Additionally I am concerned about the ability to keep my home and DHW hot as I work long hours and am concerned that I will miss reloading during the day if necessary. With no heat storage will I be able to do this in the early morning and early evening? Seems to make sense every 12 hours?

I don't understand the term "full burn". Is that to say that the unit burns everything inside and if so do I need to immed. refill, or do they work more like a gas furnace and in "lame mans" terms turn on and off reigniting and shutting down as heat is required. Not this siple I'm sure.

These simple questions are what I lack in knowledge. I do have a good understanding of the units and plumbing of them My next obstacle is how to operate one. I'll work on that later.

Sorry to be the truest of novices here. Hope that in a year from now I can sit here, beer in hand and discuss the newest, latest and greatest with you guys and actually know what I'm talking about. Thanks again

 

[antos_ketcham]

Compared to my Central Boiler, the Greenwood 100 burns a lot cleaner - this is without storage. That said, I think with storage my Greenwood would burn even cleaner and burn less wood.

Pete

 

[ISeeDeadBTUs]

Yes, you can heat anything with a twelve hour burn . . .as long as the 12-hour heat load is matched to the wood load. My WAG would be that, for the size house you describe, and built in PA, and wanting to load twice a day, you are going to need a LARGE unit!

But it can be done. Don't expect storage to be some sort of magic wand. It probably becomes the most beneficial about this time of year.

I can't remember from your original post. . . will you have a back-up system?

Jimbo

 

[Nofossil]

If you're building on a slab, consider putting radiant coils in the slab. You won't regret it. Not only is it more comfortable, but you'll get much better performance out of storage if you add it later.

 

[gradwell]

I will have a back up. Planning to run NG in the event I am out of town or not home in time. Cant have the wife or dog freezing!

I will be adding radiant to the concrete slab as I am hoping to make this my heat source. Learning the importance of "heat dumping" from this site, I suppose this is where I will send it.

You know, I sit here every night reading these posts trying to learn about the possibilities of heating with wood and feel as if I have a little grasp of things until I read the next post and realize that I have sooooooo much to learn. I have said it several times in my posts, "I am truely a novice". Almost embarrasing. However, I am hell bent on figuring this out! I hate utility bills! Solar is next. My only true concerns at this point are actually burning. This is where it is confusing to me.

I am still curious. Do these units EKO, Tarm etc. operate in such a way that once loaded they kind of burn until temps are met and then shut down repeating this process until all wood is burned? Or do they burn all of the wood at once storing the heat within the unit (assuming no water storage).

 

[leaddog]

I am still curious. Do these units EKO, Tarm etc. operate in such a way that once loaded they kind of burn until temps are met and then shut down repeating this process until all wood is burned? Or do they burn all of the wood at once storing the heat within the unit (assuming no water storage).

They burn untill the water temp gets up to a set point and then go into idle, so if you have storage they will burn hot and store all the heat in the storage unless the storage is up to temp and then they will gointo idle. If the temp drops they will start back up and repeat the prossess. Each time they cycle you will loose some eficency and that is why storage is better. So if you have your storage tank up to temp. you wouldn't fire it untill needed.
leaddog

 

[gradwell]

What is a typical set point or are there other factors to consider?

Using the assumption that my radiant floor heat does not require any additional heat and that the set point in the boiler has been reached, is this where over heating becomes a potential issue being that I would have no additional storage to use the extra heat provided?

Hope that made sense.

 

[Nofossil]

What is a typical set point or are there other factors to consider?

Using the assumption that my radiant floor heat does not require any additional heat and that the set point in the boiler has been reached, is this where over heating becomes a potential issue being that I would have no additional storage to use the extra heat provided?

Hope that made sense.

Let me take another whack at this. The details may vary a bit between manufacturers, but I think this is a good high-level description of the situation:

Gasifiers use a fan to provide the air that creates the primary and secondary combustion. The controller will modulate fan speed to try and maintain a water jacket temperature at the selected setpoint (around 180 degrees in my case). If the heat demand from all of the zones is less than the boiler's output, then the boiler will start to exceed the setpoint. When that happens, the controller shuts off the fan. When this happens, it's no longer a gasifier - it's essentially a conventional boiler with the inlet and flue dampers closed. The circulator will continue to run, and there is still some combustion happening. Eventually, the temperature will drop to the point where the controller turns on the fan again and gasification happens again.

This is called 'idling'. It's not inherently evil, but it does result in some lost efficiency. The EKO operates this way with no problems, but it's more efficient if the heat load matches the boiler output. For this reason, I suggest buying the smallest boiler that's big enough for your needs. A bigger boiler spends more time idling.

Since there's still some combustion going on, you can get a problem if there's no heat demand at all. If you had a really hot fire going with plenty of wood and you had no place to dump heat, you could overheat the boiler. This would be more likely a problem if your boiler was way oversized.

With a radiant zone you'll need a mixing valve and an additional circulator. You can't run the water jacket cold enough to match what the radiant zone needs.

In my case, I use storage to dump additional heat. I also overheat my domestic hot water tank, and I heat my hot tub as well. I turn heat loads on and off to try and match the boiler's output. This is probably a bit over the top, but it keeps me off the streets. I've got a description on my site - link is in my signature below.

 

[Eric Johnson]

A couple more points on the blower(s) and controller to add to the already excellent descriptions above. (The EKO 60 and 80 have two blowers.)

The stock controller modulates the fan speed as the temp approaches the setpoint. In other words, the fan begins to slow down as the water temp nears the setpoint in an attempt to slow the heating so that the boiler is less likely to idle.

And, like an aquastat, the controller has a differential control (I don't know if you can set it), so that the fans will continue running until the water hits the setpoint (say 80C), and then shut down until the water temp declines to 76.5 degrees C.

 

[solarguy]

The newer controls allow you to adjust all your setpoints.

 

[gradwell]

Just learned that an Econoburn Dist. has set up in my area in the last 30 days. Went and looked at their unit this weekend. Seems very similar to the EKO. But then again I barely know what I am looking at!

Currently they are the only dist. of any brand within about 4 hours of me. To this point I had narrowed my decision down to Tarm or EKO. Now that I have Econoburn within 30 mins. of me I wonder if it would be the better decision simply based on convenience. What do ya think? I would say that I was leaning more toward the EKO. Again it seemed to be that the EKO and Econoburn were related even though Econo made in USA.

Again just looking for some views and opinions. I have noticed some issues with Econo here in the Boiler Room. EKO seems almost squeeky clean. Thanks again. Joe