I have an old craft insert that i would like to use for heating hot water for showers/ laundry and other not potable uses. I wa hoping someone could maybe provide a few ideas as to where to start nd what materials are needed. Maybe a link or two. I know it will not be verg efficient but our houshold uses roughly 90 gallons per day of hot water. If there is a way i may look at piping the water into the air handler at some point.
using old insert for hot water
- Thread starter Byrond
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BoilerMan
Minister of Fire
Have you looked into some type of DIY solar? 90 gal/day in the summer is alot, solar or even a heat pump water heater may be a good payback and produce the hot water you need.
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Hadnt. Thought of solar. I just thought with this old sto sitting around that i woul check oht the possibilities. wa thinking of fabing an insulation jacket and running a series of tubues inbetween and usint that to heat a 250 gallon storage tank via a heat exchanger. Another thought was to us it for a whiskey still.
BoilerMan
Minister of Fire
I think you may have some overheating issues with tubing and insulation around a wood stove. You may also expierence the water flashing to steam and cavitating your circulator. I've been looking into a Geyser heat pump water heater, you could use it with your existing tank, they say they are well built.
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probably could use it. How would i go about preventing the flashing of the water/ overheat issues? I am ckueless to this boiler stuff. I am just trying to learn enough to get me in trouble. This would be a very basic system. I would like to build a fire in the evening o that during the night so that the storage tank would be hot enough for a shower in the am. I presume that it would hold enough heat throughout the day to do laundry and dishes but i am not sure.
Unfortunately - a proper system is not all that "simple". Safety features MUST be included. A system that is NOT proper is called a bomb. When dealing with a pressurized system, as you are (as opposed to open air), pop off valves, circulator pumps, thermos, etc. are the norm.
I do have an understanding of safety and all. At work i maintain 11 water source heatpumps with 2 gas boilers. Our loop is completely computer controlled. I would keep everyrhing outside the house. I guess my main question is that can an outdoor woodstove supply enough heat to heat a storage vessel, say 250 gallons, to a comfortable temp? I m looking for a starting point to be able to create a loop that would use a water to water heat ex to then heat storage water. I also would like to install. Is thi doable? Or could this be made into a open no pressure system? Im not really looking for peak percormance, just a project
Are you saying that you are going to use the old insert - outside? Now I am getting the picture. Sure it can be done, but as you state above...it will be very inefficient. I know this from first hand knowledge. I built an open loop heater for a swimming pool out of an old stove. The amount of wood consumption was crazy.
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