glycol with a gassifier?

[turfman]

Hi guys. Well I made the plunge and bought the Vigas 40. In the process of running pipes through the house, hooking up the chimney ... I had to run some of the pipes in outside walls. I used 1-1/4" black pipe and I'm worried about freezing if we happen to leave for a couple days in the winter. I also believe my existing system has glycol in it. My question is can you have glycol in your system and have that water enter your gasser?
I haven't seen much talk about this. Your help will be appreciated.

 

[turfman]

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention ---- the whole reason I ran some in outside walls is because there is no basement - its a slab house. So to get from gasser to boiler (which is in the middle of the house) and the gasser -- a seperate room off the garage, I had to use the attic and an outside wall (fortunately only about 4'). Attic I can insule really well but the wall....

 

[jebatty]

No issue of which I am aware concerning glycol in a gasser. Be sure to use the non-toxic gylcol. The auto-type stuff can kill living things in a horrible way.

 

[Duetech]

Boiler glycol is even recommended by some manufacturers but there is a loss of efficiency. Somewhere around 10% I believe but I have never used it.

 

[Hydronics]

Yes, you will want to check the PH of the system now to be sure it's not too low. A low PH (acidic) will eventually corrode copper pipe. If it's good when you add more propylene glycol be sure you mix it with water that isn't hard as you want to avoid the high mineral content. I run 50% glycol in my eko in an out building so we can go on vaca. and let it go out.

 

[turfman]

Thanks guys. Really looking forward to burning wood again

 

[stee6043]

For what it's worth there are other methods to control freezing (temporarily). Many boilers will have a built-in function that will cycle your circ pump if it senses temperatures getting too close to freezing. A more sure-fire way to avoid freezing in some conditions is to simply rig a switch to your circ pump so you can force it to stay on while you are away. If you need protection for a couple of days these kinds of methods might be significantly less costly than glycol.

If you're looking for protection weeks at a time...well then that might be different.

 

[ewdudley]

For what it's worth there are other methods to control freezing (temporarily). Many boilers will have a built-in function that will cycle your circ pump if it senses temperatures getting too close to freezing. A more sure-fire way to avoid freezing in some conditions is to simply rig a switch to your circ pump so you can force it to stay on while you are away. If you need protection for a couple of days these kinds of methods might be significantly less costly than glycol.

If you're looking for protection weeks at a time...well then that might be different.

+1

In the OP's situation there's gotta be a better way than glycol.

--ewd

 

[turfman]

Hmm, I kind of like that idea. If my propane boiler is running to maintain minimal house heat it could circulate through the wood boiler and keep those pipes from freezing, eh?!?
That's why I have come to like this site. People think out of the box!!

 

[ewdudley]

If my propane boiler is running to maintain minimal house heat it could circulate through the wood boiler and keep those pipes from freezing, eh?!?

It doesn't take much. Our home sweet home is sprawling affair with a lot of far flung zones that are rarely occupied in the winter. I use switches to set each zone as 'heated' or 'freeze-protected'. The freeze-protected zones get activated for a couple minutes each hour with a timer.

 

[ISeeDeadBTUs]

My wood side is an open system. First year I ran a 50/50 . . . so far this year I am running straight H2O.

That's not a recomendation. I THINK the only downside to AF is a loss of exchange efficiency. But listen to someone who knows more about such things than I do.