EKO 40 is on its way and I still don't have a plan

[stee6043]

I hate to say it but your EKO 40 is going to be severly undersized if you hit 80,000+ btu/hr with any consistency and aren't planning to run it 24/7 forever. Any idea how many "design load days" you expect in a heating season? You may want to consider a 60 or even an 80 if storage is in your future.

For reference a full load of wood will only last 4 hours +/- when an EKO is running full bore, peak output. And rarely, very rarely, will any boilers acheive their advertised output during an entire burn. So let's say your EKO 40 is outputting 100,000 btu for round numbers, and needs to be loaded every 4 hours to sustain this output. Do you think you'll ever have enough heat to charge your future tanks with only 20k to spare +/-? Probably not. And I'm sure you don't want to be loading that gem every 4 or 5 hours no matter what the conditions.

I think if you're seriously planning for storage you may want to consider an EKO 60. My opinion only...

 

[Hunderliggur]

we used 178 Kwh/day for central heat through the peak winter months....

178KWH * 3413 BTU/KWH = 600KBTU/DAY = 25 KBTUH Average load (not 88KBTUH which is the peak design load). Your heating contractor would have oversized the boiler from the design temps = you'll never call about not being able to heat the house if the boiler is too big.

The Department of Energy has a free (OK - paid for by you and me already) program called ResCheck to calculate heat loss based on your structure. Try that and see what you get.

600KBTU/DAY is about 4 - 6 hours burning in a -40 depending on your wood supply. It will be more when you first get started. You could probably "burn" for 12 hours (with idling) and let the slab "coast" for the other 12 hours and come out OK without storage. 1000 gallons of water can store about 500KBTU (Delta-T of 60F).

 

[jedclamoit]

Ya thanks for clearing it up hunderligger. We may get a weeks worth of the design load temp here and there, so I should be able to do some other things with extra output eventually, right now I just need to get it hooked up alongside the backup boiler with an arm going to the DHW, laying it all out so that storage can be easily added at a later date. I can get old scrap propane tanks for $.20/lb so perhaps I could get into it just have weld on some fittings?

 

[huffdawg]

I think BC hydro has stopped installing the smart meters here for the time being . They showed a retiree's hydro bill on the news the other day. His average previous bills for 2 month periods were around $300 . His first smart metered bill was $2000.

I live on Vancouver Island about 150 miles from you as a crow flies. So our weather patterns are pretty much the same .

25000 btu's per hour seems a lot more reasonable . And your 40 should keep easy.

 

[huffdawg]

Ya thanks for clearing it up hunderligger. We may get a weeks worth of the design load temp here and there, so I should be able to do some other things with extra output eventually, right now I just need to get it hooked up alongside the backup boiler with an arm going to the DHW, laying it all out so that storage can be easily added at a later date. I can get old scrap propane tanks for $.20/lb so perhaps I could get into it just have weld on some fittings?

Make sure you buy weldable fittings ( no cast) I made that mistake and had to do the job twice.

 

[jedclamoit]

thanks for helping me think through this everyone, the 40 is apparantly on the road, need some suppliers on the west coast! now I just need a parts list, how to figure out circulation pump and pipe sizes etc. and what sized fittings should be fab'd onto a propane tank and where. If there's a thread I'll probably find it, otherwise if someone can steer me to the right place that'd be great as well.

 

[SmokeEater]

we used 178 Kwh/day for central heat through the peak winter months, so that's 607361.21 btu/day, but we didn't heat zones of the house and had tstats set below where we were truly comfortable (about 2 or 3 degrees lower than we'd really want).

Guesstimating, using your numbers above and figuring the gasser is 85% efficient and the wood is maple and is at 20% MC, then, all else being the same, you'll burn somewhere around 23 face cord/y to supply the same heat with wood only. If the gasser is more efficient and/or the wood is drier, then you'll burn less accordingly.

 

[Hunderliggur]

Guesstimating, using your numbers above and figuring the gasser is 85% efficient and the wood is maple and is at 20% MC, then, all else being the same, you'll burn somewhere around 23 face cord/y to supply the same heat with wood only. If the gasser is more efficient and/or the wood is drier, then you'll burn less accordingly.

What's a face cord? 128 cubic feet per cord. Assuming a "face cord" is 4 feet high by 8 feet wide, how deep is it? That is why firewood legally is measured in "cords".

 

[maple1]

I think the 'common' conversion used is 1 real cord = 3 face cords.

Personally, it bugs the heck out of me. Nobody says 'face cord' where I'm at, and a cord is a cord is a 128 cu.ft. cord.

 

[stee6043]

We have face cord and ricks all over the place around here. There are plenty of people out there that advertise a "cord" for $X and then a "full cord" for three times as much, meaning that's the real cord. It certainly can be confusing.

 

[SmokeEater]

What's a face cord? 128 cubic feet per cord. Assuming a "face cord" is 4 feet high by 8 feet wide, how deep is it? That is why firewood legally is measured in "cords".

Here, a face cord is how split or round firewood is cut, stacked, measured, bought, and sold. Years ago local woodmen cut pulp wood for paper making that was usually a conifer because when the fibers were "ground" off the lateral side of the logs by "pulp mills", they were longer than the hardwoods and made a better paper. The machinery, consisting of a holding device and a large milled round stone used to grind, traditionally was sized to handle 4 foot wood and hence the mills bought pulp wood in 4 foot lengths. Conveniently, early mill buyers began buying stacks of 4 foot wood. Today in the area the 4 foot pulp wood is uncommon, but the size stuck and loggers recut their old 4' x 4' x 8' long cord into 16" pieces for sale, but still only sold the wood as a 16" deep cord or a "face cord". So maybe the face cord isn't a common measure where you are but here in the Adirondacks it is the common firewood measure. Sorry if I confused or offended anyone on the use of this local dialect.

 

[Hunderliggur]

Here, a face cord is how split or round firewood is cut, stacked, measured, bought, and sold. Years ago local woodmen cut pulp wood for paper making that was usually a conifer because when the fibers were "ground" off the lateral side of the logs by "pulp mills", they were longer than the hardwoods and made a better paper. The machinery, consisting of a holding device and a large milled round stone used to grind, traditionally was sized to handle 4 foot wood and hence the mills bought pulp wood in 4 foot lengths. Conveniently, early mill buyers began buying stacks of 4 foot wood. Today in the area the 4 foot pulp wood is uncommon, but the size stuck and loggers recut their old 4' x 4' x 8' long cord into 16" pieces for sale, but still only sold the wood as a 16" deep cord or a "face cord". So maybe the face cord isn't a common measure where you are but here in the Adirondacks it is the common firewood measure. Sorry if I confused or offended anyone on the use of this local dialect.

No offense, I guess I should have put a or on the original post. Once you start cutting your own wood for your specific boiler you may use 16" 18" 20" or whatever wood. That makes 16" face cords not too useful. Here in Maryland, if you sell firewood it have to be a "cord" 128 CuFt or a fraction of that. You cannot legally sell face cords in our fine state.

 

[jedclamoit]

Questions, questions...

I guess I'm looking at a primary loop with both boilers attached to it and the different circuits coming off of it:

I have 6 heating zones in the radiant slab

DHW (which could come indirectly from storage if I can get some coils in there)

Storage if I add it right away (remains to be seen looks like I can get a good price on a salvage tank probably start with 500 gallon) I may have to light more fires as some of you have suggested on the peak heat demand days

I like what the sticky on "simple storage system" has to say but doesn't there need to be a continuous loop so that the boiler can start up according to the outside sensor, slightly before zones may call for heat? Looks like the circulator would dead end against all the zones valves, specifically in the diagram without storage (if I don't get storage in this year)? In the diagram with storage there is a loop through the storage I believe.

I also have no idea what my system content is or the head against any of the pumps, as it was done by the pro. I obviously know I have two 3 speed grundfos 59896341 "15-58" pumps, one on the boiler loop and another dedicated to switching on when one of the 6 zone valves calls for heat. Both pumps are set to high. Am I safe to stick with same size circulator for Mister EKO 40 or should I really dig into this and see if the original designer hung onto to his calcs from 4 years ago?

There is also a mysterious "Macdonnell flow switch" shortly after the outlet on the existing boiler, why would I need that (gasket isn't looking to good on it either)?

I'm with Hunderligger, down with face cords and all the symantics, 4'x4'x8' is king in these parts as well

 

[maple1]

Re. the DHW indirectly from storage: have you factored in keeping your storage hot all summer? If you will be or want to, fine. But there may be situations where it would be better to just run a simple electric hot water heater all summer rather than burning wood all summer - or even periods where the fire will simply be off for a week or two. I plan on using a regular electric hot water tank, but also hooking it up to a sidearm heat exchanger that will gravity circulate from storage, and also using some McGyver engineering on more DHW heating by wrapping 5-600 feet of pex around my storage tanks, and insulating the crap out of it all. Hoping it will be the best of both worlds (when the wood is burning, and when it isn't).

 

[Hunderliggur]

I have a little more complicated system, but in essence all of my make-up cold water goes through the HX in the storage before reaching a tankless heater. If the storage is hot, the tankless will not fire. If the storage is not, the incoming water (55F) is tempered to whatever the storage is (say 70F is the summer) before being heated by the tankless. My tankless also serves as my whole house backup heat the way my system works (in essence an open system with potable water in the loops - requires bronze or stainless pumps).

 

[SmokeEater]

I'm with Hunderligger, down with face cords and all the symantics, 4'x4'x8' is king in these parts as well

Sorrry again, but I thought I apologized earlier for the use of our local dialect regarding the "face cord". I promise to remain quiet and won't contribute any additional info on this particular thread in the future, promise.

 

[ewdudley]

Sorrry again, but I thought I apologized earlier for the use of our local dialect regarding the "face cord". I promise to remain quiet and won't contribute any additional info on this particular thread in the future, promise.

No need to deprecate the use of 'face cord', at least not in the State of New York, where arithmetic is universally taught, and sometimes even put to use.

From the New York State Weights and Measures Regulations, 1 NYCRR Part 221, Revised March 29, 2007:

(13) Wood for fuel.
(i) All wood for fuel shall be offered for sale or sold at retail in the manner provided in this paragraph, except:
(a) any sale of unpackaged wood for fuel if the wood was observed by the buyer or his agent before sale; and
(b) any sale of standing trees offered as stumpage for fuel purposes.
(ii) Definitions.
(a) Wood for fuel means any kindling, logs, boards, timbers or other wood, split or not split, and similar products advertised, offered for sale or sold in a form or size appropriate for use as fuel.
(b) Cord means the amount of wood which is contained in a space of 128 cubic feet, when the wood is ranked and well stowed. The dimensions for a standard cord of wood are four feet in height, eight feet in width and four feet in depth and shall be stated whenever the term is used.
(c) Face cord means the front or face of a standard cord, i.e., four feet in height and eight feet in width, and the depth being defined by the length of the cut wood expressed in inches. The dimensions shall be stated whenever the term face cord is used in any representation.
(d) Ranked and well stowed means the placing of pieces of wood in a row, with individual pieces touching and parallel to each other, and stacked in a compact manner.

(e) Representation means any advertisements, offering, invoice or the like that pertains to the sale of wood for fuel.
(iii) Identity.
(a) No representation of wood for fuel shall identify as "hardwood" the wood from any species of conifer, aspen, poplar, basswood, butternut, willow, grey birch and paper birch.
(b) If wood is represented as seasoned, the length of time and the manner of seasoning must be specified.
(iv) Quantity.
(a) Whenever wood for fuel is advertised, offered for sale, or sold at retail, the three dimensions of the wood, when ranked and well stowed, shall be stated and shall be expressed in feet and inches. The dimensions may be accompanied by any descriptive word, such as cord, face cord, truckload, rack, etc.
For example:
(1) 4 ft x 8 ft x 24 in (1/2 cord);
(2) 4 ft x 8 ft x 16 in (face cord);
(3) 4 ft x 8 ft x 18 in (rack);
(4) 9 ft x 9 ft x 3 ft (truckload);
(5) 1/3 cord (4 ft x 8 ft x 16 in); and
(6) face cord (4 ft x 8 ft x 18 in).
(b) Wood may be sold by weight if the quantity exceeds two cords.

So anyone in New York, who can read, and who can do arithmetic, can feel free to use the term 'face cord' if they find it useful.

--ewd

 

[Hunderliggur]

From the New York State Weights and Measures Regulations, 1 NYCRR Part 221, Revised March 29, 2007:

So anyone in New York, who can read, and who can do arithmetic, can feel free to use the term 'face cord' if they find it useful.

--ewd

Except down here in the South, #2 Face Cord (4' x 8' x 16") is not the same as #6 Face Cord (4' x 8' x 18")

I guess the NY politicians can't do arithmetic (but we knew that already, didn't we?).