Wrapped up installation and fired her up last night. Fired for about 4 1/2 hours and got the tank temp to 120 degrees at 2/3 from the bottom, 90 degrees on the very bottom. I don't yet have a thermistor on the very top of the tank but its real hot to the touch. Steca 301 controls tank charging pump. Tank is equipped with headers top and bottom. Tank charging and retrieval flows are reversed via a 4 way mixing valve. Tekmar 153 controls the boiler return temp. When boiler pump stops at end of firing the boiler loop mixing valve automatically isolates the boiler loop and the tank flow reverses to retrieve heat from tank.
Outdoor Biomax 60 installation complete (pictures attached)
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Beautiful setup, termite. As I recall, you have a big steel tank for storage, and your boiler is in an outbuilding.
Expansion tank is a cash acme TV-160 (acceptance volume of 64 gallons). It's hidden behind the boiler in the photo. Its connected to the tap on the bottom of the air scoop. Since the boiler loop is isolated from the rest of the system when it isn't circulating I also tee'd it into the storage tank. I couldn't find any examples of tying a single tank to multiple locations in a system (worried about a short circuit) but I did it anyway.
I think pressure is pressure. As long as it has access to the tank, I don't see why it wouldn't work.
I did the same thing you did with the tee. The only potential problem I could see is that you need an isolation valve somewhere so that you can drain one side and not the other. And you're not supposed to be able to isolate expansion, but most installations that I've seen have a valve right ahead of the tank so that you can easily isolate it for service, anyway. Amounts to the same thing, I guess. What I eventually wound up doing was putting an Extrol 60 on both sides. Since I had a spare, it was no big deal. In your case, obviously, you'd want to put the smaller tank on the boiler side of the equation.
I did the same thing you did with the tee. The only potential problem I could see is that you need an isolation valve somewhere so that you can drain one side and not the other. And you're not supposed to be able to isolate expansion, but most installations that I've seen have a valve right ahead of the tank so that you can easily isolate it for service, anyway. Amounts to the same thing, I guess. What I eventually wound up doing was putting an Extrol 60 on both sides. Since I had a spare, it was no big deal. In your case, obviously, you'd want to put the smaller tank on the boiler side of the equation.
I thought about using a small tank at the scoop and plumbing the big tank low on the storage tank to keep the temperature down on the big expensive tank. For various and likely wrong reasons I thought it would be best to keep the pressure the same across the system. Not to mention I didn't want to tell my better half that all I need is one more part (for the hundredth time).
Very nice. I bet that your boiler room is really toasty with out all the pipes being insulated. And that Tank is one big radiator. I think you made a wise move not insulating untill you have run it up to temp for a short time as the change in temp does strange things and it's a pain to take all the insulation off to fix things.
leaddog
leaddog
leaddog,
Very toasty indeed. I have a bunch of that black foam stuff you see on the feed water line. For the tank I have 2.5"x4'x8' sheets of log cabin roof insulation and R33 fiberglass batts. Do you have any suggestions on a radiant barrier (material, placement) for the tank?
Very toasty indeed. I have a bunch of that black foam stuff you see on the feed water line. For the tank I have 2.5"x4'x8' sheets of log cabin roof insulation and R33 fiberglass batts. Do you have any suggestions on a radiant barrier (material, placement) for the tank?
I'm no expert so I hope Nofossel jumps in as he has done more in this area but I think I would rap the tank with foil/bubble/foil first to cut the radiant. or even just foil, Then put the rest of the insulation. It's interesting that you are getting good stratification in your tank while you are heating it. I thought you might not because of the turbulance.termite said:
I helped my bil tear out a bunch of copper from a store that they were selling to be completely remodeled and I took off the insulation. some of the stuff is 1-1/2in thick as it came off the freezer compressors. Also some was for 2in copper so I put that over some of the small insulation you buy in the stores. It really makes a difference. I wish I had saved a bunch of the copper as we sold it for scrap. Alot of it was long lenghts but then the $2500 was nice. We only had 2 days so had to work fast. I didn't know I had the boiler project comming up at that time.
leaddog
I reuse fittings all the time. The only thing going in my scrap bucket is the stuff mangulated beyond repair.
leaddog,
Stratification is due to the headers in the tank. The tank has a 12"x16" manway. I welded up some 1-1/4" standpipes and fitted them through 2" bungs on the top and bottom of the tank. After watching what I ate for two days I crawled into the tank and put elbows and 6 1/2' long headers on each of the standpipes. Heat is delivered through the top header which is located about 3" from the top of the tank. Retrieval is accomplished through the same upper header by reversing flow. Headers are capped on the ends and have a series of (27) 3/8" holes drilled along their length getting closer together as they approach the capped end.
Stratification is due to the headers in the tank. The tank has a 12"x16" manway. I welded up some 1-1/4" standpipes and fitted them through 2" bungs on the top and bottom of the tank. After watching what I ate for two days I crawled into the tank and put elbows and 6 1/2' long headers on each of the standpipes. Heat is delivered through the top header which is located about 3" from the top of the tank. Retrieval is accomplished through the same upper header by reversing flow. Headers are capped on the ends and have a series of (27) 3/8" holes drilled along their length getting closer together as they approach the capped end.
Congratulations Termite on the successful startup of your heating system. By any chance do you have a diagram of your setup that you could post? I am way down on the learning curve path and I am studying the pictures you have posted. A diagram would help me sort things out.
Don L,
I have a diagram of the plumbing and a schematic of the electrical. I don't have either with me now. I need to reverse the leads for one of the actuator motors on the schematic. I posted a rough version of the plumbing diagram in an earlier thread. I have since simplified the reversible flow plumbing for the storage tank. I'll fix that and add the plumbing for the expansion tank and post them to this thread tonight or tomorrow.
I have a diagram of the plumbing and a schematic of the electrical. I don't have either with me now. I need to reverse the leads for one of the actuator motors on the schematic. I posted a rough version of the plumbing diagram in an earlier thread. I have since simplified the reversible flow plumbing for the storage tank. I'll fix that and add the plumbing for the expansion tank and post them to this thread tonight or tomorrow.
what size pipe did you use from the boiler room to the house? how much time do you expect to get off the tank?
Noting to say. I just want to be attached so I can be notified when the pics are posted. Looks like a very well made setup. Congrats on the nice work, esp since it WORKS. j
termite said:
termite,
High E and I were throwing around the idea of surrounding our tanks with sand then insulate the walls really good. I believe garn uses vermiculite to insulate there tanks. We are thinking that the sand would absorb some heat and then radiate back into the tank. I read somewhere that soil can absorb and release heat twice as fast as water. Theory is more heat storage.
Dry soil?
I like the sand idea. Plenty of that where you are.
Vermiculite is going to run some bucks with a tank that big. Same thing with perlite. Have you seen the pic of his tank, Garnification? It's pretty impressive. I guess you know what a 1,300 gallon tank looks like. I like the manhole. What's the inside of that tank like, termite? What did it contain before?
I really appreciate you guys posting these pics of your projects. It's great how everyone is doing something a little different. When I was shopping for gasifiers last year at this time, there was basically nothing independent on the EKO, other than a few dead threads at the Mother Earth News site, and then they shut it down for maintenance. Now we've got people using at least five different brands and a couple of pretty impressive homemade rigs that anyone who wants information can interact with.
I like the sand idea. Plenty of that where you are.
Vermiculite is going to run some bucks with a tank that big. Same thing with perlite. Have you seen the pic of his tank, Garnification? It's pretty impressive. I guess you know what a 1,300 gallon tank looks like. I like the manhole. What's the inside of that tank like, termite? What did it contain before?
I really appreciate you guys posting these pics of your projects. It's great how everyone is doing something a little different. When I was shopping for gasifiers last year at this time, there was basically nothing independent on the EKO, other than a few dead threads at the Mother Earth News site, and then they shut it down for maintenance. Now we've got people using at least five different brands and a couple of pretty impressive homemade rigs that anyone who wants information can interact with.
I really think you should look for a second tank and use it for more storage. The sand really was slow and didn't tranfer either way very fast. I had a plate for the top of the fire box and then I had a copper heatexchanger on that to move the heat up thru the sand. The pvc was about 8in above the plate so you didn't melt it. They stressed SMALL fires but I wanted more heat and over fired it and the pvc bulged out the size of a softball in places where the heat moved faster. The sand just wouldn't move it fast enough. I had to shut it down in the middle of winter and the center of the sand was still over 50f in the spring so you can see the heat didn't move very fast. Plus the sand was a pain to work with when I tried to repair it and I had to take it all out by hand. Water is so much easier to work with.
leaddog
leaddog
Termite, a beautiful job, congrats! The use of the weatherproof breaker panel enclosure looks like it works well. The plumbing looks great too. The best of luck to you on it's performance, now you're required to keep everyone posted on it's progress.
Eric Johnson said:
I just looked back and seen termite's tank. It looks alot like the tank that High e built his boiler out of. It had a tag on it ( 100psi @ 650*f) No capacity tag. But calc. it to @ 2100gal. It has convex ends and has a .375" wall thickness. I had numerous bungs and flanges welded on it with a manway access too. After looking at termites setup, I can't help but wonder why didn't he just buy a Garn. You were building a seperate shed to house the buffer tank anyway and you could of eliminated some of the piping and pump. "Simple is better" - High E.
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