Purchase made - Froling S3 with dual 240 gal Storage

[Bad LP]

I'm directly responsible for over $12m of a families personal properties. I assure you that over an area of 5 houses you will not find a single dielectric union anywhere. The oldest house is over 40 years old and I've been here from the day the trees were being cleared, all the blasting of ledge and the road was built. If there was ever a problem I'd be the first one to know about it. BTW all of these buildings are on private well water of varying quality.

 

[maple1]

I also have no dielectric unions. My old boiler (17 years) had none. The system at my parents has none and it's as old as me (50+ years). Seems to me I'm faintly remembering an old thread on here that mentioned their issues?

 

[hyfire]

Another thought are you going to use tap water to fill the system or something like distilled or deionized?

 

[Newfiestang]

Another thought are you going to use tap water to fill the system or something like distilled or deionized?

using town water.

 

[Newfiestang]

Great feedback folks.

I cant say im a big fan of a thin piece of non metal material in a union constantly exposed to high temp either. I think its an recipe for leaks over time...... but im also not to interested in my components being damaged from corrosion either. Between my Froling, Turbomax 2000 DHW heater, and 2 ASME tanks in sitting at about $14K CDN invested.

Anyway I will continue my research on this topic and see where it leads me.

 

[Newfiestang]

One arrangement that seems to fail often is male black pipe threaded into female copper. I think the female copper stretches around the harder steel.
Important goals with any hydronic system are no air, and no leaks. Threaded joints seem to be the most common corrosion point, and a slightly leaking threaded connection can create corrosion in short time.
Also, corrosion inhibitor is good and helps keep things shiny inside.
Dielectric unions often corrode (maybe that’s the plan?). Some peeps don’t like the idea of plastic being at the 200+ degree boiler exit.
Do some searching on this and other forums (heating help) to get more real world opinions on dielectric unions, but I hear where your coming from too, @Newfiestang. It’s one of those deals that gets spec’d.

Pretty hard to avoid the black pipe threaded into copper as both my boilers have female NPT connections so pretty much have to start with a nipple. Maybe you meant the type of metal, black iron as opposed to steel or something?

 

[salecker]

Great feedback folks.

I cant say im a big fan of a thin piece of non metal material in a union constantly exposed to high temp either. I think its an recipe for leaks over time...... but im also not to interested in my components being damaged from corrosion either. Between my Froling, Turbomax 2000 DHW heater, and 2 ASME tanks in sitting at about $14K CDN invested.

Anyway I will continue my research on this topic and see where it leads me.

You got in cheap...

 

[Newfiestang]

You got in cheap...

Oh im in for $21600 so far, and i dont have any pipe, valves, fittings, etc yet., but all that together shouldn't run me more than another $2K i expect.

 

[hyfire]

If you had propane it take about 15 years to burn through 20 k worth of gas or am i way off prices? Is this wood boiler equipement really worth it ?

 

[chew72]

If you had propane it take about 15 years to burn through 20 k worth of gas or am i way off prices? Is this wood boiler equipement really worth it ?

In my case I enjoy dealing with wood, so don't have to pay for a gym membership I figure I'm in my system for $20k and this year with free wood I'm looking to save $2.5-3k on my electric bill.

 

[Newfiestang]

If you had propane it take about 15 years to burn through 20 k worth of gas or am i way off prices? Is this wood boiler equipement really worth it ?

Well propane is definitely not feasible here where i live, in fact im not even aware of any sort of central heating furnace/boiler that uses propane. Natural gas in not available here. Pretty much everyone in Newfoundland heats with electricity, oil or wood. Electricity in the form of baseboard emitters or a heat pump of some sort. Minisplits have become popular as well in recent years.

Others heat with oil in the form of boiler or forced air but you know how that goes, its up and down like a dogs stomach. In fact a lot of folks in recent years have removed oil heat due to rising cost of oil and the cost of replacement oil tanks which have tripled in recent years.

I've always heat with wood and some oil and grew up in a house with same, so its more of a way of life i guess. And for me personally, i really love cool things that perform excellent at what they are meant to do. These gasification boilers seem to be that so here i am, $20K into it. And right now im in a position to make this investment but likely not once retired. Actually thats the main reason we decided to do this, we hope this investment allows us to stay in this fairly large home after we retire and living on a reduced fixed income. Long winded but thats my story lol.

 

[Newfiestang]

Folks, toying with the idea of adding a zone valve on the hot water supply piping to the DHW heater. Im thinking that with no heating zones calling for heat and wood boiler fired im going to see ghost flow to the DHW boiler when its not calling. I know the circulator on the supply line to the DHW heater will create some resistance to flow and most of the flow should go through buffer tanks but do you guys think this will be a problem? Dwg below to help with answers.

In this scenario the Froling will set the 3 way diverter valve on the cold water return line to flow to wood boiler thus oil boiler will be isolated with no flow possible. Thoughts?

 

[hyfire]

It might be a good idea to keep the DHW hot , legonella will grow beltween 77-122F I think, so think of a way to keep that tank regulated to 125 min. I would just put a check valve on the oil boiler output so it cant flow backwards. I understand your passion for wood, I miss burning it for a while now. My condesning gas boiler will run on propane just a jet change. Problem is with the new carbon tax, I will have to make a choice between heating or starving for food at the new gas rates.

 

[TCaldwell]

Don’t assume “town water” is suitable, you should ask the town for a analysis. Often town water containers polyphosphates used to suspend iron particles shed from distribution piping. This isn’t a problem until the water is heated to 140degf, after that the iron particles drop out and can cause corrosion.

 

[Newfiestang]

It might be a good idea to keep the DHW hot , legonella will grow beltween 77-122F I think, so think of a way to keep that tank regulated to 125 min. I would just put a check valve on the oil boiler output so it cant flow backwards. I understand your passion for wood, I miss burning it for a while now. My condesning gas boiler will run on propane just a jet change. Problem is with the new carbon tax, I will have to make a choice between heating or starving for food at the new gas rates.

The Froling will keep the DHW tank to whatever we decide to set it to anyway so i dont think Legonella is a concern. There will be a temp sensor on the DHW tank and connected to the froling controls. Also the DHW circ pump is controlled by the Froling as well.

You may be right on the check valve. Once the wood boiler is fired there will be a time frame there that the 3 way diverter valve is still open to the oil boiler so may be some back flow possible. Will have to put more thought into that but from first glance i think the only route for backflow will be through the DHW tank in reverse but the check valve in the circulator for that tank should stop that......I hope.

 

[chew72]

What size pipe is supplying the DHW? 1"?

 

[Newfiestang]

What size pipe is supplying the DHW? 1"?

Never got that far in design yet but it can be, everything else is so no reason not to i guess. The Turbomax 43 DHW boiler which is what i have is fitted with 1 1/4" tapping for boiler water and DHW connections.

 

[Bad LP]

Never got that far in design yet but it can be, everything else is so no reason not to i guess. The Turbomax 43 DHW boiler which is what i have is fitted with 1 1/4" tapping for boiler water and DHW connections.

Then I wouldn't bush them down.

 

[chew72]

Never got that far in design yet but it can be, everything else is so no reason not to i guess. The Turbomax 43 DHW boiler which is what i have is fitted with 1 1/4" tapping for boiler water and DHW connections.

We'll if it is 1" you can feed it the full output of the boiler. I'm gonna guess that 30kw of hot water is enough. Also if ghost flow is a concern why not zone it the same as your heating zones? And save you one circulator.

 

[Newfiestang]

We'll if it is 1" you can feed it the full output of the boiler. I'm gonna guess that 30kw of hot water is enough. Also if ghost flow is a concern why not zone it the same as your heating zones? And save you one circulator.

Yes discussed option of zoning the DHW circuit but apparently that removes the ability of the Froling to have complete control over priority between heating and DHW demand. The froling controls every circulator and can be programmed to pretty much what ever scenario you want in terms of priority.

But what I could to is wire a zone valve in parallel with the line voltage of the circ pump so that whenever the Froling turns on the DHW circ the zone valve opens.....other wise its closed. That may be worth doing.

 

[Newfiestang]

Ok so im struggling with the simplest thing, where to plumb in the expansion tank. Ive read alot on the pump away philosiphy and it makes sense but what im struggle with is which circulator do i consider for this philosophy, the 3 way cold water protection circ or the heating zone circ? Maybe i should plumb it at the suction of the Froling cold water protection circ and that will be placed in a pump away position for both that circ and the heating zone circ. Thoughts?

 

[chew72]

Ok so im struggling with the simplest thing, where to plumb in the expansion tank. Ive read alot on the pump away philosiphy and it makes sense but what im struggle with is which circulator do i consider for this philosophy, the 3 way cold water protection circ or the heating zone circ? Maybe i should plumb it at the suction of the Froling cold water protection circ and that will be placed in a pump away position for both that circ and the heating zone circ. Thoughts?

View attachment 276119

I would place it in the cold water feed to the froling myself. The main circulator to be concerned about in this regard is the heating circuit, as that circulator has the most head pressure to contend with. But if that location covers all circulators why not.

 

[Newfiestang]

Dwg 95% complete, few views.

 

[Newfiestang]

 

[Newfiestang]