Outdoor Boiler Site Placement

Ironwood · December 29, 2005, 06:21:42 PM

Dana,

All I can say was the mass of glowing embers................was surreal. And WAY COOL.

His photos dont do it justice at all. Reid

JohnBoy · January 13, 2006, 11:41:20 AM

JohnBoys Delemma:

My unit is a SCL-5448--409 stainless steel--with CB's "Smart Controller" with a remote for inside control.
This April it will have been sitting unused for 6 years. With the ordiances coming, I will have to hook it up this spring/summer. Even though I think as I bought it and it is in place and the bill of sale says, April 2000 I would be grandfathered in.
I have not hooked it up as to if I want to go thru the hassel of all the work to do it. It's called Procrastination!!
I am on a slab and have to dig like a mole under the footing and 15 feet to a closet where the hot water tank is and that will be the control center. Then tunnel to the right and left 15 feet each to get the other ends of the house and garage.
So you can see my delemma and why I have been lerry of this project. (Its just work!!)
Right now I heat with a woodstove and backup hot air furnace. The woodstove heats my hot water with a coil thru thermo-syphon. I have a 50 gallon tank and an 80 gallon tank and flip the valves to heat each tank. I usually leave it on the 80 gallon tank which preheats it and hot water flows to the 50 gallon tank which has an electric timer and comes on twice a day. It works very well.
I burn 5 full cords of wood and 200 gallons of fuel oil per year.
I can get all the wood I need from the 15 acres I live on and loads of wood elsewere. I have a backhoe.
So you can see my hesitation. I'm tired of just typing this log, but you guys got the answers.

Will It be worth it or not? Go for it? Am i crazy?

JohnBoy

just_sawing · January 13, 2006, 12:22:04 PM

I'm running a Hardy stove. Everything that everyone said about watch the location can't be stressed enough. I am going to have to relocate mine it appears. I live in a valley and am eating the smoke. We burn about anything but when we have green slabs we smoke the valley.

wiam · January 13, 2006, 09:11:40 PM

JohnBoy, hook it up. I really like my CB. I could not procrastinate on that. (I am very good at that though) My furnace in the basement burned through and I had to put my head in it and weld three times the last winter. I had been looking at outdoor boilers for several years, so there I went.

Will

RiverRat · February 16, 2006, 12:13:50 PM

Hi Folks,
I've been reading your threads on the subject of Outdoor Boilers and Waterstoves. I recently bought a house that has a Taylor 450 Waterstove and I know little to nothing about the stove. I was wondering if anyone had any idea what the ingrediants were in the Taylor Chemical or the water treatment stuff they use. The previous owner told me that I need to service the stove with this stuff. If anyone has any idea on the subject I would greatly appreciate it. This is a great discussion board--I have learned alot of valuable info.
Thanks,
RiverRat (new to the forum)

ronwood · February 16, 2006, 02:46:11 PM

Welcome Riverrat,

I have a Central Boiler and they sell a chemical that is used as a rust inhibitor. Wish I knew what the generic name of the chemical is.

Ron

eagles nest · February 16, 2006, 07:28:38 PM

Quote from: devo on February 10, 2005, 09:32:00 AM
Unclebuck, or anyone else that is interested, when I decided to build my stove I knew I didn't have the ability to cut, roll, and bend the steel and would need to use a steel shop, so I needed a good set of plans with dimentions. Since I couldn't find anything already drawn up that had the features I wanted, I had my engineer friend help me with the plans. These are profensionally made plans in SolidWorks 3D. If anyone wants them thier welcome to them. The plans include everything, including the water cooled door. The design is based very loosely on a Heatmore 400, but with a lot of improvements. This beast is still evolving a bit so the plans are changing a bit as we go, but hopefully in a month or so I'll be done with the stove, and the plans will be finished too. I'm not looking for money or anything, so if interested let me know.

P.S. Yes I'm taking pictures of the construction, and will post them if people want.

man i would love to see those plans

eagles nest · February 16, 2006, 07:51:32 PM

any one have experence with the econo water stove i think they are built in lebon,mo.
they have a neet flue / heat exchanger set up

Engineer · April 06, 2006, 05:35:35 PM

Well, time to fire up (pun intended) a popular thread.

Back in October '04, I asked about outdoor wood boilers in the early stages of this thread, and TODAY, we finally fired it up. Went an entire year with the boiler sitting idle on a concrete slab, and over the last three weeks we finally got all the plumbing done in the basement, wiring done and all the tubes hooked up. Started the fire at 2 PM, hoping to warm up 385 gallons of well water at 46 degrees to a usable temperature. By 5 PM the water temp was at 142 deg., water temp in the manifold was 115 deg. and the slab was actually feeling warm to the touch.

The setup, for those who want to know, is a Central Boiler CL5648 with a propane Dual Fuel backup system. It is 80 feet from the mechanical room, about equal elevation. I have six zones in the house. Five are heat zones, one is domestic hot water. I have an Amtrol Boilermate with a built-in heat exchanger to heat domestic water, and all of the other zones go through PEX manifolds for radiant tubing - one in the basement slab and four staple-up underneath the floors. The outdoor boiler, as should be obvious, is both the primary and backup heat source. There is no boiler, furnace or other heating device in the house. It will be nice to have quiet heat in a house without hearing the oil burner in the basement roaring and clanking.

I will post some pictures over the weekend so that people who are curious about the setup and piping of these things can use the photos as reference.

Now to build a woodshed..... ;D

thecfarm · April 06, 2006, 06:52:56 PM

I'm looking a little to get one.You mentioned equal elevation.Is this real important?Mine will be on the down hill side no more than 4 feet and probaly 80 feet away from the house.

Engineer · April 06, 2006, 08:21:13 PM

No, elevation isn't something you have to worry about. You do have to take it into consideration when sizing the circulator pump. I have 85 feet of 1" PEX each way, so the pump has to overcome friction and elevation losses in 170 feet of run, plus losses in the fittings and the heat exchanger. The system has a Taco 010 pump mounted at the boiler, which is maybe a foot or two in differential elevation below the heat exchanger in the basement. If you had, say, 200 feet of PEX each way and the unit was 40 feet below the house elevation (not a good idea anyway - smoke rises), you would need a much larger pump. Most folks that I know of that have these system have the boiler at or just above the basement elevation. The higher above the basement you are with the boiler, the elevation actually adds pressure to the system and overcomes some of the friction losses, thus a smaller pump.

EDIT: After a gentle reminder from someone more awake than I, I realised that I wasn't thinking straight. :-\ I'm used to designing water systems without a loop. In a case where the boiler is at a higher elevation than the heat exchanger, the boiler manufacturer recommends putting the pump in the house. That way you are using the assistance of gravity to flow from the boiler to the house, and the pump only has to go one way - back up to the boiler. Either way, you figure the pump for the elevation difference. You still have to figure friction losses in a long downhill run, but they often are cancelled out by the elevation drop.

slowzuki · December 19, 2006, 05:18:01 PM

If it is closed loop in the house, and the pump is up at the boiler you are still only pumping part of one way. The water gains pressure on the way down and loses on the way back up. Net effect the same. The only problem you can have is cavitation so if the head from your boiler tank isn't enough to keep a good positive pressure on the pump it might cavitate. But if your pump is sucking that much coolant you would probably cavitate down at the house too from the friction losses unless you have a really big suction line.

JohnBoy · January 03, 2007, 07:38:19 PM

Hey: This is JohnBoy. Aren't there any more talks about Outdoor Wood Boilers?

beenthere · January 03, 2007, 07:53:44 PM

Johnboy
What is it you need to know?

How to dig under that concrete slab?

Furby · January 03, 2007, 07:55:53 PM

12 pages not enough info for you ??? :D

Engineer · January 03, 2007, 09:04:37 PM

Quote from: JohnBoy on January 03, 2007, 07:38:19 PM
Hey: This is JohnBoy. Aren't there any more talks about Outdoor Wood Boilers?

I'll let you in on a secret. I have been all over this Whirled Wide Web looking for better and/or more information on outdoor wood boilers. There isn't a better resource than right here. If it isn't covered in this thread or any others on this Forum, you probably won't find much else. There are quite a few sites devoted to the prevention, regulation and alleged pollution of these things, but not much on the positive/technical side. I have had all my questions answered here, I have found that there are a lot of things the manufacturer doesn't tell you, and I have certainly found ways to make it run more efficiently and effectively. Most of the major manufacturers and a few homebrew jobs are represented here by members of this forum, just ask.

Since you're near Saratoga, mosey on down to Easton on Route 40 and visit Beecroft's; they're the Central Boiler dealer in these parts. You'll get a good look at them, and they have the big Pallet Burner model running. Not much they can offer you other than the company-sponsored brochures and propaganda, though. Or you're welcome to cross the border someday and come look at mine.

EDIT: Never mind, I'm stoopid. I just read through this entire thread and realized that you asked (and I responded) about these a year ago. Have you gotten the chance to hook yours up yet or not? If not, why not? It's really not all that difficult. There's another thread floating around the FF somewhere that's more of an "operations" discussion. I've had mine running full bore since September '06 (left it idle all summer) and aside from some learning experience, it's been excellent. I am heating 4300 square feet of SIP-enclosed timberframe to 68 degrees with JUST THE BASEMENT SLAB TUBING running 170 degree water through a copper plate heat exchanger. Have not used domestic hot water yet (but SOON!). I have been averaging one heaping wheelbarrow full of mixed dry wood (slabs, scraps and some hardwood) every two to three days. Feed the fire once daily. Today it hit almost fifty degrees and the fire was low, so I let it go out at 8 am, water temperature was 170. I came back at 3 pm and cleaned out the firebox (about 10 gallons of ash from 3 months operation). Fired it up, turned the boiler back on, temp read 160. I just put 250 gallons of fuel oil in my tanks at my current place while we finish the new house, and at almost $700, I am not happy. That's $700 I'll save every three months in the winter. Can't get the house done fast enough.

JohnBoy · January 04, 2007, 05:35:49 PM

Hey, Furby and Beenthere, you guys are funny and thanks for still being there. Engineer, yo only 50 miles from me and I would like to come see your setup.
Yup, I may have big problems here. New zoning going through soon (I just found out), but I'll be grandfathered in. Have to get a permit but no probs as the zoning officer will give me one as it has been on the property going on 7 years. They are banned in my area after this zoning proposal goes thru.
Here's the problem: My boiler is 175 feet from my sisters house (not property line, the house) and and 150 feet from my home. I put it out of the way to try to please her (moved it 3 times). No pleasing, she doesn't want it hooked up at all. I only got $8500 into it and that was in year 2000. I thought she would be the last one to hassel me. (Family Crap) Did you guys read this: www.woodheat.org-technology-NYSOBreport.pdf (Smoke gets in your lungs by Spitzer my wonderfull new govenor). Well she's on top of that, but here's the real clincher: Her son just passed his bar exam (my nephew) for New York State.
My friends say I'm screwed. With that report and the Clean Air Act, I don't think I can beat it. What do you guys think. I procrastinated and look where I'm at now. (Stupid Me) If i hook it up and get shut down, ain't worth it. I gots 11 acres of wood to and equipment to get it. Oh Crap.

JohnBoy

farmerdoug · January 04, 2007, 08:38:56 PM

I have mine by the greenhouses and it heats our house also. It is about 160 feet to the house so I think the 150 feet is not a problem. It just costs by the foot to install so it will increase your price. I would get it up and running to get a head start of the laws.

Farmerdoug

Furby · January 04, 2007, 08:50:02 PM

Yeah, I guess I don't see your problem.
You CAN get a permit and are grandfathered in, so you aren't breaking any laws.
Your sister will have to live with it or move.

thecfarm · January 04, 2007, 09:00:49 PM

I'm still in the looking stages.From what I've seen some only have a 6 foot chimmey.Some have a few sections of stainsteel pipe added on.I feel this is the way to go.Get the smoke up in the air where it won't bother neighbors.I plan on getting mine up in the air.I don't want to be smoked out.I don't have any close neighbors.I'm thinking of at least 12 feet,if the furance people says it's OK to do.How many people complain about smoke coming from a wood stove from a house?I realize a outdoor furnace is differant.

farmerdoug · January 04, 2007, 11:44:12 PM

Jerry, the Central boiler dealer I deal with said they installed one down in the city, Sterling Heights or close to there I think. Anyways he put 30 feet of chimney pipe on the unit to meet the city requirements and it is now operating. He said that it has to have a forced draft fan with that much though. He said that the more pipe the less problems with smoke also.

I think just the forced sraft fan would help get the burning going faster with less smoke and a quicker cycle time to reheat also.

Farmerdoug