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Old 02-28-2015, 09:59 AM
moonlaker moonlaker is offline
 
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Default Expert boiler guys

Here's my deal; I'm currently at lock-up building my own quasi passive solar house south west of Etown. The house has 12" thick walls that I'll fill with dense pack cellulose fibre insulation. It faces directly south with lots of south facing, triple pane windows. The main floor of the house is 1615sq ft and will have about 2.5inches of concrete for it's floor. The basement will start with 4" of eps foam and then 4" of concrete. I'm going to run hydronic lines in the concrete on both floors.
I'm thinking of slapping a viessmann Vitodens WB1B-35 in to take care of my space heating and DHW. I'll also run a loop out to my 27'x32' attached garage.
I'm also going to be putting this http://www.whitfield.com/products/fireplaces/montecito/ on the main floor and hopefully ducting half of it's heat to the basement below. I foresee myself using the fireplace lots.
I had a design heat loss calc. done on my house and it's 4500watts at -36C (Edmonton).
Some guys with experience in these passive solar homes are telling me the in-floor heat is redundant but I don't care. If I'm going to have to live with concrete floors for the rest of my life then they better at least be warm.
Anyone have any suggestions? I was thinking of running the in floor lines by myself and then finding a mechanical guy to tie it all in. I'm an electrician by trade and, not to knock anyone but, I haven't worked with a plumber who is really really good with boilers.
Should I get the whole thing professionally designed? I'm worried about how my fireplace will work in conjunction with my boiler and HRV.
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Old 02-28-2015, 11:56 AM
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I'm a big proponent of heated floors, just be sure to insulate well under the basement slab with 1 1/2" or 2" sheet foam. With a very well insulated house that boiler might well be sufficient in size, my home is similarly sized and 100% spray foam insulated and my IBC 15-150 boiler never reaches full fire except at initial warm up of a cold system up or a domestic water call. One trick I did was to also isolate the slab from the foundation wall by putting a perimeter of sheet foam around the wall prior to pouring the floor, so there's no thermal bridging anywhere. As for sizing of the system I entrust that to the engineers at my suppliers, who provide the service with their materials supply quotes to me, with the computer programs they have to punch in the R-values, window allowances and exterior wall area its just not productive for me to drag out my old 'analog' charts. I like the concept of a heat exchanger tank style water heater arrangement as opposed to the instantaneous arrangements some combi-boilers can provide, one reason is higher flow rates, a person can fill that big bathtub more quickly and draw multiple fixtures at the same time with no pressured drop, another is just having that tank full of water to draw from if there is a water service interruption.

We have a wood fireplace that we like to run a lot, it throws off enough heat that we need to open windows. It does have side effects with the floor heat though as our thermostat in the hall becomes satisfied and shuts off supply to those loops, consequently our floor will be cold the mornings after we ran the fireplace overnight (I'll fill the firebox and throttle back the air supply for a long/low burn). However our main floor is a 'staple up' system and I do not have a concrete thermal mass to mitigate such temperature swings, you might find less noticeable temp swings with 2.5" concrete or gypcrete. I would recommend that you locate you thermostat as far as possible from your fireplace, and that you utilize slab sensors for reading your floor temps. I was interested in putting in a hot water coil from our fireplace to some tanks to store hot water thermal mass for the hydronic heating that could be drawn from as 'stage 1' where the boiler would be 'stage 2' through a boiler control but never got to that (I have pipes futured in, but the tanks would take up my storage area). Wouldn't it be nice to have the fireplace supplying your domestic hot and basement slab?


This is the system I installed in my own home (yes, I've pimped out this photo on here many times before... ) :
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Old 02-28-2015, 12:03 PM
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I built a very basic system to heat slab with a small circ pump pushing domestic water through a small plate exchanger it easily heats an 1100 sqft house and 900 detached garage with poly glycol. Simple.
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Old 02-28-2015, 04:00 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
I'm a big proponent of heated floors, just be sure to insulate well under the basement slab with 1 1/2" or 2" sheet foam. With a very well insulated house that boiler might well be sufficient in size, my home is similarly sized and 100% spray foam insulated and my IBC 15-150 boiler never reaches full fire except at initial warm up of a cold system up or a domestic water call. One trick I did was to also isolate the slab from the foundation wall by putting a perimeter of sheet foam around the wall prior to pouring the floor, so there's no thermal bridging anywhere. As for sizing of the system I entrust that to the engineers at my suppliers, who provide the service with their materials supply quotes to me, with the computer programs they have to punch in the R-values, window allowances and exterior wall area its just not productive for me to drag out my old 'analog' charts. I like the concept of a heat exchanger tank style water heater arrangement as opposed to the instantaneous arrangements some combi-boilers can provide, one reason is higher flow rates, a person can fill that big bathtub more quickly and draw multiple fixtures at the same time with no pressured drop, another is just having that tank full of water to draw from if there is a water service interruption.

We have a wood fireplace that we like to run a lot, it throws off enough heat that we need to open windows. It does have side effects with the floor heat though as our thermostat in the hall becomes satisfied and shuts off supply to those loops, consequently our floor will be cold the mornings after we ran the fireplace overnight (I'll fill the firebox and throttle back the air supply for a long/low burn). However our main floor is a 'staple up' system and I do not have a concrete thermal mass to mitigate such temperature swings, you might find less noticeable temp swings with 2.5" concrete or gypcrete. I would recommend that you locate you thermostat as far as possible from your fireplace, and that you utilize slab sensors for reading your floor temps. I was interested in putting in a hot water coil from our fireplace to some tanks to store hot water thermal mass for the hydronic heating that could be drawn from as 'stage 1' where the boiler would be 'stage 2' through a boiler control but never got to that (I have pipes futured in, but the tanks would take up my storage area). Wouldn't it be nice to have the fireplace supplying your domestic hot and basement slab?


This is the system I installed in my own home (yes, I've pimped out this photo on here many times before... ) :

Caber,
I have nothing to add to this discussion.. But damn that picture impresses me.
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Old 02-28-2015, 04:52 PM
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Totally agree. That is pipemanship at a top level. Laying pipe to make it work is one thing, doing it too look sporty is art
And the male model he got to stand in for the pic too!
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Old 02-28-2015, 04:55 PM
RandyBoBandy RandyBoBandy is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by roger View Post
Totally agree. That is pipemanship at a top level. Laying pipe to make it work is one thing, doing it too look sporty is art
And the male model he got to stand in for the pic too!
^ ^ ^ THIS! How much do you pay the guy to monitor that NASA looking command center?? WOW!!
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Old 02-28-2015, 04:58 PM
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Beautiful work caber.
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Old 02-28-2015, 05:03 PM
canuck canuck is offline
 
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I heat close to 4000 sq ft, and supply DHW, with a Vitodens 100 with no trouble at all, biggest gas bill has been $160 - its the perfect boiler for your situation.
Run a slab sensor like caber suggested, but watch where you locate it.
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Old 02-28-2015, 05:09 PM
qwert qwert is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
I'm a big proponent of heated floors, just be sure to insulate well under the basement slab with 1 1/2" or 2" sheet foam.
snip
One trick I did was to also isolate the slab from the foundation wall by putting a perimeter of sheet foam around the wall prior to pouring the floor, so there's no thermal bridging anywhere.
snip
This is the system I installed in my own home (yes, I've pimped out this photo on here many times before... ) :
I did not insulate, but did lay a good bed of crushed gravel under the slab. My thinking was that since there is no moisture or thermal movement through the very dry solid clay under the gravel and the ground temp is a constant @~55F, and since heat rises, any heat that leaks under the slab will just warm the gravel and clay and it will all form part of the thermal mass. I did not insulate between the floor and the walls because I wanted all the concrete to be part of the thermal mass. I did insulate the full height of the outside of the walls with 3" styro plus 1.5"x2' @ 45 degrees at the surface.

I have poly piping @ 12" centers in the slab and heat it with a wood fired low pressure low temperature boiler. I use a single Grundfos circulating pump feeding 4 loops. My plumbing is no where near as complex as yours and is best described as fully manual controlled. It takes some long fires to heat the mass in the fall but then much less to maintain through the winter. I often do not light a fire on a sunny day.

My Grundfos circulating pump (which draws .7amp) is the only part of the system that depends on Hydro. I would like to add a circulating pump that runs on 12VDC, which I could power with hydro through a transformer-rectifier or with standby battery power.

Does Grundfos make a small circulating pump that runs on 12VDC?
Can you suggest or recommend another manufacturer that makes such a pump?
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Old 02-28-2015, 05:25 PM
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Dewey Cox Dewey Cox is online now
 
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It's best to insulate.
Contrary to popular belief, heat doesn't rise.
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Old 02-28-2015, 05:29 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
I'm a big proponent of heated floors, just be sure to insulate well under the basement slab with 1 1/2" or 2" sheet foam. With a very well insulated house that boiler might well be sufficient in size, my home is similarly sized and 100% spray foam insulated and my IBC 15-150 boiler never reaches full fire except at initial warm up of a cold system up or a domestic water call. One trick I did was to also isolate the slab from the foundation wall by putting a perimeter of sheet foam around the wall prior to pouring the floor, so there's no thermal bridging anywhere. As for sizing of the system I entrust that to the engineers at my suppliers, who provide the service with their materials supply quotes to me, with the computer programs they have to punch in the R-values, window allowances and exterior wall area its just not productive for me to drag out my old 'analog' charts. I like the concept of a heat exchanger tank style water heater arrangement as opposed to the instantaneous arrangements some combi-boilers can provide, one reason is higher flow rates, a person can fill that big bathtub more quickly and draw multiple fixtures at the same time with no pressured drop, another is just having that tank full of water to draw from if there is a water service interruption.

We have a wood fireplace that we like to run a lot, it throws off enough heat that we need to open windows. It does have side effects with the floor heat though as our thermostat in the hall becomes satisfied and shuts off supply to those loops, consequently our floor will be cold the mornings after we ran the fireplace overnight (I'll fill the firebox and throttle back the air supply for a long/low burn). However our main floor is a 'staple up' system and I do not have a concrete thermal mass to mitigate such temperature swings, you might find less noticeable temp swings with 2.5" concrete or gypcrete. I would recommend that you locate you thermostat as far as possible from your fireplace, and that you utilize slab sensors for reading your floor temps. I was interested in putting in a hot water coil from our fireplace to some tanks to store hot water thermal mass for the hydronic heating that could be drawn from as 'stage 1' where the boiler would be 'stage 2' through a boiler control but never got to that (I have pipes futured in, but the tanks would take up my storage area). Wouldn't it be nice to have the fireplace supplying your domestic hot and basement slab?


This is the system I installed in my own home (yes, I've pimped out this photo on here many times before... ) :
Sweet engine room caber!! I'll post a few pics of mine. I'm sure you will appreciate.
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Old 02-28-2015, 08:09 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by qwert View Post
My Grundfos circulating pump (which draws .7amp) is the only part of the system that depends on Hydro. I would like to add a circulating pump that runs on 12VDC, which I could power with hydro through a transformer-rectifier or with standby battery power.

Does Grundfos make a small circulating pump that runs on 12VDC?
Can you suggest or recommend another manufacturer that makes such a pump?
when you say 'hydro' for power im assuming you mean electricity.cause hydro is water as far as i know.
i deal with the alberta grundfos rep on a regular basis and i can ask...i didnt see it on the website, but its a terrible website to navigate.
there is a company in saskatoon...wse tech who deal with off the grid whole home packages. also they have solar panel powered direct to pump motor systems. no battery, but it doesnt work at night so its actually for solar collecters but it might work for your app.
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Old 02-28-2015, 09:43 PM
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I've not personally encountered circulators that run on 12V dc, but its plausible that they exist. I would personally seek a standard pump and convert the 12v dc to 120 ac as you will likely need to source replacement pumps in the future, and it would be sensible to keep the cost down.

So far as the 'heat rises' rationale goes, heat spreads through conduction, convection or radiation, you've just planned on convection. Thinking of the earth below as a heat sink is correct, but that can work to your detriment so far as energy consumption is concerned as it will keep on absorbing heat.
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Old 02-28-2015, 10:40 PM
coachman coachman is offline
 
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I like the idea of a cement slab for the second floor. Mine is wood with the pipe 18 in apart, tin backed. It just does not get warm like the cement floor. With the wood stove your cement floor my not warm up. With the weather changing 20 degrees every 2 or 3 days my system is to hot or to cold. I heat a 2000 sq. foot shop, 900 sq foot living area, a chicken coop , 200 sq. dog house, barn, stock water, hot tub and the engine and hyd.tank on my skid steer all with a outside water heater.
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Old 02-28-2015, 10:51 PM
qwert qwert is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
I've not personally encountered circulators that run on 12V dc, but its plausible that they exist. I would personally seek a standard pump and convert the 12v dc to 120 ac as you will likely need to source replacement pumps in the future, and it would be sensible to keep the cost down.
I am trying to avoid the typical energy loss inside an inverter, as well as the problems of inverted wave shapes. My Grundfos has been in continuous service for >30 years and I would hate to damage it by feeding it a wave form it doesn't like.

Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
So far as the 'heat rises' rationale goes, heat spreads through conduction, convection or radiation, you've just planned on convection. Thinking of the earth below as a heat sink is correct, but that can work to your detriment so far as energy consumption is concerned as it will keep on absorbing heat.
When I installed my system there was a lot of variation of opinion and not much experience to provide guidance. It has worked well so far and I am not about to rip it up, if I was doing it today I suspect I would put down a better thermal break, but even dry clay does have an R factor as does the air in the gravel and even gravel acts to slow conduction, and a 55 degree floor is nice in the summer.

My welding experience has been that even conductive heat rises easier and faster than it goes down, which is a major reason we weld thin material down and not up, as it is possible to stay ahead of your heat and avoid burn through.
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Old 03-01-2015, 05:23 AM
Ranch11 Ranch11 is offline
 
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Quote:
Originally Posted by CaberTosser View Post
I'm a big proponent of heated floors, just be sure to insulate well under the basement slab with 1 1/2" or 2" sheet foam. With a very well insulated house that boiler might well be sufficient in size, my home is similarly sized and 100% spray foam insulated and my IBC 15-150 boiler never reaches full fire except at initial warm up of a cold system up or a domestic water call. One trick I did was to also isolate the slab from the foundation wall by putting a perimeter of sheet foam around the wall prior to pouring the floor, so there's no thermal bridging anywhere. As for sizing of the system I entrust that to the engineers at my suppliers, who provide the service with their materials supply quotes to me, with the computer programs they have to punch in the R-values, window allowances and exterior wall area its just not productive for me to drag out my old 'analog' charts. I like the concept of a heat exchanger tank style water heater arrangement as opposed to the instantaneous arrangements some combi-boilers can provide, one reason is higher flow rates, a person can fill that big bathtub more quickly and draw multiple fixtures at the same time with no pressured drop, another is just having that tank full of water to draw from if there is a water service interruption.

We have a wood fireplace that we like to run a lot, it throws off enough heat that we need to open windows. It does have side effects with the floor heat though as our thermostat in the hall becomes satisfied and shuts off supply to those loops, consequently our floor will be cold the mornings after we ran the fireplace overnight (I'll fill the firebox and throttle back the air supply for a long/low burn). However our main floor is a 'staple up' system and I do not have a concrete thermal mass to mitigate such temperature swings, you might find less noticeable temp swings with 2.5" concrete or gypcrete. I would recommend that you locate you thermostat as far as possible from your fireplace, and that you utilize slab sensors for reading your floor temps. I was interested in putting in a hot water coil from our fireplace to some tanks to store hot water thermal mass for the hydronic heating that could be drawn from as 'stage 1' where the boiler would be 'stage 2' through a boiler control but never got to that (I have pipes futured in, but the tanks would take up my storage area). Wouldn't it be nice to have the fireplace supplying your domestic hot and basement slab?


This is the system I installed in my own home (yes, I've pimped out this photo on here many times before... ) :
Captain, I'm giving her all she's got. The dlithium crystals won't last much longer.
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  #17  
Old 03-01-2015, 10:58 AM
moonlaker moonlaker is offline
 
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Nice work Caber, it's nice when you're not worried about customers bitching about extra hours on a job that will last the life of a home. What would that job cost a customer if you were to bill it out normally?
As for insulating the slab, I'll be putting down 4 inches of eps terra foam underneath the basement floor. And insulating between the walls (and footing) is a big one that I've found lots of people miss. Thermal bridging is a huge source of heat loss.
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Old 03-01-2015, 11:02 AM
moonlaker moonlaker is offline
 
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Hey, do you have the veissmann combi plus kit (tankless) or do you run it to a tank? How long have you had your current set up? Any complaints?
I'd kind of like to stick with IBC boilers, simply because I've worked on them and they're local(ish). Getting parts would probably be a lot easier and I've talked with their tech support guy on numerous occassions, so I actually know they have tech support.
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Old 03-01-2015, 11:51 AM
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In our home I run a 75 gallon stainless steel exchanger tank that is out of sight to the left as well a fan-coil in addition to the heated floors, its been operating absolutely trouble free for 5 years so far. I've serviced a few IBC's at a client property one of which required a venter motor replacement, but of the ones I installed personally I have yet to have an issue. The building that required me to replace the venter motor is actually pictured on IBC's website in the commercial case study section http://ibcboiler.com/resources/energy-studies/, where a bank of 5 45-225 IBC's replaced their two much larger old boilers. I didn't perform that installation though, I just serviced it, it seems that IBC has taken the photo of that boiler room down, though the building exterior shot remains.

Mr Leahy: the guy that monitors that mechanical room gets paid by laying on my couch, and getting an occasional new tool or hunting gear piece. Someday I hope to pay him with a new truck, but not until after I build his new garage.
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