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Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
Hi @Teemok , My understanding of the conventional wisdom for household hot water use is 20 gallons for the first person and 15 for all others. Still, measuring hot water usage we've found that it can change by nearly an order of magnitude in different households. That's part of why I try first to reduce the load. People have always liked 1.5 gpm showerheads if they're well designed. They can make up for old, clogged up plumbing. I recently did a job where I was allowed to install 1/4" tubing from a manifold for the distribution. It takes no more than six seconds to get hot water, and the short runs have it in three. There is a lot we can do to make things efficient without sacrificing comfort. Or we can build monsters 👹 I've dealt with my share of those too 😑
Yours, Larry
Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
@Larry Weingarten I wonder if 15gal. is enough? I guess it all depends on the clients intention and the end users expectations. While I have lived using 15 gallons or less of hot water a day, asking people to be that frugal here is an affront to their freedom to consume. A big no no even here in crunchy Nor Cal. I agree with the unpressurized storage and high coil HX approach. That could feed a 120 gallon tank with a mixer that's backed up by a cascade of 199K tank-less heaters. Could even low coil the big storage tank so that if the sun goes down or away and the big tank is too cold the tank-less could bring it up to a min. temperature for the next mornings peak load. And this is how I start to build a monster. 😁

Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
Hi, Just some basic math… Twelve apartments with two people each, or 24 people. At fifteen gallons of hot water per person per day, that's 360 gallons, or three times the storage you have now. One approach would be to install an unpressurized storage tank of 500 gallons or more and put a large coil in the top of the tank as a preheater for your backup storage heater. This likely wouldn't be inexpensive. I agree with @Teemok that unless you can adjust the owner's expectations to line up with reality, this could become a nightmare.
I like solar thermal and have been doing it for about 46 years, but to function, it MUST be simple and designed for the people who live with it. In this case, I think I'd start by looking at what could be done to make the hot water delivery system more water and energy efficient.
Yours, Larry
Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
Hi Mike,
If tossing best logic to the wind and doubling down on thermal is the unalterable will of the investor, so be it. I think if are they willing to fully understand it, monitor it and maintain it themselves, it could be a good thing.
Is the money worth it for you to be involved? The risk to you is: Can you make a system meet the needs in almost all conditions? Will you be expected to maintain it? Will the customer at some point in the life cycle expense of the system realize that the whole effort was ill advised from the start? If that happens, will they find you at fault for aiding and abetting in creating the creature they invested in? Stating it up front in writing that it's "not wise" and getting it signed before hand doesn't prevent the future unhappy customer syndrome.
12-2 bath units all linked with a recirculation system?
High volume daily use makes for a best payback scenario but substantial storage is necessary and that's not cheap in materials or sqft-age. If it's a mission critical hot water system, full backup capacity is a must. Double investment. And the two systems need to play well together to make the solar payback. Then there's parts failures, clouds, hail, dust, roofing and heat dumping.
Think hard about it, it's going to be primarily a heart thing. Logic is necessary but secondary only to make it function. I don't think any logic will make it a simple, reliable and good investment. It's the free panels trap. It has to make sense if the panels are free right?

Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
Around me you can pretty regularly pick up solar hot water collectors on Craigslist for free.
When you consider the cost and complexity it makes more sense to put electric panels on the roof and use electricity to heat the water.
I know that's not what the customer wants, but sometimes what the customer wants is not in their best interest.
Re: Solar water heater Drain back evacuated tube
What DCContrarian says is generally true. But I have uncountable number of clients with solar thermal installations—mostly flat panel collectors, but some evac tube systems as well. The infrastructure is in place and seemingly robust, but often not maintained. Overheating, bad fluid, no pressure, no circulation, freeze ups are most of the common problems. The principal drawback is that it is a separate plumbing system that is often hard to access and it involves indoor and OUTDOOR plumbing. When they work…they make virtually "free" hot water. Your average, run-of-the-mill plumber has more than enough work maintaining conventional plumbing systems these days. They generally aren't looking for work on unconventional systems, let alone ROOF work.
Re: Tankless heater proximity to gas meter
That 3' clearance applies to the meter itself. They can't service it if its blocked!

Re: Understanding Boiler System in New Home
As far as maintaining rooms in one home at different temperatures. Typically the walls between rooms are not insulated, so some temperature difference is workable, a few degrees.
It would be hard to have one bedroom at 60F and the adjoining at 72F for example. Some of the heat from the warmer room will migrate to any colder spaces.
An energy audit with blower door and infrared scan would shed some light on the loss through windows and walls. That may help with a window upgrade decesion. Once a thermopane window loses the seal and they cloud, not much can be done other than a replacement.
There are many options for levels of low E glass also that can help with both heating and cooling loads, if an when you upgrade.

Re: Understanding Boiler System in New Home
No if moisture is getting between the panes — so they are thermopane or some equivalent — they're done.
The double hung windows to which I was referring are the older single pane windows, usually with weights to counterbalance them. They are worth fixing, and will last a long time (a couple of centures) with care. The newer ones such as you have… not worth fixing, and you've gotten more life out of them than they usually provide.
Re: Help with short cycling on a Weil-McLain GV-5 Boiler
As far as the sequence of operation is concerned,
- It starts with a cold boiler so all the limit and temperature devices on the boiler are closed.
- The fan pressure switch is open to indicate that the fan is not operating
- Then the thermostat (or zone end switch) calls for heat
- The control receives the call for heat and starts the fan to pre-purge (the fan will not start unless the pressure switch is open). The circulator will also operate with a call for heat
- Once the fan starts, the pressure switch closes indicating the fan operation is successful and sends that signal to the control.
- After the alloted time the control starts the trial for ignition, by sending power to the ignitor (hot surface ignition HSI will glow)
- Once the trial HSI is hot enough the control will send power to the gas valve to allow gas to flow to the combustion chamber, past the HSI
- At the same time, the power to the HSI stops and the HSI is then able to be utilized as the flame sensor
- Once the flame is established and the flame sensor indicates to the control that the flame is there then the trial for ignition sequence is terminated. and the burner is allowed to continue the flow of gas.
- If any of the following happens then the gas vlave closes instantly
- High limit opens
- Block temperatiure switch opens
- Fan pressure switch opens
- Flame signal is interupted
- Loss of power to the control
- Then the post purge sequense starts.
- Once the post purge is completed, the start up sequence will start again at the beginning as long as the limits and fan pressure switches are in the start-up position, and there is a call for heat.