Best Of
Re: Need help with new install of radiant with Buderus cast iron boiler
I guess I just wasn't understanding the concept or advantage of the "dumb" 4 way vs going with a thermostatic valve like Kaos was showing in his setup. The thermostatic would keep a constant/regulated temp going to the system, It seems like with the 4 way it would fluctuate as the boiler cycles? Or does that just not matter if it was being controlled with ODR from the 256?
I like where we are heading though!
Re: Evaluating Ductless Install Quotes
And gas for the truck and truck insurance and and liability insurance and workers comp insurance and the time it take to put a quote together, run the office, do the billing and payroll and bookkeeping, truck repairs, employee training on you system. He also has to make a profit to stay in business
If you don't like the pricing don't complain to the contractor, Massachusetts is one of the most over regulated states in the country. i know, I have lived here 72 years.
Re: Evaluating Ductless Install Quotes
TL;DR: You're buying a lot more than the equipment.
I can't say much about your particular installers, but while it doesn't take much skill to slap a mini split on the wall & cash a check, a good install takes quite a bit of skill and experience. And not especially cheap tools. And insurance. And licensing. And training. And warranty.
ratio
Re: I get all the weird ones...
redesign the whole job,
keep the conveyor warm inside,
put the feed hopper outside, maybe under a shed roof if snow or rain matters, have a small opening for the feed conveyor, air curtain that,
neilc
Re: Thin Tube Steam/Hot water in Barre VT
i kind of lumped the inspection door and hanger iron and furnace cement in with the corrosion.
mattmia2
Re: I get all the weird ones...
I appreciate most of the comments guys. I did have a conversation with them verbal and through email, that discussed their expectations. I told them that no matter what we do that building wont maintain a satisfactory temp if any of the 3 overhead doors remain open for prolonged periods.
The best I can offer is at startup in the morning, the space will be 70 degrees, but within mins of the door opening, all bets are off. They understood and think they can manage as long as the conveyor and hydraulic oil get warmed up and rolling. I said keep it on through lunch then!
I dont think I will walk away from this job but I will have enough disclaimers and exceptions it'll make a lawyer wanna high five me!
Tom_133
Re: Need help with new install of radiant with Buderus cast iron boiler
A 3 way thermostatic can only send the adjusted temperature to the slab. It is a smart valve with a one track mind :)
So if you set it to 110F for example, and the weather warms, heatload goes down, it is sending water that is too warm and you will over-shoot the thermostat setting. Remember the slab needs some, maybe hours to respond to a load change. So it could take 2, 4 maybe more hours for the slab to cool down and bring room temperature down.
This is called the flywheel effect. It works in both directions, warming or cooling down the slab. One of the very few downsides to a high mass radiant emitter.
We try to minimize that by 1) adjusting the supply water temperature based on outdoor temperature, called ODR outdoor reset.
Not to overwhelm you with options, Constant circulation is another nice function. In my shop the pump runs 24/7 durning heating season. The thermostat connects to a 3 way zone valve. It pulses heat into the slab. It also takes the passive solar gain I get in the south end of my shop and moves it to the back, north (colder) part. So my slab across the room stays very consistent. I'm connected to a mod con with ODR, so mostly it sends between 90- 110 temperature. But you add another 150 bucks or so for the 3 way zone valve.
A manual 4 port valve gives you a few options. You can go down and manually turn the knob during a cold or warming spell and fine tune it. Maybe 3- 4 times a season as you get large outdoor temperature changes.
IF you add the tekmar 265 to the boiler it could run maybe 160 on coldest day, modulate down to maybe 140 even 130 with that particular boiler.
As the boiler modulates down, the hot supply to the dumb, manual mix valve decreases by default, so it get a bit of what we call proportional mixing. The manual mix valves tracks a bit with the boiler reset curve and temperature.
While not as accurate as a mix valve with a sensor and actuator, it would modulate water temperature a bit more accurately than a thermostatic mix that only knows 1 condition, the setting on the knob.
The 4 way is always slipping some flow back to the boiler to help keep it in a safe condition. A 3 way does not allow two mixing points as a 4 way can. Price wise about the same.
Pipe it with a manual 4 way. Try and see if it is being controlled well enough for your use habits.
If not add the 256 later to get more control, higher efficiency. The lower the boiler operating temperature, the more efficient it runs.
Viessmann claims for every 3 degrees you reduce the boiler temperature fuel consumption decreases 1%. So ODR controls actually can pay for themselves over a few years based on your energy costs and consumption, of course.
200 bucks or so seems like a good investment for temperature control, fuel savings. Even on a "free" boiler :) Pretty much all boilers come with some version of this now.
As far as the boiler protection, running them cold for extended periods causes condensation corrosion in the flue and at worse case excessive CO from the flame. It's not just about saving the boiler, but allowing it to run safely, efficiently.
I think we are all try to get you a safe, comfortable, efficient system with the pieces you have and the least additional $$
hot_rod
Re: Discolored hot water / HTP PH 76-60 hot water heater installed 5 months ago
I think the meter in the pic is set to voltage? Reading just under 1 volt. Adding salt to the water would increase conductivity.
hot_rod
Disgusted by today's electricians, Today's rant
At one time I had about 12 licenses in different states, electrical, oil burner, gas fitting, sheet metal etc
But unfortunately, now licenses mean you don't know anything. Its becoming a joke. being a licensed electrician used to mean something back in the day. now it means your a hack.
I feel bad for HO calling contractors who not only pay contractors huge $$$ but the work is so shoddy. I have been on the other side for 50 years but I can't blame any HO for doing his own work now.
Long story short, a relative called me who I had re-wired their 1915 house in the early 80s, they have had electricians their doing work over the years since then and have a few issues. One issue is a nasty dirt floor damp crawl space. The other one is very shallow old-time framing that requires the use of shallow electrical boxes with limited space.
So even though I don't really do any "real" work anymore I was curious to take a look. I still have my electrical license and go to the update classes (don't know why).
What I found:
Electrician added new kitchen lights and an outdoor spotlight and wired them to the 20 amp kitchen small appliance branch circuit which has never been ok.
He mounted old work metal boxes by driving sheet rock screws though the back (there's 3/4 wood paneling on the other side of the wall so i am ok with that) but he "grounded" the box by wrapping the wire around the sheetrock screw. NG.
One of the shallow wall receptacle boxes I had installed back in the 80s he extended the circuit coming out of the box. The box is not large enough for the added wire and wire nuts so he hammered the receptacle in to the box crushing the wires which eventually shorted.
He added an arc fault circuit breaker to the panel for an existing circuit that he extended. When I looked inside the panel the neutral pigtail was not connected to the neutral bar. This should have left the circuit with no neutral but yet I had 120 on the breaker and the circuit worked.
Turns out the circuit has the neutral and ground shorted together somewhere. I ran out of time to track that down, but I disconnected that portion of the circuit (with the short) hooked up the AFCI breaker correctly and the breaker and the rest of the circuit is fine.
Because of the shallow boxes and wire fill problems with the smaller boxes you end up with more junction boxes in the crawl space than you would like. Most electricians don't want any part of a crawl space and I don't blame them being in the cobwebs, bent over, the damp dirt floor, rocks, rubble, broken glass tracing wire and a lot of boxes is tough. The difference is they will guess at things, and I won't.
I didn't like it when I rewired it when I was 28
I still didn't like it today at 72 but i spent the afternoon down there.
All the original stuff I did is pretty good. Every problem is where someone hacked things up when adding things like trying to add GFCI receptacles into boxes not large enough
Hope I can get out of bed tomorrow.
My curiosity is now satisfied.