Don't throw stones

singh

was a mess also.

First thing I noticed the GB was in poor condition. Internal condensate trap was broken, spewing exhaust fumes into the cabinet. Control board is damaged from all the moisture. Fan stop blowing, all wet and corroded.

VSIP needs to be turned, DHW is too small, needs a 26-99, wiring needs to be traced and sorted out. Lines need to be purged. There is a leak in the slab.
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singh

when you live in a glass house!

So I was called to look at a poorly performing radiant system. As I turned into the driveway, I thought to myself, geez, pretty long driveway.
Then I see the house!! Built a year and half ago, I'm still trying to figure out how this was allowed , given ResCheck and NYS energy codes.
I guess no one ever explained cold 70 to them.
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singh

So far

I replaced the defective fan, and installed a new condensate trap. I will have to go back and install a new board, and pipe the condensate in to a drain, because that container under the boiler just wont cut it : )

Also , this place has second stage Hydro air, but not working well.
The air side is off three Carrier infinity thermostats, but the radiant is off single heat only stats. I proposed some Tekmar stats to sync the first and second stage heating.

One last item is there is a lot of fogging and weeping inside the glass, I'm think a HRV or at least a whole house dehumidifier. This has more to do with air leakage in the structure since ther is not a piece of insulation in the joint.

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Darin Cook_5

Holy S***

Looks like somebody tried to give it ****. All nice equipment, pro-press, iso-flanges, tek-net 4. Who the heck sold these folks on a glass house??? The Amsterdam board of tourism?? So what did you tell these folks they needed for supplemental heat? Massive bon fires around the perimeter of the home?? Looks like you got yourself a good one Devan.





Darin

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Mike B.

famous house?

Is that the house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright?

singh

Every night

The nocturnal critters gather around for a show.

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singh

No

this was built 18 months ago. But there is a house in CT that's all glass built in the '30's, not Frank Lloyd Wright.

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Jim Bennett_2

Looks like.....

a good candidate for that new radiant glass product that was discussed in a thread here awhile ago.

Wouldn't want to live there during deer season.

Jim

bob_46

Looks

like something by Phillip Johnson or Mies van der Rohe. You need some of ME's trick windows.

gerry gill

hehehe

they get to watch them poop too!!

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jp_2

air leaks and sweating window

singh,

air leaking during the winter shouldn't cause inside windows to fog unless the leakage is lowering window surface temps more than they are.

remember, for the most part, winter weather has little moisture in it. could be moisture from crawlspace.

BIG QUESTION???? what the heatloss come out on that place?

Tom Hopkins

Dwell Magazine?

This looks like a new house that was in Dwell Magazine this year...cost multiple millions.

(Oops..wrote this before I saw Bob's post below)

This one and the one in Dwell appear to be inspired by the "Farnsworth House" by Mies van der Rohe http://www.farnsworthhouse.org/. and/or the "Glass House" by Phillip Johnson http://philipjohnsonglasshouse.org/

These were cutting edge Modernist homes of their time, with a major influence from the Bauhaus (via Mies van der Rohe). I believe both were vacation homes...being more of an experiment in design than practical.

F.L. Wright very much disliked this incarnation of Modernism, and dispite popular belief, tried really hard to be practical while still moving design past the Victorian era. Some of his designs failed to be durable because he was using new materials in ways they had never been used before.

Tom Manton

House fix

BULLDOZER

singh

.

JP,

The original builder did not do such a great job, or just was over his head with the glass. There is leakage of air all around the windows where they meet the steel.
House humidity levels could be from shower/bath , cooking, plants, people, etc. Oh, I forgot to mention the roof leaks.
When the inside air meets the cold air leaks, it does weep on the windows.
Most of the house is slab on grade, There is no edge insulation detail that I could see, not sure whats underneath, the small wing with the full basement has staple up tube, a layer of shiny stuff, and a layer of fiberglass.
As for the heat loss, I would like to do one, but they won't spend the money. They already spent enough on the system , they said, and question everything now. Except when the heat crapped out, it's a real emergency to get it up again , (glass don't retain heat real well)
The architect likes the idea of HRV.
Not looking for summer, most get real hot.

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Brad White_185

Nocturnal Critters

Voyeuristic deer, rabbits and yes, Woody Woodpecker...

Weezbo

Singh, Namaste.

i saw some fancy new designs on a web site in Australia that closely resembled the home ...

they received awards for the use of space and products ...eg. lots of open space and glass.

that was a few years back. someone must have seen it and thought 'hey Theres an idea!'

where was the plan originally designed?

bob eck

This house must be warm when the sun is up what is the problem?????? Oh the sun goes down! long winter nights!

joel_19

$$$$

They already spent to much so they don't want to spend it now???? That's like saying it's too exspensive to fix the flat on your Ferrari. I love people like that having been down that road my suggestion would be give them a quote to fix it once the right way and if they balk walk away. if not they will decide they basically own you and everything that crops up the next few years will somehow become your fault. you'll be out there on sundays patching together the stuff that you already new was a problem but they didn't want to pay for the first time.

Wayco Wayne_2

True dat!

I had a job a few years back where some large floor to ceiling windows had so much condensation it would puddle up on the nice bamboo floors overnight. The GC's solution. Blame it on the HVAC contractor. ACK! What did I do? They tried to say since my ceiling vents (FA system) did not properly sweep the windows it was ALLOWING the condensate to happen. Grrrrr! I asked the Homeowner, What if we had gone with the radiant floor I suggested? Then there would be no air movement and the windows would still sweat. How can you blame the air movement. The GC said to leave the blower going of the heat pump air handler to prevent it. That lasted a long time,...not. Can you say low velocity wind chill? Homeowner's lawyer finally got to the bottom of things and got the Window company to admit there was a mistake. Yeesh. Sorry for the rant. You all be careful out there. WW

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Tony_23

?

Our winter weather has lots of humidity in it. Happens when it snows, then melts. Very common to see 60% or more most of the winter.

Inside a heated house, now that's a different story

Those "window walls" probably never get warm until June

Gordy

Would have been cheaper

To have pitched a tent made out of visquine !!

tim smith

Wow, looks like a fit for Mark's radiant glass

That's a whole lot of glass!!! Good luck.

jp_2

relative humidity

tony,
thats relative humidity. the % of moisture that the current outdoor temp air can hold, as you raise that same air to indoor temps, you'd find the % humidity very low.

Tony_23

No kidding

That's what I implied with my statement about inside a heated house

jp_2

oops?

guess it went over my head

Unknown

I vote for this (joel's) reply...

scott markle_2

I don't see a tekmar Tn4 control. The wiring is a mess, the LWCO is so low in the system it useless. This is a classic example of overly complicated poorly designed work.

Looks like two injection mixed radiant zones and three high temp? I assume the high temp are air handlers. Seems like with the air and the radiant it might be possible to heat this house.

I like modern design (generally) but this is a sad situation, I would imagine that the 142/30 is running at full throttle most of the time,and is probably deficient on cold nights. Thats one serious fuel bill especially since the gb only gets 88% efficiency above 140deg. operating temp.

I have had my own concerns about the flimsy plastic the condensate trap is made of, I see those concerns have some real merit. Also unless the boiler is disassembled a bit (fairly quick and easy) removing the trap puts a lot of stress on this plastic. I would forward the pictures to Budarus, this seems like a real defect if you ask me.



I have found some very significant corrosion in a GB that has been in service for less than a year. It appears that these things really need significant attention, I think part of the problem is LP gas with it's impurities, in the netherlands LP is almost unheard of, and probably far more regulated in-terms of it's purity.

singh

Scott

It's a GB 142/45. There is a tekmar injection control for two mixed temps. In reality if the original installer just put plates on the staple up portion instead of bubble wrap, one mixed temp was all that was needed. Elimating those extra pumps and controls.
Really the radiant in my opinion is just floor warming for this type of house.
LWCO is usless in that position.
The trap had wooden shims !! under it, I suspect it some how got broken at installation. It DID not melt or deteriorate all by itself that way. It is not flimsy plastic, I always remove when servicing to clean out the trap, and replace, not one broke on me yet.
I doubt Buderus would warranty the fan ,trap, BC10 board or anything else.
I made that clear to them.
It's not the manufacturers fault, only the fault of the installer,imo.

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scott markle_2

Devan,

It didn't look like the big boy from the pics, thats good, I'm sure that the output is required.

You don't feel that the trap is a bit thin? I don't like that removal requires deflection of the plastic. When you clean or fill a trap I feel it's a bit difficult to get it out with out removing the lower hx cover. I feel like it puts quite a bit of strain on the section that broke. The fact that there were shims under it suggest that someone damaged it and was aware of it, it's normally a tight fit. What kind of hack could leave it like that!

One potential design flaw: There will be low load conditions when only the radiant is required. The present injection control is mixing down from a air handler reset curve, so in the situations were radiant alone would suffice, the condensing efficiency advantage of this low temp operation is not being realized.

An Em-10 board, which would operate the boiler from a 0-10v signal could be used to interface with a more sophisticated tn4 control. This(tn4) control would have direct control of boiler modulation and would only fire the boiler to the temperature required by the zones calling. The tn4 by virtue of it's predictive logic is more tolerant of differing supply temps and would have (along with the plates) made a single mix down temp more feasible. Eliminating the extra injection pump and piping could have covered much of the cost of this control upgrade, and the higher operational efficiency would have paid for the rest in fairly short order I imagine.

Still given the (unnatural) loads and the impetus to run these radiant zones at highest possible output, it's hard to say if a single temp radiant design would have been the best idea in this (ridiculous) situation.

Hows your Vitosol-300 performing? doing any solar for clients?

Scott

singh

Trap

I slide the trap down, then rotate it pass the HX, the slide up and out. The neck has that flex built into it. I slid the new one in place just in reverse.
The damaged trap here was broken at the connection to the HX. When I removed it I broke it after into two pieces(shown in pic) trying to figure out why it broke in the first place. I could not believe the shims holding it in place, and the container under collecting the condensate.
I wonder if he failed to put water into it at start up and it got brittle, the he pulled it out and broke it, then shimmed it back. A real pro.

I seem to average 80 degrees at the tank this winter. It was sunny today, and the days are getting longer, more production for me!
I only got inquiries about using solar thermal for HWBB , and the salesperson in me told him to forget about it, DHW only or some radiant.

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Mad Dog_2

C'mon, Markie....was that you???????

Hee hee. Yeah, over-designed fer sure. Looks like they went crazy with flux on the Buderus manifold...Mad Dog

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Mad Dog_2

Two things, Devan....................................

Do you know the company? I hope you are getting TOP dollar for this...because you WILL be inheriting this. Mad Dog

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Mad Dog_2

I would like to see a more easily-removable trap

Mad Dog

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singh

MD

Speaking of inheritance !

Got a no heat call last night. 6P error code. The UBA needs to be replaced also !!!

The last one to touch it owns it. What did I get myself into. Cheaper to rip it all out and start over, including Buderus boiler!

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[Deleted User]

Yeah...

You could virtually eliminate all the other heating systems in THAT House.

Ya wanna see that suckah warm? I'll show you WARM...

Piece of cake.

ME

Brian

Condensate trap

Devan
I've had 1 condensate trap fail on me.It split at the neck and leaked on the floor.Caught early so no internal damage.Inspected another one the same week and it showed a small split starting.I've got 3 traps on order to keep on hand.Have started putting zip ties at the neck on new installs. That first trap failure was the first problem I've had with the GB's, 35 plus and counting.

Good Luck
Dobber