Worth upgrading?

Philip Nasadowski

Ok, here's the situation:



I moved into a nice new home in the West Milford NJ area, and it's got baseboard radiators in it.  It's bilevel (1k sq ft on each level), with the bottom level about 1/3 the way into the ground in spots.  The boiler's a recent (2005 or so) Weil Mclain CGa gold, 105,000 BTU standing pilot.  There's one B&G wet rotor circulator and two honeywell zone valves, one for upstairs and one for downstairs.  The thermostats are the typical brainiac programables.  The hot water supply is an AO smith gas tank (also same age and standing pilot).  There's a motorized damper on the flue, but it's switched to be open all the time for some reason i do not know (maybe the pilot - though my parent's place there was a hole in the damper for that)



The attic isn't as insulated as I'd want and the windows are original to the house but in good shape (they have storm windows, also).



I obviously haven't done a heat loss calc here, or had any done for me.



The boiler in today's weather comes on and runs a good % of the heat call to maintain temperature, but the heating system as a whole does not run very often.  I haven't instrumented it to get actual data though :)



Now, the gas bills from last year, according to the last owner, were on the order of 350 in February.  I don't know how warm he kept it, though.



The big question is - can I see a useful savings (i.e 10 year or better recovery) from putting in a mod/con boiler?  I'm not planning on radiant heating, but would likely go for the domestic hot water tank in such a situation.  The flue piping would be an easy straight shot up to the roof, not shared with anything else.  It's an easy install.  But would I even see the advantages of a mod/con boiler here?  I'd obviously have an outdoor reset, but still, would it ever turn down low enough, often enough to get more efficient than my current boiler?  I like the idea of giving less money to PSE&G but I need a payback to justify it in the end.



Thanks!

JStar

Boiler

I'm in NJ, too, if you ever need onsite help. We do a lot of boiler work near you.



A mod/con will always be an immediate upgrade. You'll be going from 83% to 98% efficient with any good high end boiler. Plus the additional benefit of the oudoor reset. The ROI depends on the size of the boiler, and projected savings.



At the very least, I would highly recommend adding an outdoor reset to your current boiler for a quick and easy 10-20% reduction in fuel usage.