Hydronic Diagrams

RedOak

I'm looking for good boiler to hydronic baseboard system diagrams. We presently have a 4-zone propane boiler to finned-copper baseboard system, but, when the wind kicks up in the dead of winter, it runs home to momma.

As we have a nice supply of anthracite available to us, we have a line on a coal stoker boiler, but, no matter how many words I read about this type of heating -- which includes Dan's "Pumping Away..." -- I need to "see" an overall diagram with labeled components to really begin to "get it." As a builder, I've been a JLC reader for many years and, yes, I've seen articles with diagrams in them...which have been helpful...but none of those drawings show a system being supplied by a coal stoker boiler (with an internal domestic hot water coil).

If anyone would point me to a source for this type of drawing, I'd really appreciate it.

By the way, Dan sent me.

Thanks for your time,
Red

ratio

Caleffi has Idronics issues available for download here. They include, not only drawings, but detailed explanations as well.

mattmia2

Look at the thread about the runaway coal boiler in a power outage too, probably want to think about how to handle that.

RedOak

ratio said:

Caleffi has Idronics issues available for download here. They include, not only drawings, but detailed explanations as well.

Ratio: I found the July 2016 issue (Volume 19) of "Idronics" after I posted this question -- and it looks like a very good resource for hydronic heating help, in general...and, by the way, it does contain drawings that remind me of those found in the JLC, but, in this case, a single boiler is depicted as the heat source...very nice.

Thanks most sincerely for posting a link to the same website for others in need of this kind of information to use.

RedOak

mattmia2 said:

Look at the thread about the runaway coal boiler in a power outage too, probably want to think about how to handle that.

MattMia2: As common sense has made me wonder about the same thing, it's funny that you would bring it up here. I'd like to say that I've learned how to do it, but I have been told that there is a way to safeguard against this. Nevertheless, thank you for the warning -- I will certainly keep reading up on this before we pull any triggers.

retiredguy

I have witnessed and handled a few "run away" coal boilers during power failures on boilers much larger than any in a house. All of these were burning soft coal but burning anthracite the problem and fixes is the same. In the case of an industrial building, it was recommended that they have a back-up generator wired to run at least 1 circ pump. If however, they did not heed the warning, the only other measure was to make sure that the combustion air to the burning coal was kept at a minimum and if that was not enough to keep the water temp in check, then the burning coals had to be "pulled" out of the boiler on to the floor and extinguished by some means which was usually water. You had to be aware that the resulting steam could scald/burn you as could the heat from the fire. For your system, a back-up generator would be the best solution. Another idea would be to have a battery back-up pump installed in the heating loop and piped to be either manually operated or automatically, your choice. By the way, I have only seen 1 home coal boiler/stoker working and it was a "Keystoker" burning anthracite. I have seen a few much larger units. Good luck in your endeavor. my 2 cents

hot_rod

Depending on how long you want to provide over-heat protection, or no power conditions, here are some options along with control logic.
Credit: John Siegenthaler NYSERDA training

mattmia2

I'd go with the gravity flow and normally open valve if you can get the capacity out of it, a lot fewer parts to be maintained for it to function.

hot_rod

Gravity loops are one place where a swing check has some value
They are a bit more unpredictable as to how much how fast you can dump however

With a pumped overheat you can size for exactly what you need to move