Mark Eatherton's post got me thinking

Unknown

from every source . I have a Peerless boiler under my stairs with a hot water coil . With the boiler door closed it stays hot in there , all the time .

What if I were to use a 40 gal. water tank , uninsulated , to preheat the incoming cold water to the coil ? I know it would be real easy to add a bronze circ and make the tank an aquabooster , I'm just floating the idea .

Dave Palmer_3

better off adding

air to the room cuz thats sounds confined,but why not buy a coil of 1/2 aqua pex and staple it to the walls and ceiling? Draw more heat that way huh? Dave

Unknown

Air is perfect

The boiler has been in there almost 7 years and burns just fine . I do have a BF3 Riello I'm gonna install once I run a fresh air pipe .

The pex idea sounds intruiging , but wouldn't copper have a better heat gain ? I was thinking of an uninsulated tank because it would heat up while we sleep to at least 80 degrees , maybe more , and be ready when we need it the most - in the morning . What kind of pressure drop would I have through a full roll of Aquapex ? Thanks for the idea Dave .

Dave Palmer_3

or

old lengths of BB element,I say pex cause it would be cheaper up front. I don't think the tank would pull in enough heat.But what if coil was tied into the tank with a bronze pump running slowly?dave

Nron_9

how about removing the insolation form a 40 gal gas tank and remove the burner and use a computer fan to push air down the 3" flue to help pick up extra heat in the room

Unknown

Only got enough room

for either a 30 gallon or squat 40 gallon tank , but thats another good idea Ron . Gas heaters used to be pretty cheap .

My setup would be picking up extra btus from the hot room , without using electricity ( a premium on LI ) . I would guess a bronze pump would run at least an hour or more a day to keep the tank around 120 . What I'm asking is would a tank that just preheats give more hot water , or save oil and electric usage comparable to an aquabooster setup ?

Another problem with my setup might be bacteria growing in the warm tank .

Mark Eatherton1

I've seen that...

and it WORKED!. Gotta watch out for condensate though...

ME

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Uni R

Coils of copper...

Run a coil around that room for the winter and another through the attic (totally drainable if you get a real winter) for the summer to preheat water for everything but the kitchen sink.

Unknown

Do you think

an uninsulated tank would condense in a normally very dry boiler room ? Thank you Mark .

sootmonkey

come on guys

Why don't you install an indirect h2o heater, and run the boiler as a cold start? Then you could wrap your flue pipe with copper tubing and run it into the coil that you installed in the flue collecter and then pipe that to the indirect cold water side.

ScottMP

I think

soot monkeys right.

But if you go the original way Ron, why not an uninsulated galv. tank. You could get a small 30 gallon tank very cheap from a supply house.

Scott

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Mark Eatherton1

Humidity

is prevelant on Lawn Guy Land is it not... Even though your boiler room feels hot and dry, the humdity is still there.

Worst case, you'd have to insulate the tank, or put a catch pan beneath it to catch the drippings.

ME

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Mark Eatherton1

WHy not

put a small fan coil in the room...COnnect it to the preheat tank, and viola, a cooler boiler room and preheated hot water.

ME

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Larry Weingarten

idea from the past

In the early days of electric water heating, the tanks heated very slowly. Heater salesmen would suggest adding a "tempering tank". Often it would go in a boiler room to preheat the water going into the electric heater and make it's performance look better. Usually it was a galvanized tank the same size or a little smaller than the main heater. Yours sounds like a perfect application. However you do it, check the anode!

Mark Hunt

Just remembered!


How about the "WatterSaver"? It's an electric water heater with a heatpump sitting on top. Takes up no more space than an electric tank and you could grab all of the available BTU's with the heatpump.

No such thing as "free" btu's in a mechanical room. you already paid for them.


Mark H

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Mark Eatherton1

Vie$$mann ha$ one of tho$e...

designed to recover the escaped btu's from a mechancial room and keep the room cooler.

You're right, they're not free...

ME

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hr

If you are on a private well

you may already own a free preheat tank! Mine is located next to a wood boiler in my pump house. Yes it does sweat, under certain conditions. But it does pick up some heat from the small space. Notice the sweat stains. from the upper tank.

A plain galv tank would be better as it doesn't have the rubber bladder inside.

hot rod

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Constantin

Yep, my former colleagues designed one

... I think they even got a prize for developing an affordable, HP/resistance hybrid electric water heater. Not the simplest thing in the world, but a whole lot more efficient than resistance elements alone.

If I recall correctly, the traget audience was customers in CT an Long Island, since the utilities there were willing to try anything but to string additional capacity (NIMBY strikes again).

Those were the days... I certainly miss many aspects of Arthur D. Little.

Kal Row

i try not to think, it hurts too much, but you know

the sun is 900 watts per square foot, even a collector at 50% efficiency is 450 watts per square foot – the only thing you need is a large insulated holding tank to store heat, for those cloudy days and you'r home free – I loved ME’s post, it was a great learning tool – but it’s only economically feasible in a large scale plant, with lots of waste heat – the rest of us aught to use the obvious gift the creator has given us – and if you have radiant heat, solar is such a perfect fit for radiant built for 110 supply and 90 return!!! – the only concern in such a setup would be bacteria in the system – since the return side temps are just perfect for them