Wood Boiler Setup

Nick_16

Hi again everyone. I am in the process of installing a wood gasifacation system. Hotrod, you said you would like to see my piping ideas. Here you go. There are of course many ways of piping the wood boiler but this way is what I have been thinking about. However, I have only worked on one wood system before. Still not sure what the best way to control the system is. I would like to use a Tekmar control but I don't know if they have a simple control for use with wood/bio fuels or not. Please let me know what you think or any ideas. Thanks again everyone!

Nick_16

Sorry, forgot the picture

here you go!

hr

Why not

use a plain, insulated storage tank for the boiler buffer? No need to use an indirect tank here. Insulated steel tanks are available from any water heater manufacture. I use basic electric water heater tanks for some jobs.

Send that piping drawing to Mike or Greg at tekmar. they will help you select the correct controls to make it all happen.

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Nick_16

Well, I see

what you are saying and I have a new(er) 80 gal. electric heating in my basement right now but, you would need four tappings and they would need to be bigger than 3/4". The reason I thought of an indirect is so that a wood fire could be started, let burn, heat the boiler water. The boiler water would be circulated through the indirect's coil to heat up the tank. This way, the indirect's aquastat could kick the circ on when the tank droped to 160 and kick it off when the tank hit 180. Then if a fire is still going in the boiler but the indirect's aquastat kicked the circ off, the boiler's aquastat could kick the same circ back on if the boiler water hit say 200 and the off again at 180. This way, even the boiler's fire went out, you have 80 gal. of about 180-190 water to heat with. Also, in this setup, when the wood boiler isn't firing, water wouldn't be circulated through the boiler loosing heat. Does that make sense? If you used a reverse indirect such as Ergo (which does have bad insulation, I opened one up yesterday) there wouldn't be a good way of controling the tank temp. and heated water would be circulated back through the unfired wood boiler.

hr

You show

the indirect coil in series with the boiler as a buffer. I have had better luck using the tank volume as opposed to the coil. It just seems to work better that way.

I still would pipe the buffer off the primary loop instead of in series with the boiler. I like the concept of the VS circ for the boiler to primary loop pump. This gives you the thermal clutch to protect the boiler return temperature.

With the boiler as a secondary, when there is a call for heat the full boiler output is available into the loop. As the heat demands satisfy, then the buffer could be charged.

When the buffer is charged to setpoint temperature it could be drawn from without firing the boiler, or if the fire has died down. It just seems a little more flexible this way. On a cold start up you do not need to first get the tank up to speed (temperature)as you would piped in series.

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Kevin_30

What

do you recommend for controls? What kind of Tekmar should I look into?

hr

I would still

suggest you send your final drawing directly to tekmar. They will recommend controls, and supply a drawing, based on what you are trying to accomplish with your piping and tanks. Generally a few setpoint controls and a few differental (solar) controls can make it all happen. If you need to mix down temperatures then a VS injection control may be needed.

I believe tekmar has blended some of these features into one control, that would simplify some wiring for you.

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hydronicsmike

Thanks Hot Rod and Yes Kevin,

call tekmar at 250-545-7749. We'd be happy to help you with control selection if you wish.

I got your drawing on my desk. If you call and ask for Mike, I'll be glad to go over this with you.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Regards,

Mike

Ron Schroeder_3

Outdoor wood boiler help please

Sorry, I should have started a new thread.

hydronicsmike

call (NM)