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Buderus Boilers

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Comments

  • radiant_5
    radiant_5 Member Posts: 5
    yo dc

    It is not in the salesmanship that mine and others customers by VIessmann from us. It comes from the absolute belief that it is superior equipment. Never underestimate your customers ability to reason. I also bet that most people familiar with any investments would not find a 10 yr.ROI excessive most will welcome it. Thats even if it were 10 years. Lets say you take most any domstic boiler and indirect and upgrade to the Viesmann equipment its about a $6,000.00 upgrade. but lets do like you say and "over do everything mentally" and add all kinds of accessories because we are crazy like that and make it an $8,000.00 upgrade. In NE where everyone is building huge homes with lots of glass and they see fuel bills well over $1,000.00 lets use a monthly average of $500 per month- calendar year. In their mortgage that $8,000 costs them what an extra $50- $70 per month lets go high say $70.00. now from experience I know that the VIessmann equip with the weather resposive controls will save you 30% and I see a lot more than that on our installs but lets use 20%. Thats $100 per month in savings and it costs that homeowner $30 less a month to live their and they got the best of equipment to boot. Never mind after that 10 year period... and no one is taking in to account how much fuel costs go up and god only knows how much they will in the future... it could get really scary.
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    V is not a public company

    and therefore all allegations are subject to the rather strong marketing with no verification - other than by those who have much to gain by what they tell us.

    The biggest of them all was Vallaint and we are all now holding dat vunderful Cherman Bag of wunderbar engineering -
    That was crushed to death by identical wishful thinking that dominates the alleged superiority of the V boiler(s).

    I went to their factory and witnessed the mindset and production line and saw with my own eyes nonchalance, union mentality laziness and gross overpayment of wages for sub-standard production. We are paying a fortune for mediocre production, high shipping costs and a very unfavorable euro:dollar exchange rate.

    They are more expensive because of labor problems, shipping and financial nightmares - not wonderful engineering.

    Madison Avenue is where the bread is. A common Tekmar controller makes the most sophisticated V control look like the expensive toy it is.

    I love your devotion to Madison Avenue, but please stop letting it confuse the real issue of price vs. performance.

    Is that not the utlimate arbiter? I guess not. If it were, Madison Avenue would not even exist. Would it?

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  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    Just another correction...

    ... Mark, my post referred to the G115, not the G215 you mention. Yes, the 215 can handle very low return water temps. However, how many homes need a boiler with a minimum DOE output of 134kBTU? This boiler would be almost 2x oversized for my home, and I'm heating 5,000 sq ft in a cold climate.
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    Ron,

    There does not seem to be a point in debating Ken on the finer points of Viessmann products. He's apparently convinced they're overpriced products only made successful by interventions by Madison-Avenue, while we look at the actual features of the products out there and come to a different conclusion.

    For example, no manufacturer of durable consumer goods I know of can spend 10x of its R&D budget on marketing, and being private doesn't change that. The numbers simply aren't there. For that matter, where does Viessmann advertise? Never mind...

    I guess I'll just go back to enjoying my over-priced, marketing-hyped piece of junk that is assembled by a bunch of lazy unionized Germans. That there were no US products with comparable features and track records is irrelevant, I guess. ;-)
  • S Ebels
    S Ebels Member Posts: 2,322
    We just put a Rondomat in a barn of all places

    Viessmann has a product for all applications. An approved product I might add. I hate it when a product is "introduced" with out the required approvals to be sold in all locales.

    What's the deal with the GB condenser?

    I could have used the G-315 which is an outstanding boiler, but, the 2107 will not provide the 175* domestic hot water required for sanitizing in a modern dairy barn. (Pay attention Buderus guys, this is probably the third or fourth job that I couldn't use a Blue German because of the lack of high temp domestic on your 2107)

    I'm already off track here...........your pardon please

    Back to the Rondomat in a barn. I looked long and hard when spec'ing this job. To say the owner is frugal brings new reach to the word. After considering all the things this boiler would be asked to do, efficiency, control strategy, reliabilty, serviceability, space alloted, etc. I decided to recommend the Rondo. We ordered it with a two stage Weishaupt firing at 325K on low and 650K on high. This is oil fired BTW.

    The Dekamatik control will run two temps plus the low temp mixing valve the way we have it configured. It will actually run three temps if needed. This was a big factor because we need a high temp loop that will go to 220*+ and a low temp loop for the in-slab zones. One of the things I really like about Viessmann is that the control is matched to the boiler and the application. No problems integrating Brand T with brand V or B or BU or WM. It just saves a lot of time and aggrevation plus you know that there will be no problems with the control asking something of the boiler which it was not designed to do.

    So how's it working? Combustion tests after being dialed in yielded 88.4% on high fire and 90.2% on low. O smoke, CO2 in the 12.8 range, flue gas on low 255, high 295, water temps between 145-165 during test. It just runs beautiful. I have never seen another oil boiler hit these numbers. A couple smaller Buderi have run 87-88 but nothing in this btu capacity has come close. The installation went great. Very minor problems at start up and adjustments were easily made with the Dekamatik to get all facets of the system talking to each other.

    IMHO Viessmann is in a group of ONE. Nothing else is in the same league.

    All that being said, for a basic changeout on an old system or a simple one temp new system. Buderus is equal in nearly everyway and we install more than a few. When things get complex the integrated controls available for Viessmann come with one of those big EASY buttons. They make life much simpler for my guys and myself.

    Viessmann.......nothing else like it.
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    Connie,

    The facts speak for themselves. All is not wunderbar in Viessmann-land. They employ ~6,000 workers, of which few actually make boilers. 10% of the workforce is union. 90% are scabs.

    "The Economist" reports the case of Viessmann, a German engineering firm. To avoid shifting the production of a new boiler to the Czech Republic, it negotiated with its workers an increase in the working week without a commensurate pay rise. IG Metall blocked the deal, though it later compromised.

    This is a typical story. The collective agreements in 2000 and 2001 were an aberration and a political concession to a socialist regime in trouble. In contrast, wages rose 4.1 percent in workplaces covered by the 1999 settlement with IG Metall -- most of them multinationals who exploited the agreement's egregious terms to squeeze their indigenous Mittelstand suppliers.

    IG Metall is notoriously intransigent. Unlike its brethren in other industries, it refuses to link pay rises -- or even annual bonuses -- to profitability, for instance. It rejects the idea of implementing, by mutual consent of employees and employers, wage reductions or overtime to prevent layoffs. It abhors profit sharing schemes, either regional, or sectoral, or even confined to the single plant level. It would not sign two-year pay agreements based on "bad experience" in the past. Many exasperated firms resort to the profligate exercise of "opening (escape) clauses". They renege on the collective agreements without being seen to flout the rules.



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  • Paul Pollets
    Paul Pollets Member Posts: 3,656
    One Question....

    How did Viessmann manage to attract, and hold the attention of N. America's top hydronic/radiant contractors?
    Let's be specific...Scott Milne, Andy Stack, John Felciano, Jeff Young, Dan Foley...to name just a few. These guys can't be fooled easily and they know boilers. Uncompromising mechanics with extensive experience know. Period. Those who don't know, seem to denegrade the "competition".

    By offering poor products or poor service? Poor tech support?

    I've installed just about every American boiler made over the past 30+ years. It's been strictly German for the past 14. I prefer quality products that are made for the long haul. There's a reason American boiler manufacturers are copying the German designs.

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  • Dale Pickard
    Dale Pickard Member Posts: 231
    Buderus @ ISH

    I took myself to ISH this year. I had been absent too long. I'm a pure Viessmann fan. We distribute Viessmann and Crown only. However, one has to be impressed with what Buderus is doing. I managed to get a couple of great photos of the boiler Buderus is bringing to the U.S. I thought I'd share them with the Buderus fans.

    I'm personally not into fin tubes or aluminum HX or ceramic burners necessarily, but you have to appreciate what the Buderus folks have put together here.

    Talk about super extrusion designs, take a look at this boiler sidewall. Look at how it's designed to conduct the condensate down to the bottom. I would love to see them creae these precision aluminum fin tubes with rifled water ways.

    One has to wonder how the design of the rifling, or the tapered fin tubes is done. I don't think that they guess with this stuff. Niether do they cynically design just to obviate the competition. Look at the Fin Tube! Design features are there for reasons. Good reasons.

    I think that this is an example of how fea studies, (in advance of final design) can really lead manufacturers places "where no man has gone before".

    I wish them all the luck in expanding the market for high tech boilers.
    I hope they don't mind me publishing these photos. I love photography and it's hard to ignore the excellent displays at these shows.

    Dale
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    Very interesting extrusion!

    I really like how they incorporated an inner and an outer fin, though the "twist" of the inner one is much less than that of the fins on the outside. I wonder how they achieved that, short of having an external die that twists much more slowly than the inner one. Either way, it would be a pretty nifty thing to do, considering all the benefits of creating turbulent flow within the HX. Thanks for posting the pix!
  • Dale Pickard
    Dale Pickard Member Posts: 231


    That's not an extrusion Constantin. It's got to be a precision casting of some kind. You don't just make this stuff.

    It's like the dimples in the coiled Viessmann HX. Ask yourself, at what point in the manufacturing process are they created?
    They take stainless tlat coil sheet, fold it into a rectangle, (that incorporates the HX area they want), laser weld it, and roll it into a coil, and weld it into the finished HX.
    Predetermining and precisely locating those dimples is more a trick than one may appreciate.
    Here are some Viessmann photos. God, I wish they would let me in after hours with a tripod. I got busted 5 times with my camera.

    BTW, you're up too late!

    Dale
  • Dale Pickard
    Dale Pickard Member Posts: 231
    Interesting

    Ken,

    Can you lead me to that isse of the Economist? I admit that I'd like to think I read the Economist. Truth is, I'm an American, I glaze over pretty fast. : -)

    Dale
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    I agree...

    The trouble with most American companies is that they compete on price when they should be differentiating themselves by bringing out a better product. The list of companies that have innovated successfully and prospered as a result is a long one.

    Why else can Toyota, Honda, etc. charge much higher prices on sedan sales for vehicles that were assembled in America by Americans with some of the same suppliers as the big Three? Why is it that a company like HTP is one of the first to bring condensing technology to the US gas heating market instead of Weil McLain, ECR, etc.? How come US manufacturers of TV sets couldn't compete with the Sony's of the world? Etc.

    The Prius is sold out a year in advance despite costing $$$ more than a comparable car and not possibly repaying most consumers on the savings they'll enjoy unless gasoline prices go up 10x? Now Detroit has to license the very technologies that they could have developed on their own. Just this year, GM ended the leases on and destroyed almost all their innovative electric vehicles, vehicles developed for $1BN+, vehicles that consumers were willing to buy used from GM for $29k a piece. Now GM wants to bring out a hydrogen vehicle. If I were a shareholder in that company, I'd be pretty irate by now.

    I like the many little features that differentiate my Vitola from the other products in the same market segment and that's why I chose it, not because it's German-made. Had a American company stepped up to the plate with a reliable product that was as innovative, I would have considered the product on its merits, not its origin.

    As best as I can tell, one US boiler manufacturer tried to bring out two innovative boilers under a new brand name to differentiate them from their regular products. While innovative and US-made, these products didn't seem to have found broad acceptance, and the brand seems to have been folded into the parent company with the boilers now brought out under a different name. Perhaps all the beta-testing under a different name made a broader roll-out safe.
  • Dale Pickard
    Dale Pickard Member Posts: 231
    Gee Paul,

    Feeling a little left out, ;-(

    Dale
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    OK, now I'm confused

    Two posts up, you state that we're looking at an extrusion. Now you claim it's not?

    I could see how the finned HX visible two posts above could be extruded if you had a rotating inner and an outer mandrel to play with. Simply rotate the outer one quickly to get the pitch you want while rotating the inner one more slowly. The same process produces the rifling found in gun tubes. With a twin-rotating mandrels, I think the shape shown above could be extruded. This is not to say that there aren't other means of casting that shape. Buderus is a master of CI casting...

    As for the Viessmann HX pictured above, I'm not sure it's that hard to do (rather, it's harder to think of in the first place)... If I know where the dimples have to be, then I can program a turret punch to put the dimples where I want them on some pre-cut flat stock. Then I send the dimpled stock through a roll former that accomodates the dimples (the dimples are quite small, compared to the total flat area). Now I have a boxed section ready for welding. Then I weld. Lastly, I put the boxed section through another roll former to achieve the final round shaped HX we know. Done.

    The big trick with dealing with 316 SS is springback, i.e. how to ensure that the two edges of the HX will allow a nice butt-weld. I imagine some fine tolerances are being held to do that. I presume they're using a automated TIG welder at the end of the roll-forming line that comes on as the straight boxed sections fly by. Bathe the whole are in Argon and the weld should be clean and consistent.

    You're right, it's bedtime. Cheers!
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    What I find so interesting is how the topic keeps changing

    Viessmann went from "probably spending 10x on marketing than it does on R&D" to being filled 90% scabs and only 10% unionized workers of which only very few actually make boilers. I don't understand the issue here. Don't like the boiler, don't buy one, simple enough.

    Allow me a Hunt-ism and ask: How many Viessmann boilers has Ken personally installed and what is that percentage of his total installation business? Has he taken a class at Viessmann lately? If so, which one(s)?

    I prefer a market where a consumer has a wide scope of choices. If the market places a premium on a certain company's products then that should be an inspiration for the other manufacturers to do better, not to snipe and suggest Viessmann is an inferior company that somehow brainwashes its installers into installing inferior equipment at premium prices. Given how experienced most of those installers are, I'm somewhat surprised that Viessmann can allegedly pull such a trick.

    As for IG Metall and the pay issue, what Ken left out is that some years ago German non-management workers got a nationwide 35 hour workweek (down from 38 or 40) w/o a pay cut. Now German industry is hurting enough that even the German workers realize that their traditional job security is on the chopping block. The concessions are widespread but reflect a pragmatic approach towards securing jobs. After all, even the SPD realized that job market reform is needed and the latest unemployment benefit elegibility requirements are pretty tough by German standards.

    And the concessions are all over Germany. While we were over there, GM announced that it would continue to build Opels at a particular plant in exchange for a longer work week and more flexibility. In return, the workers got several years of job security. As far as I'm concerned, if everyone agrees to the deal, then the deal is legitimate. The reality is that multi-national companies can and will shift production to lower-cost environments, so it's better to face that issue head on instead of waiting for the plant to be closed outright.
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    Connie,

    Let's get somehing straight.

    My point is and has always been to buy American when equals are involved. Is it a matter of fact that American boilers are inferior, and if so, in what manner? Other than superior marketing skills and a lot of waste in the production phase of the 'V' - coupled with obscene transportation costs and enourmous marketing overhead (which works better than 'V' could have ever hoped for - because of our gullibility and naievete, and the pricy euro notwithstanding) - there is absolutely no evidence that the 'V' is superior in any way to many American boilers.

    Many of the American boiler makers were heating homes in the world when the Viessmann boys were still wearing diapers. Experience and making equipment that lasts 40+ years can be overcome. Not so much by engineering superiority as much as very powerful marketing.

    At the moment, the Munchkin, with roughly half the cost and stainless steel construction and very small advertising budget captures my fancy. It also puts someone to work in United States to make them.

    Is there something wrong with that? Prefering to buy American?



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  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    Connie,

    Better check your facts.

    G.E. made condesning boilers in 1939!

    Back when German superior engineering was focussed on Panzers and Messerschmidts and wouldn't know a condensing boiler from a sweet potato.

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  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    Dale,

    place the words: "Viessmann Strike" in a Google search.

    Many pages of euro labor problems are available. Three refer to union unrest as being culled from "The Economist," A magaizine I too once subscribed to. Just never had the time to read most of it.

    It did state Viessmann has a facility in China. Making boilers in China would be a great way for Viessmann to avoid the labor problems of Europe and compete successfully with the Americans with both Madison Avenue hype AND price as a sales promotions.

    Watch out America! The Sino-Arians are coming!

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  • radiant_5
    radiant_5 Member Posts: 5
    ken

    Ken you need to get off the heroin and your thoughts will become more clear.... good luck with that
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    You're not answering my questions!

    Have you personally installed a Viessmann or not? If you or you company has installed Viessmann's, how many in the last 5 years? If any of your staff have attended a training seminar in Warwick, how many times did someone go in the last 5 years? I'd like to understand just how much actual experience you have with the product.

    I see that you have a nationalistic attitutde when it comes to boiler selection and things being equal, you'd chose the American brand. Fair enough... However, I have yet to understand why a Viessmann is inferior to a US-made boiler in my application. Last time I checked,
    • As of 2004, No US-made oil-fired boiler in my size range (~ 100kBTU/hr DOE) was/is inherently shock-proof and shrugs off radiant emitter return temperatures.
    • No US-made, oil-fired boiler offers an integrated controller that can monitor the flue gas temperatures, run a mixing valve, recirc system, OR, etc. US-made solutions in this area typically require lots of add-on boxes, like Tekmar's excellent line of controllers to make some of these things happen.
    • The ease of service of a Vitola is second to none. If you haven't taken a class lately to see all the neat and thoughtful features they put into a Vitola for the maintenance folk, I urge you to go, if anything, to understand the company you so despise a bit better.
    I also find your reasoning regarding the learning curve a bit hard to understand. On the one hand, Viessmann is inferior because its company history is not as long as that of some US companies. Yet, HTP is being praised as an excellent company to buy a boiler from, even though they have only recently entered the boiler business. Which way are you going to have it, Ken?

    BTW, is 87 years of experience enough in the boiler business? Because that's what Viessmann has... Lastly, I'm convinced that HTP makes a solid product and I would have seriously considered the Munchkin, if there was an oil-fired version.
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    There is no questions,

    Just posturing.

    1) No. I have not personally installed a Viessmann.

    2) No. My company has not installed a Viessmann in the past 5 years.

    3) No. None of my staff have been to Warwick in the past 5 years.

    4) How much actual experience I have with Viessmann is as follows: We service two Viessmanns and have for 8+ years. I went to the factory in Germany where the boiler is made. I saw the workers and the parts and the assembly line. I spoke with the staff and management. I saw the test facility and the warehouse which was rented to non-Viessmann wharehousing entity that Viessmann rented to justify the wasted space. I spent days pouring over the Viessmann booth and their wares, in Frankfurt ISH, not once, but twice (2001 and 1997).

    5) Yes. Just like you, I have a nationalistic tendency. The difference is, my tendency would be American. Yours?

    6) Let's stop turning this one around. My point has always been that by alleging Viessmann's superiority, we denigrate American boiler companies! Because the terms good, better and best are based on subjective logic and language, I take issue with that form of debate and all the wrong conclusions resulting therefrom!

    7) As of 2004, no European boiler was offered in a steam model! (Does that imply the Euros can't build one?)

    8) Americans prefer components to "packaged" controls. We can choose a specific configuration talored to the uniqueness of each system configuration. We're not "stuck" with integrated controls, we like and choose options of brand and design over "integrated" packages offered without brand options or features. K-Mart offers integrated stereos for 50 bucks. Tuner, CD player, tape, speakers and amp - all in one - just like Viessmann. I have a Harmon Kardon amp, Thorens turntable, Altec Speakers, etc. I don't like - or want integrated components, nor do many Americans. Is that "wrong" thinking?

    Now let me ask a few questions:

    A) How many years have you been earning a living as a heating professional?

    B) Is it possible your ethnicity has influenced and induced a strong bias?

    C) Did you consider or even look at the Monitor FCX condensing oil boiler?

    D) Are you (or your family) that independently wealthy that the cost vs. the performance considerations of the boiler chosen - was ever really relevant to your decision to use an imported product?

    E) I may have implied Viessmann was "less experienced" because of it being half the age of America's older boiler makers. I did infer they had no interest in coming here until their biggest competitor Vallaint did.

    F) What is the AFUE rating of your Viessmann?

    G) Is it a condensing by design boiler?

    H) If not, and it is the "best" boiler on earth, why doesn't it condense? Or by your standards, would that make the FCX the better unit? After all, Monitor overcame the engineering issues of condensing oil boilers - why can't Viessmann?

    BTW, the FCX burner that allows condensing is made on Long Island - USA

    Not Europe!



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  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    Whatever, Ken

    By your own admission, your knowledge re: Viessmanns products is scant, at best. Servicing two 8+year old units is not the same as taking a two-day class regarding their entire product portfolio, as I have. Perhaps you could consider evaluating the products on their own merits, not just on the basis of "made in the USA", a factory tour, and some time at the ISH stand.

    Whether integrated controls are a blessing or a curse is for the market to decide. I happen to like the user-friendly interface that the Viessmann ships with, a user interface that allows home owners to easily adjust heating curves and other variables, unlike the controls shipped with most US boilers.

    Your attempts at baiting me with regard to my ethnicity, origin, years of experience, etc. are duely ignored. I hope that some day you manage to overcome your anger or whatever is motivating these sorts of pointless, personal attacks. I've stated my experience in this field several times, a level of disclosure you may wish to emulate when it comes to commenting on products you don't know well.

    That I may have simply compared features between boilers and come to a different conclusion from yours is, I guess, simply inconceivable. As I've repeated many times, had I gone gas, I would have seriously considered a Munchkin, Opus, Trinity, whatever. However, my focus was on the oil side of the business, because that's traditionally the cheaper fuel where I have made my home.

    And, yes, I looked at the FCX, a unit that you were convinced was entirely manufactured in the US until I corrected you. Monitor had little to do with the unit, as far as I can tell, other than importing the thing, slapping on a Heatwise burner, and getting it certified. In my mind, that does not constitute overcoming significant engineering issues. The heavy lifting was done by Equinox, who developed the package in the first place.

    Based on the advice of the fine folk over at OilTechTalk, I declined to use a FCX as the consensus is that US fuel oil is too contaminated with sulfur to not rot out the secondary HX in no time. Furthermore, the FCX comes in only one (wrong) size for my heat loss needs. Thus, while the FCX is likely to be a fine boiler, its not the right boiler for me.

    The Burnham Opus was another boiler with a lot of potential. Yet, I didn't feel like being a beta-tester on a new product that had yet to cut its teeth in the marketplace. Judging from the number of revisions and its subsequent withdrawl from the market, I wasn't the only one who questioned the viability of the product despite the stellar reputation that Burnham enjoys. I also looked into the other Burnham products, Biasi, Crown, Pinnacle, Dunkirk, etc. and found nothing that fit my needs as well as the boiler I have now.

    For what it's worth, Viessmann has a VitoPlus wall-hung condensing oil boiler that comes in several sizes and which looks a lot like the Vitodens. If you need a larger condensing unit, you can choose a VitolaPlus. I suppose that once allowable contamination levels in US heating fuel drop to less than 300PPM that Viessmann might introduce these products over here also. Until then, the potential liability of introducing such a product probably outweighs the profit potential by a wide margin.

    All the best, Ken, and please get some help.
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    And you have the

    arrogance to suggest I'm the baiter?

    Find someone else to annoy,

    Please.



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  • Weezbo
    Weezbo Member Posts: 6,232
    Thank you for posting the Buderas pic's...

    this is off topic a bit...i recall a type of hard candy that came out of europe or england that had a similar designe running thru its center...many years ago...i would like to know who really is to credit for the internal designe of the finn tube...it might be that many things are from different trades altogether...
  • Constantin
    Constantin Member Posts: 3,796
    (Laughing)

    Way to go debating those points, Ken!

    But seriously, where is the flaw in my boiler selection for my application? A Weil, Burnham, etc. might be just the ticket for the one-pipe steam house I'm living in now, but the Vitola is, as best I can tell, the best boiler for my RFH application. Cheers!
  • Ken_8
    Ken_8 Member Posts: 1,640
    Does this mean,

    I owe you a beer at WSVI?

    Bartender, Zwei Pauliner bitte!

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  • Dale Pickard
    Dale Pickard Member Posts: 231
    I have no clue

    how they made it. If you think that's how then maybe that's how. Twin rotatig madrels....I'll ask our extruder. The extrusions I was referring to make up the casing of the boiler. A big hollow extrusion like that is a little more difficult to produce. It's a nice application of an extrusion.

    About the dimples, I'm just pointing out the attention to detail. A true rectangular tube where they can adjust the area exposed to the flue gases, the dimples which carefully regulate the pressure drop of the flue gases through the gap.

    Viessmann doesn't really belive in Fin Tubes. For them, HX surface wants to be backed by water, otherwise you derate the exchanger surface.

    It's interesting to see the very different design philosophies between the two companies.

    Dale
  • Brian (Tankless)
    Brian (Tankless) Member Posts: 340
    Turbulence

    Great photo's Dale.

    I don't know if there is a way to protect a patent using turbulence to improve heat transfer efficiency, but, I do know as a fact, that a gentleman here in S.W. Louisiana holds patents regarding turbulence in heat exchangers.

    He owns Kim's Radiator in Sulphur, Louisiana, and has the patents very prominently framed & hung on the walls of his office.

    His way to make a radiator almost 100% more efficient while maintaining the physical size, was rediculously simple.

    He took the end-caps off a rad', took flat metal strips almost as wide as the I.D. of the rad' tubes, spiralled them in a home-made jig, somehow soldered/brazed them in place in the tubes, and had a greatly improved HX.

    I hope Buderus have their collective a*%@s covered, because I think "The Man" will be very interested in the photo's.

    This for Constantin. When I first started visiting/posting & asking questions on The Wall about seven years ago, I asked a "dumb question" and was immediately called "Laddy" by Secor. Now he calls you "Connie". I'm glad you didn't respond.

    Is there a Viessmann Vitriol?

    Is there a pex with rifling?

    Is there a more lovely & perfect metal than copper....NO. On that, Ken & I agree.

    I went back to being an electrical maint' eng'r, folks don't want radiant in the south.

    Must go, got some Pipe-lay barges to take care of.

    Brian, Tankless in Swampland.

This discussion has been closed.