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hydronic heat


Plymouthy Adams

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well,,,temps predicted to 30 or so tonight....and will be cold next few days....(we need a high wall at the Canadian border, let them keep this cold up there)  I lit a fire earlier in the month and it would not burn clean no draft and even with force air induction no exhaust.  That meant one thing, the china cap was plugged and I did not think I wouls see that on this short straight pipe but as the last days of last year were just simply banked burning I am sure this contributed to the creosote.  I dropped the pipe and sure enough it was creosoted up.....tonight I lit the fire and instant roaring flames, better drafting for sure, less than an hour later 160 gallons of water from 50 degrees to 170 and unit shut down to sleep mode.  Man what a difference....enjoying a coffee for my efforts and a toasty house with the heater now cycling...everything is now automatic except for the monkey that has to throw a log in now and then.   Hope all you folks have a warm and safe Thanksgiving and enjoy the feast of the harvest.

Edited by Plymouthy Adams
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16 degrees F here this morning. Oil hot air heat doing it's thing. We have converted our wood burning fireplace to propane. Good backup heat source but try to use it a little each month just to verify operation if needed. The garage is also oil hot air but since I only heat it when I am in it, I usually just use a kerosene torpedo heater.

Stay comfortable everyone!

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it made it down to 30 with no problem....heavy frost .....the monkey has been out and feeding the fire....the monkey slept warm though.....not sure of what time I went and laid down....I was crunching gearing data last night with much researching.  After many website reads, few forum inputs trying to find where someone may actually have some data and no guessing (not, all guessing)  and three different technical manuals, I think I got all but one items verified and sorted and got my plan of attack in order...I will strike when they least expect me with cleaned wrenches and hot pot of coffee.

Edited by Plymouthy Adams
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31 minutes ago, oldodge41 said:

16 degrees F here this morning. Oil hot air heat doing it's thing. We have converted our wood burning fireplace to propane. Good backup heat source but try to use it a little each month just to verify operation if needed. The garage is also oil hot air but since I only heat it when I am in it, I usually just use a kerosene torpedo heater.

Stay comfortable everyone!

 

⛸️?️  I'm comfortably numb at 30   ....brrr...hey, this is SUPPOSED to be the south.... ???

 

When this time of year rolls around and folks post of the cold, wind and snows....brings to memory good ole Norm Coupe...sport of all sports...always in good cheer.  Miss his input here and is friendly banter....

Edited by Plymouthy Adams
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My Garage is chilly! Natural gas hydronic heat at my place.  I am too cheap to let it flow into the garage floor. I fire up a propane space heater as needed out there.

About -5C this morning. Yet +10C forecast for a high tomorrow. The Pineapple Express is passing though again this week.

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Keith, hear you on that, I have 4 separate pump stations on the supply line with common returns with my big outdoor unit.  I have ran a loop to my shop but so far each passing spring/autumn I fail to install my heat exchangers for the shop and run my ducting and registers.   Each loop is individually controlled in the manner you wish...just so much to do ......

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Every home I have had uses a gas hot water boiler for heat with either fin tube or radiators. Love these systems. 

 

Current home uses fin tubing baseboards. 20+ years ago I tore down my old garage and poured a slab with 4 separate loops of PEX tubing in it for the new one. Upgraded my house boiler 2 or 3 years later and hooked up the garage to the house boiler at that time. 

 

Simple system uses 2 pumps, 1 for the house and one for the garage that both run off the house thermostat. Garage loop uses an adjustable mixing valve to pull smaller amounts of heated water from the house loop to satisfy the mixing valve setting for ther garage loop after which the pump pushes the mixed water ~ 25ft to the 1 to 4 manifold in the detached garage. I use just 1 of the 4 PEX loops installed in the concrete. If I did it again I would install only 2 PEX loops in the concrete just to have a back-up loop in the pour the others were overkill.

 

Positives are no flame, fuel fumes or forced air movement in the garage from the system. No condensation or freezing cold tools to deal with.

Cons are the walk from the garage to the house in the cold.

Cost per year - The old boiler was smaller but not as efficient as the new boiler so impact on cost was negligible.  

 

Picture below shows the snow ghost roll off the garage roof of Christmas pasts

 

 

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I have not lived in a house where I burned wood in wood stoves for 40 years. We did have a decorative fireplace in our old house but I only used it a few times.

 

I have never used the fireplace in the new house, and in fact I ripped it down and ripped out the chimney and replaced it with a bunch of aquariums.

 

Every house that I’ve lived in since 1981 has had natural gas heating. Before that we had propane, and I did burn wood because the propane was so expensive. Also we lived in the country and there was lots of wood available.

 

But I don’t miss the mess of dealing with ashes and chimneys and wood ticks.

 

 

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I hear you on the inside house wood burning heaters.....I have two, and one is in the shop and have not used either in years.  That is the beauty of the unit I installed...it sits out back of the house and eliminates chimney fires from the living area and only the hot water is pumped in a loop to the house.  I was never comfortable leaving a fire burning in the stoves inside the house and thus reluctant to use it.   And as you said, the mess is also outside.  I have been fortunate that all my wood is given to me.  We do not have natural gas service out in this rural area either.  

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Happy Thanksgiving folks. Have a bit of light snow today for the holiday over here.

 

 Plenty of people up here where we get Canada cold in the Midwest are using indoor wood burners.  One friend has a 40x80 barn that is 2 stories tall heated hydronic with an indoor wood burner. System is about 50 years old and uses copper tube in the concrete. His father built it and did machining on the first floor and had office and storage upstairs. I remember he had a Goldenhawk and 33 plymouth stored in the upper level. Burns wood 24/7 and like all systems you need to do periodic inspections and maintain them to be confident they work safely as intended. There is a trade off for getting cheaper heat which usually means more labor and you have to be comfortable with whatever route you go. All fires we hear about these days come from electric or portable fueled heaters and kids playing with matches as the source.

 

Now when I smell a wood stove burning I always think back to my grandparents home we used to visit near Wittenberg, Wi. as I was growing up. The upstairs bedrooms had floor registers to allow the heat to rise and warm the rooms and that brought all the smells from the kitchen with it. Grandma spent practically the whole day in the kitchen starting around 4am at the wood stove baking breads, biscuits and raisin cinnamon rolls. Then bacon ham and eggs as folks woke up and filed down for breakfast that she cooked to order and she never sat down with us to eat. She would clean up dishes till we scattered then clean ash and add wood throughout the day making cookies and cake or raised donuts. Some days I would hang around and help with the stove and we would play cards as the dough was rising or in between cookie batches. It was a good trade off to put a warm donut or 2 in a bag of sugar for a quick shake before anyone else got one. Lunch was usually sandwiches on homemade bread and always meat and potatoes at dinner. After dinner she would work on a rolled potica, fruitcakes or candies to set out throughout the next day. There was a small space heater that used fuel oil in the living room but that top loader wood stove and my grandmother that kept it going are what comes to mind when I smell a wood burner.

 

Grandfather was a bricklayer with a lot of fireplace experience and grandma cooked on a wood stove, that's a good match I think. I only have a cast wood burner on the porch of the garage for warming up if I want to sit out on cool nights. 

 

I don't mind spiders but hate ticks which are in the spider family with a passion. Remember seeing a dog just loaded with them some as big as a little finger.

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