I'm at the thinking about heating stage of my barn build...

[Raspy]

mx,

I'm completely sympathetic with your time and money constraints. I started on my place in 2006 and won't be done for another 18 months or so. Part of the problem is I'm not in a big hurry to final, and see the taxes go up, before I'm ready to make the big move.

Fortunately, we built the guest house first and moved into that, so there is no real pressure. And I am working about 260 miles away from our new place, so it's back and forth for extended periods. As you can see from the pix, I started with a 60 X 60 steel frame building that arrived on a big truck, like an erector set. Now we are all framed and closed in, windows in, roof on, walls and ceilings framed and I have power to two sub panels. The next thing is all the mechanical systems and the front door. My door will be a 4X6 steel box tubing frame with all glass block. I've been welding and fabricating various parts. I mounted the wood stove on a wheeled cart and rolled it over to the roof penetration and fired it up. Now I can finish the stove alcove while the stove is running.

As to your temporary system to get heat, I think it's a fine idea. In fact I do it on most new construction.

If you want the absolute simplest arrangement, here it is: Get an electric water heater with the standard 4500 watt elements. This should be one you'll use later for your domestic use, so it will probably be a 40 or 50 gallon. If you want to dedicate it to the radiant, get a 30. You want a standard looking tall conventional water heater. Just a cheap one from Home Depot or whatever. Stand it next to the manifold. Remove the bottom drain and screw in a 3/4 inch galv nipple, a 3/4 tee and a second nipple. Install a pump flange on this second nipple and mount your circulator there with it's flow arrow pointing AWAY from the tank and towards the manifold. Put the drain bib into the other port on the tee you just installed. Prepare your manifold with a 3/4 copper pipe extending off the hot supply pipe a few inches. Put another 3/4 copper nipple and male adapter on the outlet side of the pump with your second flange. Connect these two nipples with 7/8 ID washing machine or dish washer (DW) drain hose and hose clamps. It's a very easy to find and cheap hose.

Now run the return from the manifold to the "hot out" fitting on top of the water heater with more copper, male adapters and DW hose.

Now pour water into the "cold" fitting on top of the water heater and fill it up. Put a cord on the circulator and plug it in. Eventually, all the air will come back to the water heater and you can keep adding water as needed. When you are sure the air is out of the loops and the pump is running quietly and circulating well, drain enough water out of the tank that the water level is down a few inches from the top of the inner tank. Just eyeball it. Cap off that "cold" nipple.

Adjust the thermostat on the tank to about 90 degrees or so and wire it up. Send it power and you are done. The floor will come up and stabilize. Ideally, you'll get about 70-75 degree average floor temp and the water heater element will cycle occasionally. Fiddle with the thermostat and the loop balancing valves to get what you want. There is a slim possibility you'll have trouble with the element, but that's OK. The ones that come with water heaters are very cheap with minimum surface area and you can get a much better replacement one that won't fail, if needed. That's it. Works very well.

You need the circulator anyway and you haven't damaged the water heater, so it can go into the house for domestic use later. If this arrangement will be used for an extended period, you should get a bronze or stainless pump, designed for use in open loop systems, and bronze flanges. But if it's only a couple of months or so don't bother with the bronze.

By the way, I enjoyed your last post. Cool.


Ooooops, Forgot one thing!

Remove the cold nipple, and dip tube from the water heater. Replace with another 3/4 galv nipple. Keep the removed nipple and dip tube for later.

 

[mx842]

mx,

I'm completely sympathetic with your time and money constraints. I started on my place in 2006 and won't be done for another 18 months or so. Part of the problem is I'm not in a big hurry to final, and see the taxes go up, before I'm ready to make the big move.

Fortunately, we built the guest house first and moved into that, so there is no real pressure. And I am working about 260 miles away from our new place, so it's back and forth for extended periods. As you can see from the pix, I started with a 60 X 60 steel frame building that arrived on a big truck, like an erector set. Now we are all framed and closed in, windows in, roof on, walls and ceilings framed and I have power to two sub panels. The next thing is all the mechanical systems and the front door. My door will be a 4X6 steel box tubing frame with all glass block. I've been welding and fabricating various parts. I mounted the wood stove on a wheeled cart and rolled it over to the roof penetration and fired it up. Now I can finish the stove alcove while the stove is running.

As to your temporary system to get heat, I think it's a fine idea. In fact I do it on most new construction.

If you want the absolute simplest arrangement, here it is: Get an electric water heater with the standard 4500 watt elements. This should be one you'll use later for your domestic use, so it will probably be a 40 or 50 gallon. If you want to dedicate it to the radiant, get a 30. You want a standard looking tall conventional water heater. Just a cheap one from Home Depot or whatever. Stand it next to the manifold. Remove the bottom drain and screw in a 3/4 inch galv nipple, a 3/4 tee and a second nipple. Install a pump flange on this second nipple and mount your circulator there with it's flow arrow pointing AWAY from the tank and towards the manifold. Put the drain bib into the other port on the tee you just installed. Prepare your manifold with a 3/4 copper pipe extending off the hot supply pipe a few inches. Put another 3/4 copper nipple and male adapter on the outlet side of the pump with your second flange. Connect these two nipples with 7/8 ID washing machine or dish washer (DW) drain hose and hose clamps. It's a very easy to find and cheap hose.

Now run the return from the manifold to the "hot out" fitting on top of the water heater with more copper, male adapters and DW hose.

Now pour water into the "cold" fitting on top of the water heater and fill it up. Put a cord on the circulator and plug it in. Eventually, all the air will come back to the water heater and you can keep adding water as needed. When you are sure the air is out of the loops and the pump is running quietly and circulating well, drain enough water out of the tank that the water level is down a few inches from the top of the inner tank. Just eyeball it. Cap off that "cold" nipple.

Adjust the thermostat on the tank to about 90 degrees or so and wire it up. Send it power and you are done. The floor will come up and stabilize. Ideally, you'll get about 70-75 degree average floor temp and the water heater element will cycle occasionally. Fiddle with the thermostat and the loop balancing valves to get what you want. There is a slim possibility you'll have trouble with the element, but that's OK. The ones that come with water heaters are very cheap with minimum surface area and you can get a much better replacement one that won't fail, if needed. That's it. Works very well.

You need the circulator anyway and you haven't damaged the water heater, so it can go into the house for domestic use later. If this arrangement will be used for an extended period, you should get a bronze or stainless pump, designed for use in open loop systems, and bronze flanges. But if it's only a couple of months or so don't bother with the bronze.

By the way, I enjoyed your last post. Cool.


Ooooops, Forgot one thing!

Remove the cold nipple, and dip tube from the water heater. Replace with another 3/4 galv nipple. Keep the removed nipple and dip tube for later.

You mean the one about our earthquake? We don't get too many around here so it's always something to talk about when they do happen.

I'm keeping this thread in a file form on my puter to go back to for reference later on later on when I need it. It's too much to try and keep in my little brain.

I do have one other question with regards to something you have said a couple times in this thread. You said to add a few extra lines in the bathroom areas to keep them warm and toasty. I don't know exactly where but I have seen written several times where it was said to do just to opposite or at least keep it to a minimum. The reason they gave was that where most bathrooms are quite small the heat could melt the wax ring that seals the toilet to the floor drain. I don't know if this is true or not but was wondering what your opinion of this 'could be' problem or how you would prevent this from happening if the coils were actually too close to this area and exactly what would be too close?

 

[Raspy]

"Melt the wax ring". Man, I love the stuff people dream up.

In general heated areas like the middle of a bedroom or living room, 12" spacing of the tubes works pretty well. Especially if the system is, more or less, constant on. But in the bathrooms we want a faster respons and closer spacing so our feet won't find cold areas and we are greeted with warmth when stepping out of the shower, etc.

I like to run the tubes in bathrooms at 6" or 8" average. Sometimes to slip in an extra loop I run them siamese, or right next to each other.

All piping in the bathroom should enter and leave through the door, it should stay out from the wall far enough to allow drilled in door stops and it should be no closer to the toilet flange area than a 10" radius. I don't run it behind the toilet because we don't step there. Getting it in and out of the shower is always tricky and must match the type of pan being used. Each case seems different and sometimes it gets left out of the shower. Under the tub is optional. Don't run it under the cabinets, but do run it close to the front of them.

The maximum average floor temp in the bathroom is about 87 degrees. More than that and the air temp becomes uncomfortably warm. To get there fast we might need 110 degrees delivery or even more. To maintain it we only need about 95 degrees.

"Melting the ring" is a fun wrench to throw into the conversational gears. With several billion people connected on the internet, there are always comments that spread and get repeated. This whole radiant game is about common sense and, simply, making people comfortable in a practical way.

Another one is having the wood flooring guys say they can'y have their wood warmer than 90 degrees or so, and if it gets hotter than that, there is no warrantee. I simply ask them what happens if the sun shines through a window and heats the wood to 100 degrees. "Does the sun void your warrantee?" Then I ask them if they can't meet the floor heat specifications laid out in the engineering data and on the plans why they are installing the wrong product? It ruffles some feathers, but I won't be told to not heat the house so their floor material can survive. I won't accept that they won't guarantee their work if they decide not to.

The ultimate goal is to make these systems disappear into the background and become a silent part of a comfortable home. People often tell me the radiant heat is their favorite part of their home. I once went on a service call to a home with radiant and asked where the thermostat was. The woman, who had lived there for at least thirty years, looked puzzled and said she didn't know they had one. Wow. I instantly knew this was the perfect system. Always comfortable for many years, invisible, silent and, simply forgotten about. I put in a new boiler and now another ten years have slipped by with no complaints.

Radiant heat, in some ways, is like solar, in that it is relatively new to the minds of current builders and homeowners. It's also fascinating and a bit suspect at first glance. Engineers who claim to be experts can't design it well in many cases, some contractors understand next to nothing about pumps and energy and mass and conduction. People bring up extraneous, off the wall concerns and argue them to exhaustion. Other's are salesmen and push bugus products or proprietary layout plans that won't work well either. Sheesh. It's all part of the game and part of the fun.

I'm the practical guy that strives for real world performance, comfort and efficiency. Often, I have to redesign plans that people paid a lot of money for or recommend against products that have a terrible track record and have been called out to be used. Sometimes the required performance can't be done with the supplied equipment. It goes on and on. So, forgive me when I roll my eyes at wild claims about turbulence in tubing, concrete failing with too much rebar, too much tube in the bathroom, underslab insulation, new tubing materials with no track record and a host of other non issues.

 

[mx842]

"Melt the wax ring" Man, I love the stuff people dream up.

In general heated area like the middle of The bedroom or living room, 12" spacing of the tubes works pretty well. Especially if the system is, more or less, constant on. But in the bathrooms we want a faster respons and closer spacing so our feet won't find cold areas and we are greeted with warmth when stepping out of the shower, etc.

I like to run the tubes in bathrooms at 6" or 8" average. Sometimes to slip in an extra loop I run them siamese, or right next to each other.

All piping in the bathroom should enter and leave through the door, it should stay out from the wall far enough to allow drilled in door stops and it should be no closer to the toilet flange area than a 10" radius. I don't run it behind the toilet because we don't step there. Getting it in and out of the shower is always tricky and must match the type of pan being used. Each case seems different and sometimes it gets left out of the shower. Under the tub is optional. Don't run it under the cabinets, but do run it close to the front of them.

The maximum average floor temp in the bathroom is about 87 degrees. More than that and the air temp becomes uncomfortably warm. To get there fast we might need 110 degrees delivery or even more. To maintain it we only need about 95 degrees.

"Melting the ring" is a fun wrench to throw into the conversational gears. With several billion people connected on the internet, there are always comments that spread and get repeated. This whole radiant game is about common sense and, simply, making people comfortable in a practical way.

Another one is having the wood flooring guys say they can'y have their wood warmer than 90 degrees or so, and if it gets hotter than that, there is no warrantee. I simply ask them what happens if the sun shines through a window and heats the wood to 100 degrees. "Does the sun void your warrantee?" Then I ask them if they can't meet the floor heat specifications laid out in the engineering data and on the plans why they are installing the wrong product? It ruffles some feathers, but I won't be told to not heat the house so their floor material can survive. I won't accept that they won't guarantee their work if they decide not to.

The ultimate goal is to make these systems disappear into the background and become a silent part of a comfortable home. People often tell me the radiant heat is their favorite part of their home. I once went on a service call to a home with radiant and asked where the thermostat was. The woman, who had lived there for at least thirty years, looked puzzled and said she didn't know they had one. Wow. I instantly knew this was the perfect system. Always comfortable for many years, invisible, silent and, simply forgotten about. I put in a new boiler and now another ten years have slipped by with no complaints.

Radiant heat, in some ways, is like solar, in that it is relatively new to the minds of current builders and homeowners. It's also fascinating and a bit suspect at first glance. Engineers who claim to be experts can't design it well in many cases, some contractors understand next to nothing about pumps and energy and mass and conduction. People bring up extraneous, off the wall concerns and argue them to exhaustion. Other's are salesmen and push bugus products or proprietary layout plans that won't work well either. Sheesh. It's all part of the game and part of the fun.

I'm the practical guy that strives for real world performance, comfort and efficiency. Often, I have to redesign plans that people paid a lot of money for or recommend against products that have a terrible track record and have been called out to be used. Sometimes the required performance can't be done with the supplied equipment. It goes on and on. So, forgive me when I roll my eyes at wild claims about turbulence in tubing, concrete failing with too much rebar, too much tube in the bathroom, underslab insulation, new tubing materials with no track record and a host of other non issues.

Don't you roll them eyes at me young man! :laughing:

Yeah I know what you mean about rumors being passed on from one place to another. The internet is a wonderful tool if you can sort out the true facts from the fiction. Like I said I don't really remember which sites I read this on but I think it was off of a couple links that were posted here on tractorByNet in another thread. The sad thing is they were sites that were selling equipment to install radiant heat systems, go figure.

I sure do thank you for taking the time to help me out with the questions I had. If the truth be known I probably have a bunch more but I just don't know about it. As I get closer to the pour I'll probably dig this back up for a refresher course though. I'm going to get there, its just going to take a little longer than first expected.

 

[Ranger Rick]

Hey neighbor!

I guess you could call us neighbors, I live in Varina a little east of Richmond. I pass through Lousia every other week when I go to Culpeper to visit a friend. I heard you guys had another 3.5 shaking the other day. I don't know what it felt like there when the big one hit but here, I thought at first a helicopter was landing on my roof full of ATF agents coming to take my guns but then the shaking got so bad that I knew a train had jumped the track and was crashing through the house then as I looked out I saw the trees moving back and forth and the wavy lines and knew we were having an earthquake. I have felt a few before in other parts of the country but never seen one that lasted so long and made such a noise.

Hey fancy that. We are over next to Zion Crossroads. Funny you should mention the aftershock earthquake. I read about it the next day. I was so busy that day burning my brush pile and running my tractor back and forth to pick up other piles of brush to add to the fire that I never felt the ground shake. It was a calm day in the wind department so it all worked out well for me. Good luck on your project.
Rick

 

[mx842]

Hey fancy that. We are over next to Zion Crossroads. Funny you should mention the aftershock earthquake. I read about it the next day. I was so busy that day burning my brush pile and running my tractor back and forth to pick up other piles of brush to add to the fire that I never felt the ground shake. It was a calm day in the wind department so it all worked out well for me. Good luck on your project.
Rick

My oldest son belongs to a hunt club that is in the area and he was up there taking down some deer stands and he said he felt it pretty good. The club is real close to the center of this activity and they were having 7 to 10 aftershocks a day for a long time after the main shaking. He said most of them you didn't hardly feel but you could hear them well enough.

I have just about gotten all of my blow downs from the last storm cleaned up. At one time I had 8 or 10 big piles burning at one time. I was lucky enough that my roofer friend let me use his skid steer while they were not using it while they were here. Man, that thing saved me a lot of work and time. The big storm before that I lost over 70 big oaks and it took me and my Bronco 3 years to get them all cut up and burned. Actually I never did get all of the stumps burned they were just too big to get them all the way out of the ground so I could burn them.

The last time he let me use it I had it for the weekend and I was able to shake out all the piles and move what was left to one spot that was in a low wet area that I could not get into before. There was several piles that I had tried to pile up but it was just to wet to do any good. I had burned them like they were and with a lot of hand work I got most of the stuff burned all except the main parts of about 15 stumps and when I went in there this time it was still real wet but I did manage to get them out and piled with the rest of the stuff I had just brought down from the hill and most of it is gone now. I still need to shake this pile out and repile it with the last few remaining trees and stumps I couldn't get to before. Hopefully he will be kind enough to let me use it again once spring rolls around and things dry up a little. The land still looks like a bomb went off around here but once it dries up hopefully I can get on it and level it out some.

Oh well nice talking to ya.

 

[mx842]

Hey Raspy....one more question. We were talking about pumps and I was wondering if you could tell me what the difference is in the taco 008 and the other pumps you mentioned. I know they are made of corrosion resistant material but the 3 speed thing is what I was wondering about. How does that work? Do you have to rewire the motors to get the different speeds or is there a switch that you flip? And why would you want or need a 3 speed motor for in the first place.

 

[Raspy]

mx,

The two pumps, 008 and 15-58, are made by different companies, but they are both cartridge style, system lubricated centrifugal pumps. The three speed Grundfos 15-58 has a three position switch that can be switched anytime. No wiring changes. Sometimes I have to use the TACO because it's more tolerant of the additives I need to run. But normally, the 15-58 is excellent and a good choice for you, if you don't go with the 26-64 Grundfos.

If you had no other restriction than an 8 or 10 loop manifold with loops of 250-300 feet, and it was a more or less continuously circulating system, the 15-18 is a good choice. You would probably only run it on the lower settings if you were doing a domestic water recirc system or some situation where too much flow was a problem. The radiant needs more power and likely the highest speed. If you want more even heating during a faster response and you have some restriction in the boiler heat exchanger, the 26-64 is a better choice. It too is a system lubricated, cartridge, centrifugal circulator. I think the 26-64 is 1/12 horsepower and the 15-58 is a 1/20 hp. They'll only be drawing about 300-400 watts or so.

We're looking for flow that will provide a small differential between the supply and return line temperatures. The loop return lines from the floor should all be warm and even temp with minimal balancing.

All models are fine with propylene glycol added to the mix. Be absolutely certain you NEVER add ethylene glycol (car anti-freeze).

How's the work going?