Sublimes Central Boiler 760HDX

[sublime68charger]

So I got a CB 760HDX this fall and got it installed and been up and working the last 10 days.

Pic of My Boiler and wood shed setup.  This is heating 3 buildings  2 story 2,500'House/24x26 Car Garage/1,300' Small Workshop

[sublime68charger]

some more Pics of my add hoc wood shed she's a not pretty but if it can keep the wood dry and me out of the wind when Having to load up my wheel barrow each day that's all I'm looking for.  Mostly small buzz saw wood in the middle lined with Heavy split wood on the ends to make stacking the small stuff in the middle a little bit easier to due.



 

 

[sublime68charger]

in the pics on the right corner you can see the door frame I made up as that is my entry and exit with the wheel barrow as I cut the tarp there into 6" wide strips dont have a photo of that but it seems to be working for now as I have the front of the shed close up since it was full of wood.

[boilerman101]

Nice set up. Congrats!

[sublime68charger]

Nice set up. Congrats!

thanks,
I have a Taco 015 pump in the house basement this morning that air locked on me which has me a little puzzled as the Pump is below the level of the wood boiler.  Also had a small leak from the input side of the heat exchanger in the house basement.  I Have the Central Boiler Clamp's that I just use my cordless drill to tighten them up and at first when the pex was cold I had a bunch of leaker's had the drill set to 18 on the auto clutch,  Used a heat Gun warmed up the pex and set the drill to 20-21 and retighten them and all was good.
any way I unplugged the pump for 5 min plugged it back in and I had water moving again.
just has me a little puzzled is all.
its a learning curve on this I guess.

[hedgerow]

Nice looking set up with the boiler and your wood shed. It helps a bunch to keep that wood dry. Make sure you check your bolts were your pump bolts to the flanges on your pipes that they aren't loose and pulling in air. Air locking can be a issue. I have four systems running on my Garn so I always have to watch for air locking issues. Doesn't take much air to keep these pumps from working and you can burn one up pretty quick if its air locked.  

[sublime68charger]

will double check the input flange bolts tonight. thanks for the tip


went home at lunch time and pump was air locked again.

though the taco 15 will turn it self off when its air locked so it doesn't burn it self out.

also turned the pump down to medium and tonight I think I'll set it to the low side which means its still moving water just not as fast I don't need the water to flow super fast just as long as its moving along in the pex lines it is all good.

[sublime68charger]

still having problems with that darn pump yet tonight I purged the line and still it wont keep going which is odd to me since the pump is sitting below grade of what the bottom of the boiler is at.  

Granted Water does have to go down from boiler then back up and into the house a rise of 3' but even the 3' rise into the house is below the water exit point of the boiler water will seek to level it self and the pump is still below level from the boiler water out point.

[E Yoder]

If that pump was mounted in the furnace pushing the entire loop it would work a lot better. With it pulling the loop the incoming line is in a vacuum which pulls microbubbles out of the water. They may be accumulating in that hump in the lines. 
As far as speeds go, the flow rate does matter, but that varies depending on the btu load.

[PoginyHill]

pulls microbubbles out of the water.

Centrifugal pumps need net positive suction head to work properly. With a length of pipe on the suction side of the pump, the higher the flow, the lower the pressure on the suction side and more likely to allow air in the water to escape. On larger pumps when these micro-bubbles collapse, it's cavitation - noisy and damaging. That is probably the biggest downside of OWB with atmospheric pressure compared to a pressurized boiler. Pressurized boilers can have a pump almost anywhere and generally not have problems, because air in the water doesn't escape as easily with the higher pressure.

[sublime68charger]

I changed out the pump last night from the Taco 15 which had worked fine the first 10 days and then started having problems.

also the Pump is lower than where it would have been if mounted right at the wood boiler.

to a Taco 007 and it worked all threw the night.

Where the hot water came into the house it made a 90 for 16" then another 90 then to the pump I didn't want to have to cut a hole in the floor joist and on my drive to the store to buy the Taco 007 I thought those 2 90 turn probably not doing my pump any favors so I cut the floor joist and now come straight into the house and run to the pump.

Pump is appx 2' below grade of the boiler and 90' feet away from it Lines come out of boiler and are 16" down and run to the house and then rise up to come into the house its a straight run there are 2 90 turns at the boiler before it enters the pex.  Ill get some pictures and post up my setup

when I get time

thanks to all that have replayed.

Also I gonna mount the Taco on some rubber bushing to hopefully cut down on the pump running noise.

[sublime68charger]

just a pic from the boiler point to the house the trench



 

[PoginyHill]

I think your problem is the 90 ft of tubing on the suction of the pump. The additional 2ft of "head" or height you gained by having the pump in your house is more than lost when you have any significant flow. Meaning the head loss of the water running through the tube exceeds the 2ft. Is this a 1" line or 1-1/4"? Eliminating the two elbows on the suction certainly helped, but it'll be difficult to overcome that length of tubing.

[E Yoder]

Is there a reason the pump is in the house. It's going to continue to give you problems. It needs to push.

[sublime68charger]

I thought it would be easier to check on it and such if it was in the basement where I can access it regardless of the weather but If its not gonna perform in the basement I'll move it out to the boiler and put it out there.

Next question I have is I also heat my garage and small work shop from the boiler and that Pump is located on the garage wall in Vertical at the same level it would be at if it was out at the boiler but that run is only 33' from the boiler so alot closer than the 90' away that the house is.

should I move that pump as well or will it be fine where its at?  The trench is down hill to the garage from the boiler and not near as flat of a run as what the house was.

I know most will say just move the pump but it'll be darn tight access in that side boiler access panel if I have both pumps out there.  

thanks for your thoughts and advice on this.

[E Yoder]

Both a shorter piping distance and downhill helps for sure. I'd try it as is.

[PoginyHill]

I agree with E Yoder - might as well give it a try.
Is your garage using the separate circuit from the boiler? Or is it tied into the circuit for your house?

[gspren]

I understand the theory of getting air on the suction side but I have the pumps in both the house and my "man cave" shed for over 10 years with no problems but also not quite the 90 feet your pulling, maybe 70' to the house and 30' to the shed.

[sublime68charger]

Garage is on its own circuit.

Garage from boiler 36' to garage wall,  Pump then up 8' to garage ceiling 24' across ceiling 8' down wall back into the ground 90' down hill to my small workshop 1,100 square feet

up the wall 8' to heater and then back  down into the garage up the wall to garage heater then back across the ceiling down the wall and into the ground for boiler return.

I originally had the pump on this loop in the small workshop and it didn't work down there and moved to garage wall closer to the boiler and its worked just fine since.

total pex in garage run is 36'+8+24+8+90+8+8+90+8+24+8+36=384' on this circuit there and back from the boiler. 384' of pex on the garage run if my math is correct.

Pex on the House run is 86' to House 30' in basement to Furnance
86+30+30+86= 232 of Pex on the House run.

Pics of the Boiler Run to garage/workshop.
Boiler to garage trench

<b This is the Inside wall of garage on Boiler side the Pump is located here vertical at height of the top of the car trunk 

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<b

The trench from the Garage to the small workshop.

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<b 
This is the Pex run across the garage ceiling garage is 24' wide


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<b This is the Garage Wall on the workshop side with the Heater for the garage 


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<b This is the small workshop with the heater installed and its own its own dial thermostat need to make my Electric cords a bit nicer but its working as it is. r>

 

[PoginyHill]

Thanks for the pictures. I think your experience of moving the pump from your workshop to the garage tells the story - minimize pipe run or other head loss on the suction side.

[sublime68charger]

Next question I have is I would like to put a sensor on the pipe's of my heat exchangers that would alert me if the temp drops below 150 at the heat exchangers so I would know that one of my pumps has stopped working and the water is not being circulated.  

Both the house and workshop would cool the heat exchangers pretty quick if the pumps go down and they call for heat hence me getting a alert that the temp at those heat exchangers are cooling down which means either a air lock on the pump or pump not running.

what would work?
just want to clamp sensor onto the pipe and have it send me alerts if temp drops or I can pull up said sensor and view in realtime the temperature at those locations?

Have Google Wifi wireless set up at home and that seems to work pretty good.
The Boiler I can monitor from my phone both realime data and backlog histroy as well.

get txt and email of low water temp and when to reload the fire and burn time as well on the current fire box load.

[PoginyHill]

A clamp-on thermostat/switch would do the trick - But you rapidly exceeded my knowledge regarding tying that into a real-time alert with WiFi. Hopefully someone else can provide some ideas.

[DFILER2]

For your alerts check out wirelesstag.net, they work really well are pretty simple and you can even do some charting with them.

Your pump issue is odd the 0015E have been the best thing to come along in years. It is a 3 speed, did you have it set on low? That pump will cover the 007 to almost capacity of a 009. Assuming you purged with house pressure and went each direction from your hose connection. It's the most common issue people have, air is stuck in high spots between the boiler and your pump and slowly works itself to the suction side of the circulator.

[sublime68charger]

My Boiler guy is coming on Thursday or Friday and gonna put the 015 in at the boiler for me.

Yes I had filled the lines with house water first and backfilled into the boiler.

Heck last Thursday I even filled the house lines again. Just to be sure but even then on the house water that will some times have air come threw on that when running water for long times.

The Taco 007 is going fine for now but I the Taco 015 ran fine the first week or so then started kicking out on me.  I was running on the high side then tried both medium and low and after I had Purged it was set on low.

but looking at the long run of pex to the pump I be better off having the pump at the boiler and just pushing the water for the house run

thanks for the wirelesstag.net Ill check it out.

I want to know if my water temp at the heat exchanger's drop below 150 as that mean water temp is drooping for some reason even if the Boiler is up to temp.  The Garage and workshop may not get checked every day so Id like to be able to pull up the temp on those heaters to know my water is being circulated.

[sublime68charger]

I did the rough in pex stuff and the fittings but hooking up stuff out at the boiler in tight spots I'll leave that to people who due this all the time and know how to make it fit in there.