aspkiller
New Member
I sure could use some condensing/non-condensing help before I replace my 18 year old gas combi boiler. Hopefully, some of you can offer some insight. Here are some of the facts:
The house is located in the Lake Tahoe basin at 6,300 feet. It is 2,700 sq. ft. on three levels, reasonably well built and insulated and is 18 years old.
Current system is a Trianco Heatmaker HW-M2-130. (130k In / 110k out = 84% AFUE). It has a built in 20 gal. tank with a double wall heat exchanger (required by code). There is a total of
100 linear feet of 3/4†Copper /Aluminum baseboard radiators. There are three zones, one for each floor. The top floor has 40 l/f for kitchen, dining, living (high ceilings and most windows), the mid floor has 28 l/f for the MBR and bath, while the bottom floor has 34 l/f for the secondary bedrooms and laundry (which has the combi boiler, etc.).
The system supplies DHW at the constant rate of 130 gph of 100 degree rise and the intermittent rate of 6.8 gpm of 60 degree rise. It has been quite sufficient to date. However, the house is
rarely used in the dead of winter and then only by one or two people with minimum DHW requirements.
Dec to Feb temperatures average 41 hi and 15 low and the mean temp for the six winter months is 32 degrees. Additionally, we keep the house at 55 degrees when we aren’t there in the
winter. A freeze alarm calls us when there is a problem. But, I would like to go back to the days when we didn’t get those calls.
Over the past couple of years, little nagging problems have begun to surface, suggesting that it might be time for a replacement. Were it not for the double wall DHW exchanger requirement, I
would probably have opted for the Laars Endurance with DHW. But conforming to that requirement probably means going with boiler and an indirect double wall exchanger storage tank.
Which leaves me with several questions:
If I go with the indirect storage tank, will a mod-con boiler really be of any great advantage in our situation. Cost is secondary to reliability, as we really don’t like having service people in the
house when we aren’t there.
Should I split the system and go with a separate water heater that can be shut down or put into a winter mode? If so, then what type of boiler and HW heater would be best?
Thanks for any and all advise offered
The house is located in the Lake Tahoe basin at 6,300 feet. It is 2,700 sq. ft. on three levels, reasonably well built and insulated and is 18 years old.
Current system is a Trianco Heatmaker HW-M2-130. (130k In / 110k out = 84% AFUE). It has a built in 20 gal. tank with a double wall heat exchanger (required by code). There is a total of
100 linear feet of 3/4†Copper /Aluminum baseboard radiators. There are three zones, one for each floor. The top floor has 40 l/f for kitchen, dining, living (high ceilings and most windows), the mid floor has 28 l/f for the MBR and bath, while the bottom floor has 34 l/f for the secondary bedrooms and laundry (which has the combi boiler, etc.).
The system supplies DHW at the constant rate of 130 gph of 100 degree rise and the intermittent rate of 6.8 gpm of 60 degree rise. It has been quite sufficient to date. However, the house is
rarely used in the dead of winter and then only by one or two people with minimum DHW requirements.
Dec to Feb temperatures average 41 hi and 15 low and the mean temp for the six winter months is 32 degrees. Additionally, we keep the house at 55 degrees when we aren’t there in the
winter. A freeze alarm calls us when there is a problem. But, I would like to go back to the days when we didn’t get those calls.
Over the past couple of years, little nagging problems have begun to surface, suggesting that it might be time for a replacement. Were it not for the double wall DHW exchanger requirement, I
would probably have opted for the Laars Endurance with DHW. But conforming to that requirement probably means going with boiler and an indirect double wall exchanger storage tank.
Which leaves me with several questions:
If I go with the indirect storage tank, will a mod-con boiler really be of any great advantage in our situation. Cost is secondary to reliability, as we really don’t like having service people in the
house when we aren’t there.
Should I split the system and go with a separate water heater that can be shut down or put into a winter mode? If so, then what type of boiler and HW heater would be best?
Thanks for any and all advise offered