Seasonal Heating [RE-wrenches]

James Lamb, Middle Fork Engineering j.lamb at pecorp.com
Thu Jan 30 08:38:22 PST 2003


Has anybody tried running plastic tubes connected to solar collectors
underground 2-3 feet below a slab under a living space.   to create a
seasonal heating system.
In mid-summer the solar collectors will start heating the ground under the
slab and by the end of the summer the earth including the slab would heat
up. In Fall the ground would still recieve heat from the solar collectors
and the slab would heat the living space until December January?
Has anybody done this?
If so how well has it worked.
JIM LAMB 
Middlefork Engineering

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Simko [mailto:tom at skylinesolar.com]
Sent: Thursday, January 30, 2003 9:30 AM
To: RE-wrenches at topica.com
Subject: Re: Solar Fluid Diversion [RE-wrenches]



 Allan,
Interesting info on the long term performance of the thermal valves, keeping
it simple sure applies here. My thought was that they would also complicate
the initial purging of the system, more valves, fittings etc.  For my own
summertime heat diversion of my 6 panel space heating thermal system I will
be using a MODINE hydronic heater I picked up at a yard sale recently in
like new condition for 30 bucks. During the summer I will simply reroute my
existing supply and return lines, using ball valves, that go to my radiant
floor from my 500 gallon storage tank to the fan forced heater, and an
existing timer will run the heater fan and circ pump for x amount of hours
during the night, when its cooler, and vent the resulting hot air outside my
shop. I think 3 or 4 hours a night ought to keep the storage tank at a
reasonable temperture for the summer, say 120 to 160, with no messing with
the sealed glycol loop or covering of the panels required, difficult with my
installation up 14 feet. For simple, cheap solutions to potentially complex
problems I like to use the phrase:  crude.....but primitive.
   Looking at my WIRSBO radiant floor heat product catalog the other day I
noticed they have 24 VDC motorized valve actuator's, good to know.
    

Tom Simko
Skyline Solar  


on 1/29/03 12:42 PM, Allan Sindelar at allan at positiveenergysolar.com wrote:

> Wrenches,
> On the solar thermal topic of a thermally activated diversion valve, I
> forwarded Peter Talmage's message to Bristol Stickney, a local colleague
of
> mine who has done such work for decades. His response is worth sharing. It
> follows Peter's original post below.
> Allan at Pos E
> 
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Peter Talmage" <ptalmage at yahoo.com>
>>> 
>>> Another solution to draining out solar fluid is to use
>>> a thermally activated diversion valve to allow hot
>>> fluid to cool of in a loop of baseboard hydronic
>>> elements. The valve simply sits in the return line.
>>> The amount of diversion increases as the solar
>>> intensity rises. We use these in our systems to ensure
>>> that during the warmer months or when folks leave home
>>> for 2 weeks in the summer the heat transfer fluid
>>> stays nice and "cool". Check out   www.fpevalves.com
>>> and  www.rostravernatherm.com/ThermalValve.htm.
>>> 
>>> Yours,  Peter Talmage
> 
> Hi Allan,
> This is good information, although it is not a new approach. I did not
know
> that these valve models exist, and only the installers can tell us if they
are
> reliable after at least 2 years of operation.
> 
> This approach to overheat protection is known as thermo mechanical thermal
> diversion. Back in the early 1980's, I was involved with the importers of
the
> French "Priosol" valve, which was one of the most accurate and precise
thermo
> mechanical diversion valves ever made. I personally installed dozens of
them
> in similar heat control installations. The problem is that eventually they
> always fail. The cooling port will stick open or shut. And so the question
is:
> Will the failure be noticed before it causes cascade failure to the pumps,
> valves and other components? And will the failure occur long before a
system
> designed without this valve, using some other approach?
> 
> The most reliable hydronic passive thermal diversion system may have been
the
> Zomeworks "Tide Tank". This design never failed unless the boiler fluid
leaked
> out completely below the level of the "tide tank". No parrafinnic thermal
> valve can be expected to be as chronically trouble free.
> 
> I do not know how reliable these valves are in solar applications, but I
would
> ask anyone with five years of maintenance and repair experience with these
> valves to respond. I stopped using the Priosol valve after the first two
years
> of enthusiastic promotion, because of maintenance and failure
consequences.
> 
> Bristol.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> 
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