Have you gone this route? What do you think?
We’re gonna do a low cost, low end home for a client, and heat it with an oilfired or LP-fired budget boiler, doing hot water baseboard units and hot water toekick units in the kitchen and one of the two baths.
We have a quite competetent plumber, but he’s gonna moonlight for us, giving us a couple hours in evenings over the long-daylight time next June and July when we’re ready for the install. The purpose of the shop-made kit is to save time, and since he can only give us 12 to 15 hours weekly, we want to shortcut the work.
We’ve a good supplier who will engineer the whole package for us, sell us the whole kit from boiler to PEX to T-stats, and including the “boxed” package.
Replies
Just out of curiosity, define "boxed".
If you have to assemble the pieces, what is different?
I know that in England, you can phone the wholesaler in the morning, tell them you have 8 rooms, what size of panel rads you need, what boiler you want, and in the afternoon the complete package will be on a skid waiting for you.
Engineered, fabricated, assembled, and board-mounted, ready to mount to a wall or frame. Manifolds, controls, etc.
Like this, less the electric boiler.
View Image
Edited 12/21/2006 11:27 pm ET by Gene_Davis
Priced it out yet?
Not yet. What should we expect?
The equipment package, of all fittings, clips, and everything including boiler, stack through the roof, PEX, yadda, yadda, yadda, might be running into the low four figures. We'll see.
Gene,I did this in my own home. 5 zone radiant with a sealed combustion propane boiler. There's no downside that I can see. I installed the boiler first so I had exact measurements as far as the space left on the wall and positions of the inlets and outlets on the boiler, then I pre-built everything else on a piece of 3/4" painted plywood. The planning and layout was much easier working on a bench in my shop. When I was done I carried to the basement, bolted it to the wall and fired it up.Jerry
I see:
Too many circs on that panel to do the work! Parasitic energy losses loom large.
Circs are incorrectly orientated. Those wiring junction boxes are supposed to be on the top, not the bottom.
IFC circs would have eliminated the flow-checks & saved $$$
Why all the telestats???
The auto-feed vlv is tied in at the wrong spot & should be connected at the point of no pressure change.
Power wiring is plain-jane romex. Not code compliant in many areas for mechanical systems.
That's a panel designed to deliver four separate temps, which is overly complicated for the project described.
LL a gas-fired tankless WH? With so many micro-zones attached, it will be short-cycling like a mother & die an early death. Utilizing a tankless WH in any hydronic application can violate the mfgr's warranty. Make sure that's an approved application by that specific tankless mfgr or you'll be holding the liability bag all by yourself.
A solid example of why hiring a certified and well-trained hydronics contractor can and will save money for both you and the client(s). Now and on into the future as they will end up paying much more for delivered comfort as unseen parasitic energy losses steal their $$$.
Boiler room in a box concept is great when the correct panel is matched to the design and its application.
i.e. what you're saying is... don't hire the same company to fab his installation?? ;)
That pic was just a clip to show an example. The places we are talking to do much better work, and customize the config and gear to the design of the whole system.
Gene, What you are describing is so basically simple that I really can't imagine what you are going to gain by having anything preassembled, especially if there is an added cost to the project.
I would have them give you a component list and have your installer approve it and then just make sure all of the parts are there when he needs them.