OWB Performance Loss

[Biglurr54]

I have a Woodmaster 4400 and i have noticed that its preformance is dropping. The boiler could keep up with heating the house no problem to about -10 degrees then it would have a hard time recovering when the thermostat is turned up. This has been the case for the last 4 years. This year it does not seem to be able to bring the house up to temp when it is in the low teens outside. Nothing has changed this year compared to previous years other than our house he been more and more insulated. I am suspecting that the w to w plate heat exchange is plugging up. I use well water for fill ups and treat with woodmaster treatment each spring. The owb is holding temperature no problem. I would like to clean the plate exchanger but have to cut it out as there is no tee on the pex lines. I may cut the pex and put in tees with a valves so i can easily clean the exchanger in the future. Do i need to clean the oil burner side of the exchanger? I have done nothing with the water on that side ever. Could it be another problem? I believe the circ pump is about 10 years old. Its a taco 011. Could that be getting tired and slowing the amount of hot water to the oil boiler?

 

[NSMaple1]

Might get a better idea if you can accurately measure the temps at all ins and outs of the hx.

 

[abner]

Had a similar problem with my Hardy a few years back. Water temp held fine but just couldn't warm the house. It kept feeling like cooler air coming out of the floor registers. I had remembered when it was new you couldn't put your feet on the registers because they were hot. It almost felt like I had an 80's heat pump blowing cool air.
Finally after checking everything I crawled under the house and took the heat exchanger out of my trunk line. It is app. 18 x 18 x 6" thick. Where the air goes in it was stopped up with very fine dust. I basically took a hair brush and raked out the dust. Reinstalled and working like a champ. I now pull every 2-3 years and clean. Even though the exchanger is only app 6 feet from the return filter I guess over years the fine particles coming thru the filter eventually stopped it up. Hope this story is of use to someone.
Good luck!

 

[hupte]

Had a similar problem with my Hardy a few years back. Water temp held fine but just couldn't warm the house. It kept feeling like cooler air coming out of the floor registers. I had remembered when it was new you couldn't put your feet on the registers because they were hot. It almost felt like I had an 80's heat pump blowing cool air.
Finally after checking everything I crawled under the house and took the heat exchanger out of my trunk line. It is app. 18 x 18 x 6" thick. Where the air goes in it was stopped up with very fine dust. I basically took a hair brush and raked out the dust. Reinstalled and working like a champ. I now pull every 2-3 years and clean. Even though the exchanger is only app 6 feet from the return filter I guess over years the fine particles coming thru the filter eventually stopped it up. Hope this story is of use to someone.
Good luck!

wow. good find!! thats handy info to have.

 

[hupte]

I have a Woodmaster 4400 and i have noticed that its preformance is dropping. The boiler could keep up with heating the house no problem to about -10 degrees then it would have a hard time recovering when the thermostat is turned up. This has been the case for the last 4 years. This year it does not seem to be able to bring the house up to temp when it is in the low teens outside. Nothing has changed this year compared to previous years other than our house he been more and more insulated. I am suspecting that the w to w plate heat exchange is plugging up. I use well water for fill ups and treat with woodmaster treatment each spring. The owb is holding temperature no problem. I would like to clean the plate exchanger but have to cut it out as there is no tee on the pex lines. I may cut the pex and put in tees with a valves so i can easily clean the exchanger in the future. Do i need to clean the oil burner side of the exchanger? I have done nothing with the water on that side ever. Could it be another problem? I believe the circ pump is about 10 years old. Its a taco 011. Could that be getting tired and slowing the amount of hot water to the oil boiler?

is there any chance the underground lines have a leak? like ground water leaking into the heating lines? an easy way to tell is if snow is melting where the lines are buried.

 

[JCMC]

Had a similar problem a few years ago boiler was up to temperature but no heat from registers. Could hear Circulator pump running. When I took the Taco 007 circulator apart there where no fins left on the impeller It had deteriorated I replaced the circulator and everything was gooder again.

 

[tawilson]

Might get a better idea if you can accurately measure the temps at all ins and outs of the hx.

Yep. $30 or so at HF or LOWES will get an infrared thermometer. Mine gets used all the time.

 

[NSMaple1]

Yep. $30 or so at HF or LOWES will get an infrared thermometer. Mine gets used all the time.

Yep those can be handy.

Hint for first time users - they don't work good on shiny surfaces. Including copper. A big spot of BBQ paint where you want to measure soon fixes that.

 

[Del_]

is there any chance the underground lines have a leak? like ground water leaking into the heating lines? an easy way to tell is if snow is melting where the lines are buried.

I was thinking maybe underground line insulation degradation and resulting heat loss.

 

[tawilson]

Cutting in some tees and valves either side of the hx is a good idea for a couple reasons. Cleaning is one, bleeding air out is the other. Depending on how it's installed, you may have some air in it.

 

[StihlKicking]

Sounds like you need to clean your heat exchanger to me, they get dirtier than you would think. If that doesn't work I would bet on a problem with your ground lines.

 

[Biglurr54]

The lines are not insulated well. There has always been a path of melted snow to the boiler. I have been taking readings at the owb line in and Line out but not across the oil boiler side. I may take apart the circa and inspect the props. Who knows how old the ones on the oil boiler are.

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[StihlKicking]

Your burning a lot of wood heating the ground then. I would redo the pipes if it were me. This is what the manufacturer of my OWB recommends and it is the best/cheapest way I have found. Put all 4 pex pipes inside a insulated sleeve then pull the whole thing through a water tight 4" pvc pipe. Bury the pipe below the freeze line. This provides very good DRY insulation for about $4.20/ft. I would also clean the heat exchanger. We cleaned my father in laws last year and it cut his wood usage by about 35%. I have never heard of the pumps getting weak, they usually either work or don't.

 

[Biglurr54]

Your burning a lot of wood heating the ground then. I would redo the pipes if it were me. This is what the manufacturer of my OWB recommends and it is the best/cheapest way I have found. Put all 4 pex pipes inside a insulated sleeve then pull the whole thing through a water tight 4" pvc pipe. Bury the pipe below the freeze line. This provides very good DRY insulation for about $4.20/ft. I would also clean the heat exchanger. We cleaned my father in laws last year and it cut his wood usage by about 35%. I have never heard of the pumps getting weak, they usually either work or don't.

It's 135 feet of trench to dig by hand and a pretty big expense to replace. I will hopefully do it someday as it kills me to see the snow melted in a path to the boiler. But that day will have to wait. It's a lot easier to burn some extra wood. When you clean out your exchanger do you clean the oil boiler side too or just the owb side?

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[Oldman47]

Call the guy local to you with excavation equipment. I bet the bill to do the excavating will be cheaper than you think. I ran some electrical conduit in a trench last fall and was surprised at how little it cost me. Of course I let him choose the timing so he could come by after his day job and run the trench then come by after work the next day and refill it. He got a couple of hundred bucks and I made out just fine too.

 

[StihlKicking]

Clean both, dust, dirt and grime are likely built up all the way across the thing. We use a mild degreaser and high pressure water to clean ours.

 

[Biglurr54]

I've never touched the oil boiler side of things. I have no problem working on the owb side but the oil side scares me because the system will have to be drained and refilled in order to flush that side.

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[StihlKicking]

FYI the trench for the 4" pipe and lines can be easily accomplished in about 30 minutes with a walk behind ditch witch trencher. I rented one for the day for about $75. How deep is the frost line where you live?

 

[StihlKicking]

Will the boiler get up to temp using oil?

 

[Biglurr54]

The oil boiler flucuates from 130 to 160 degrees. I haven't got it going on oil in a while.

I am in the market for a tractor that I can put a 3pt backhoe on so I have been waiting for that to dig the trench. The frost here is about 4 feet.

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