Plumbers and my OWB

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cantoo

cantoo

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It doesn't work here due to my soil conditions but lots of people do use the foam wrapped and have good results. And lots of people use it and have poor results. I think you need to do a bit more research and then supervise what they do. If you end up burning twice the amount of wood then your relative might decide he is already in good enough shape and you will be running the saw.
If you have the right conditions and do a good job the wrapped lines will work for you. Need good draining soil, good quality plastic tile for the lines and enough wraps on the lines. Wet area will not work. 1 pinhole in the tile and you will flood the lines in no time. Wet lines mean huge heat loss.
 
NSMaple1

NSMaple1

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It doesn't work here due to my soil conditions but lots of people do use the foam wrapped and have good results. And lots of people use it and have poor results. I think you need to do a bit more research and then supervise what they do. If you end up burning twice the amount of wood then your relative might decide he is already in good enough shape and you will be running the saw.
If you have the right conditions and do a good job the wrapped lines will work for you. Need good draining soil, good quality plastic tile for the lines and enough wraps on the lines. Wet area will not work. 1 pinhole in the tile and you will flood the lines in no time. Wet lines mean huge heat loss.

IMO if people have had decent luck with wrapped lines, they are lucky. That stuff is a wick, and even with well draining soil, all the rain that falls still has to seep down through the soil passing the lines on the way. Would be too big of a roll of the dice for me.

Also on spraying in place - I don't think you'd even need to have the pex inside another tube or piping. Just the pex then the foam then the dirt.

There is a very decent thread on this very thing, at another place. Linking that here is illegal I think, but it's at earth. With a H in front.
 
Wayned24

Wayned24

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New Marshfield, Ohio
UPDATE: Plumbers came out yesterday to look at the lines. They've agreed to take the old lines out and install the correct PEX while they eat the cost of labor. The only thing I'll have to pay for is the cost difference on the PEX. The insulation still won't be there, but I'll just be happy to have the right lines in. I understand I'll lose some heat, but hopefully it won't be too bad since the lines are buried fairly deep (about 42").
 
panolo

panolo

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Central MN
I'm with NSMaple here. If you mean completely non insulated your making a mistake and now is the time to correct it. Even if you want to go cheap you can run it through tile and have it spray foamed. Would be 10000x better than just laying bare in the ground.
 
Stihl310

Stihl310

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UPDATE: Plumbers came out yesterday to look at the lines. They've agreed to take the old lines out and install the correct PEX while they eat the cost of labor. The only thing I'll have to pay for is the cost difference on the PEX. The insulation still won't be there, but I'll just be happy to have the right lines in. I understand I'll lose some heat, but hopefully it won't be too bad since the lines are buried fairly deep (about 42").

Seriously, please don’t do this. You’ll be far more ahead to heat with natural gas. All the work you’re putting into cutting wood and massive amounts of heat are going right into the dirt.

Buy the thermopex and save yourself years of headaches and wasted energy.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
cre73

cre73

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I will also encourage you not to go this route. My friend tried this with a 50ft run to his shop. Huge amount of heat loss, muddy ground, tons of wood. That was buried a full 48”. Two years later we finally buried in insulated lines. Good heat cut his wood usage by over 50%.
 
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