On My Way...

...to even less oil usage!

Hilkoil hot water loop just installed!

Makes you a little nervous to cut holes in the side of a perfectly good stove like that.

Looks good!

Just too bad you bought it from those crooks. I got ripped by them pretty bad. Just make sure you remove it & clean it good at the end of the season, no matter what they tell you. They don't honor their "lifetime" warranty.

This is what happens when you don't remove & clean them, if there's any humidity in your stove's location: They also charged me $14 for a drill bit that lasted all of 30 seconds through the first hole. I went out & bought a DeWalt replacement, & it still had paint after drilling the last hole. CROOKS!

Hilkoil bit after 30 seconds: Dewalt bit after finishing one hole, then drilling 3 new holes:

Do this things work? I know the Mk II and Mk III had optional DHW kits but I thought they mounted in the exhaust, not right over the fire box.

I've been trying to figure out how to rig something like this in my Mk I because my water heater is on the other side of the wall from where my stove is. The run would be short and direct.

I still have to run the oil burner for water but something like this would really help out.

My plan was to get an Amtrol Boiler Mate and run either the oil or coal through that.

Firemanz84 wrote:Makes you a little nervous to cut holes in the side of a perfectly good stove like that.

I was pretty nervous when I installed my coil. I double, triple, and quadruple checked my measurments. NOT the time to make a mistake.

jpete wrote:Do this things work?

They work well in the right circustances. It all depends on your water usage, outside temps and how hard your stove runs. If you have a lot of water use, it's not going to work as well. We have three in our house and water use is scattered throughout the day. Our 8yr. old takes a bath at about 7am, wife showers at approx. 10am and I shower after work at about 11:30pm. It takes some time for the water temp to recover but if usage is scattered it does quite well.
In the fall and spring cuts down on the run time of the NG tank and in the dead of winter the tank rarely even fires except to maintain temps during long periods of non use. If I were to install a circulator between the tanks, it would probably not fire at all.
The only part of this that I don't like is that in the winter my NG use is so low that I pay more for the supply and delivery charge than I do for the NG itself.

My $100 Craigslist Amtrol Model TD-7P Top Down Indirect Water Heater

Picked up this morning. Getting closer!

Beware of buzzing smart controllers?? LOL.

coalnewbie wrote:Beware of buzzing smart controllers?? LOL.

I have read about those going bad on the boilermates...hopefully it won't screw up an put out the fire

I think I am going to hook 24v up to it so I can monitor the temperature tho

http://www.doityourself.com/forum/water-heaters/3 ... lem.html#b

What I am suggesting is you test b4 you install. I would not like you to burn sensitive parts. Read the posts.

Finally finished the install of the indirect fired water heater. The first test was beyond my expectations The thermosyphon was working immediately the top outlet of the heating coil warmed very quickly while the bottom inlet of the coil was cold well water temperature. Within an hour of going live two showers were taken and the oil burner never kicked in. It heated up overnight and the inlet and the outlet were hot, probably about the same temperature. Two morning showers were again taken. I watched the system while the first shower was taken, within a few minutes the bottom inlet was cold again as cold well water replaced the hot water, the temp gauge dropped. As soon as the shower was shut off, I could see the temp rising already. The oil burner never kicked in...

I took the next shower and although I didn't watch it, I again went down to feel the pipes and check the gauge. Again, it did the same.

This morning everything was hot about 180f, but unfortunately developed two leaks in two different unions that I put in place in case I needed to remove part of the system in a hurry. I had to dump 40 gallons of hot water and start over. While I was refilling the tank after replacing the unions with straight couplings, a shower was taken and the oil burner kicked in ...but it did show the new system was working.

First I mounted the new water heater about the stove water coil.
I broke the Indirect Water Heater #1 cold water supply and added the 3 quarter turn valves.
Supply directed back to the Water Heater #2
Removed the existing drain off WH#2, added a new tee/drain valve and then connected it to the supply (inlet) of the water coil with a slight downhill slope.
Plumbed the outlet coil to the top of the hot water "out" with a tee and two (redundant) pressure/temperature valves.
The tee then went to another tee with a air vent and then out to WH#1 cold water supply.

The only time I hurt myself was this morning when I was fixing the leaks when I reached around the supply line...branding my bicep Need some hi temp pipe insulation...