plumbing and control ka 6 help

just got my ka 6 last weekend started assembly now time to pipe it in and get prepped for winter. ive searched multiple times trying to find out the best way to pipe my set up and im still a little cloudy as to how im going to do it. im going to have 3 zones total, house (one loop) garage radiant floor and a booster heater in the garage as well probably like a modine or something similair. now ive seen alot of primary/secondary set ups. is this necesary or can i get away with just putting the 3 pumps in parallel. as for wiring, im assuming 3 small relays (t stat controlled) that will turn on the aquastat and have 120v power going to a set of contacts to hit the pumps? thanks for help guys

Hi Paul - You can get a switching relay that can handle multiple zones, look up "Taco SR503-4" to see an example. As for the piping, you can pipe all three zones in a primary/secondary fashion, but it really isn't necessary. On my dad's system we just put the zone circulators on a normal boiler header, but the zone feeding the radiant floor was a mini primary/secondary setup...like this:



Basically there is a short loop from the circulator back to the other boiler header, with two closely spaced tees on the loop...the two tee's are the "secondary" loop that feed a second circulator and mixing valve.

There are different ways to pipe and control the boiler, some more expensive than others. The big thing is to make sure the circulators and piping are sized properly for the loads they serve.

thanks for the help rob. i like that little controller. ive been doing more homework on primary secondary piping systems would the primary loop in a primary/secondary system be able to be used as the primary loop that keystoker calls for? as seen in member "oliver power" system beautiful pipe work!! looks well planned

If you keep the primary loop short I think you could skip the bypass. Something else to keep in mind, if you pipe each zone as a primary/secondary setup you have to run at least two circulators for any heat call. Electric rates aren't going down.

very true. and the more i think about it. with really only 2 zones, i dont feel its necessary to do a primary/secondary piping set up. the idea you have should work out just fine. that 3rd zone would barely ever see any use. might not even do the modine depending on how well the radiant works.