Boiler Application

I think this is what you are looking for.

http://www.weil-mclain.com/products/display/9-SGO

I have a boiler similar to this, but with forced hot water. It works very well. They come in several btu outputs. The key is to get one large enough for you application, so you can heat and make domestic hot water at the same time. Contact a dealer, and he will figure this out for you.

Interesting.

The question being "are there any" the answer is yes. My question for you so I can really help is what is your steam pressure requirements and usage (pounds per hour). If you can use less then 15 PSI then Once again the Brick is suggesting a great boiler company. If you need higher pressures then check out Rite Boilers or Ajax Boilers they both make incline water-tube boilers that can have domestic water heating coils installed. If you have a reasonably large steam load I would look at a good stack economizer stainless steel condensing type. If your hot water needs are high and your steam loads are fairly low then look at Gas master all stainless steel Boilers to generate your domestic hot water at very high efficiencies and use that water as feed water make up for your steam boiler. This would work very well if your steam is one way steam. If your steam system has a high percentage of condensate return then I would employ a brazed plate exchange has heat recovery if possible. Please feed me more info on what going on and I will lay something out for you.

Respectfully,

Mike

You need to keep the following factors in mind:

- What % of load is your boiler running under?

- What is your steam pressure?

- How much domestic hot water are you trying to make?

- What is your total domestic hot water temperature rise?

- How will this affect your boiler emissions – will this take your boiler out of AQMD requirements?

- Will the quality (dryness) of your steam be impacted and create issues in the distribution piping and at the end-users?

Additional things to consider are "free" sources for heat transfer:

- Using a stack economizer for pre-heating.

- Using a boiler blow-down heat exchanger for additional pre-heating

- Using a flash heat recovery for more pre-heating

It may be worthwhile to have a professional steam system assessment performed by a DOE Certified SSAT specialist so they can lay out the energy savings opportunities that would positively impact the way your system operates.

I would not use a brazed plate & frame heat exchanger as mentioned by a previous post as they notoriously do not hold up in the long run in steam services. You can use a gasketed plate & frame heat exchanger; however the gasket should be rated to at least 338 deg F (equivalent to 100 psig).

Additionally, since this is domestic hot water, you will need to take special care to ensure that the water is always heated to at least 120 deg F, and not overheated where a scald condition may occur.

Good luck on finding the best solution for your needs.

Sorry to be annoyingly correct but the recommended brazed plate will work fine in the proper location in the condensate return system. That is why I asked for more info. One could guess from the request for help that this may be a less then government organization so your recommendation for "HELP" is probably out of their reach.

I feel like this is one request that we could all (or at least I) could help with if enough info was made available.

Again I ask please share more system info.

The Boiler Guy

you may take a low pressure line out of the boiler to make an outside heat exchanger to heat the water then feed it back into the boiler as a circulation.

All the above comments are good, however:

- do you have an existing boiler that will accommodate a coil?

- what temperature water do you need?

- what is the maximimum flow, and maximum gpm in an hour

- will you be operating your boiler all year-round for process? (if not, don't bother with a coil, the energy costs will be too great)

- what is your steam pressure, and are you maxed-out on your btu capacity vs load?

- the information you provided is inadequate, please paint a better picture for us so that we have something to go on

Oilguy is good. KISS only works if you know what you are doing.

In addition, I was a mechanical contractor for 31 years. I installed a multitude of systems, most of which were design-build.

I still have my hands in the fire, so-to-speak. I am a rep for 10 different boiler/tankless water heaters. We have our systems in Steak & Shake, Wendys, TGIFridays, apartment buildings, industrial & manufacturing facilities, laundromats, car washes, etc.

In a nutshell:

You need the least expensive, most efficient, longest lasting device that will meet your present and future needs, while providing that there will be little downtime and inexpensive maintenance.

To assist you,I would need more info.

Welcome fellow field guy. You are on the button.

I know someone looking for an engineer to size a boiler system to replace several hot water heaters in an apartment building.

I guess you would need to establish BTU requirement through heat loss calculation.

Out of (16) units, I would guess that no more than (8) units would be used simultaneously.

No sure if dishwater or shower would more demanding.

If you can provide some assistance, please contact me and I will pass your name along to the interested party.

Hi, bmeiring!

First of all, welcome to the amazing world of CR4. As you have already seen, this is a great place to discuss all kinds of interests. I'm sure you've already found it can be both rewarding and enjoyable.

Vis-a-vis your inquiry, I begin by admitting I have no knowledge of internal domestic water heat exchange systems for steam heating boilers. So I bow to the expertise of the bloggers whose responses I have seen in other forums, and respect.

But what occurred to me was the question, "Why are you trying to put the heat exchanger inside the boiler?" I don't know the temperature control mechanisms for such an arrangement, but for domestic hot water, they'd better be able to regulate the temps to be kind to humans.

In my experience, external heat exchangers are easily regulated for throughput temperature control. Heck, even an insulated coil wrapped around the boiler or short-run condensate lines would SEEM TO be easier to control, temperature wise, than an internal one.

So, I'm using your blog to help educate myself in this area. What kind of regulator mechanism is used for an internal steam heating boiler heat exchanger for domestic hot water? And when more hot water is required, how is that offset by a greater steam production via the burners? Please educate me. Slowly. Pretend you're explaining it to MarkTheHandyman. ^{_{Whoops! I am MarkTheHandyman! Oh well...}}

Mark

I see we have a little over-think going on here, ( I love over- think ). My Weil McLain forced hot water, for heat, with internal tankless domestic hot water unit, works just fine. They sell a similar unit for steam heat. By code, there is a cold water external bypass adjustable valve to limit the hot water temp. This is a good system as it will heat your house, and you have unlimited hot water. The boiler, with installation, cost me about 3 large, (the baseboards were already in place). Again, contact a dealer to calculate the size you need, and hire a professional to install it.