My Winter Coal Burning Formula for 2014 (Blaschak)

 
imcloud1
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Post by imcloud1 » Wed. Dec. 11, 2013 9:18 pm

2600 sq ft of glass walls sounds fun, what do you spend on windex? When we were building my house, my wife wanted glass glass glass, and now we have 6 sliders {one off the kitchen one off the dining room, two off of the parlor, ect ect ect} and now she complains constantly about finger prints and the dog print {my hunting dogs love to press their noses to the glass, lol}. Our house is 4600 sq ft above ground and I heat it with 4 tons a year {fingers crossed, lol}, so far this season I just broke into my second ton tonight, so we burnt 1 ton already and I only fired it up a couple months ago {maybe 10 weeks}...


 
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Post by kstills » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 12:13 pm

Alrighty, after three years I finally figured out that I could measure my hopper and figure out my pounds per inch of coal. That allows me to figure out how much I'm burning per given time period.

Real genius stuff, right there.....

Based on DHW calculations, I'm using about 10.5lbs of coal per day. As cold as it's been, there is very little down time on the boiler, so figure another 1-2lbs there. My usage, preliminarily, looks to be about 1.39lbs of coal per degree day of heating. I'll get more accurate numbers as I get more data back.

Works out to about 500dollars of coal to heat the DHW per year.

Per the calc on the other page, I would be paying 1130 electric for DHW.

 
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Carbon12
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Post by Carbon12 » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 12:25 pm

Wish I was only burning that much :mad: I'll be happy if I can get it down to 2.0 pounds/DD. The spousal unit doesn't want any curtains on most of the windows. That works great when the sun is shinning in those walls of glass but not so much after dark. I think thermal window curtains of some sort might make a noticeable difference. Who knew window treatments were so freakin' expensive,....nice ones anyway. Since the finished basement doesn't really get used much I'm thinking of getting some sheets of foam insulation and attaching them to the 2 sets of sliding patio doors. Ugly, yes, but you can feel the heat loss when you walk by them now.

 
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lsayre
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Post by lsayre » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 12:40 pm

Years ago I recall seeing (in a magazine, 'Mother Earth News' perhaps?) an arrangement whereby tiny insulation beads were blown in between the two panes of glass in a homes windows for times when it was dark or there was no sunshine, or alternately to keep the suns warmth out during the heat of a summer day. The beads were then poured out (or was it vacuumed out?) from between the panes to let in the warmth of the sun. It was a concept house project.

 
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Post by kstills » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 1:12 pm

I made plugs for my basement windows this winter, and the difference down there is noticable (it's unfinished, but there's zero air movement now).

I'm thinking that there has to be a way to fabricate plugs for some of the upstairs windows also. I have 26 window in a 1500 square foot 2 story house, so getting rid of half of them in the winter time would save me a buttload of heating costs.

 
imcloud1
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Post by imcloud1 » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 1:16 pm

kstills wrote:Alrighty, after three years I finally figured out that I could measure my hopper and figure out my pounds per inch of coal. That allows me to figure out how much I'm burning per given time period.

Real genius stuff, right there.....

Based on DHW calculations, I'm using about 10.5lbs of coal per day. As cold as it's been, there is very little down time on the boiler, so figure another 1-2lbs there. My usage, preliminarily, looks to be about 1.39lbs of coal per degree day of heating. I'll get more accurate numbers as I get more data back.

Works out to about 500dollars of coal to heat the DHW per year.

Per the calc on the other page, I would be paying 1130 electric for DHW.
WOW, that is incredible, you are heating and getting dhw for what dhw costs me!!! What are the conditions, I see you are in pa, what size house, how old, and what do you set your inside temp to? I heat a detached garage to 50 that is well insulated and it costs me $1200 a year in oil, lol....

 
imcloud1
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Post by imcloud1 » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 1:23 pm

lsayre wrote:Years ago I recall seeing (in a magazine, 'Mother Earth News' perhaps?) an arrangement whereby tiny insulation beads were blown in between the two panes of glass in a homes windows for times when it was dark or there was no sunshine, or alternately to keep the suns warmth out during the heat of a summer day. The beads were then poured out (or was it vacuumed out?) from between the panes to let in the warmth of the sun. It was a concept house project.
its called beadwall, I seen a green house with it, works pretty well... http://www.commonwealthsolar.com/cwbead.htm


they can be set on timers like thermostats and fill and empty your windows at your will.... pretty cool stuff, not sure how economical it is, if they pass local building codes, and if they work for long periods of time, I would be worried about vac failure, moisture issues, ect...


 
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Post by kstills » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 2:49 pm

imcloud1 wrote:
kstills wrote:Alrighty, after three years I finally figured out that I could measure my hopper and figure out my pounds per inch of coal. That allows me to figure out how much I'm burning per given time period.

Real genius stuff, right there.....

Based on DHW calculations, I'm using about 10.5lbs of coal per day. As cold as it's been, there is very little down time on the boiler, so figure another 1-2lbs there. My usage, preliminarily, looks to be about 1.39lbs of coal per degree day of heating. I'll get more accurate numbers as I get more data back.

Works out to about 500dollars of coal to heat the DHW per year.

Per the calc on the other page, I would be paying 1130 electric for DHW.
WOW, that is incredible, you are heating and getting dhw for what dhw costs me!!! What are the conditions, I see you are in pa, what size house, how old, and what do you set your inside temp to? I heat a detached garage to 50 that is well insulated and it costs me $1200 a year in oil, lol....
Doh, I just realized what you're thinking. It's 10.5 lbs of coal for DHW, then add in the 1.39lbs per degree day. So yesterday, when there was a 43.5DD, I used ~72lbs of coal.

Yeah, 10.5 per day would be great..... :lol:

 
imcloud1
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Post by imcloud1 » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 4:28 pm

OK, I got it now, Im a little slow, lol....

 
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Carbon12
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Post by Carbon12 » Thu. Dec. 12, 2013 5:31 pm

If I can make it until 9:30 tonight on what's left in the hopper, I will be at 2.02 pounds/DD for the previous 24 hrs! WooHoo! I did some tweaking with the feed rate, air and aqua stat settings. Don't know if the settings will hold throughout all DD ranges but it's looking like 39 DD for the past 24 hrs as per my weather station. I'll take it :D

 
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Post by kstills » Fri. Dec. 13, 2013 7:30 am

2 day totals: 134 total lbs of coal used, which adds up to 1.51lbs coal per DD heating. Assuming that I actually use 10.5lbs per day for DHW an ~2lbs for idle, that yields 1lb coal per dd.

Which sounds really really low to me.

I'm actually running the primary line through the indirect hot water tank, so my DHW requirements are probably not accurate.

Main floor is 71 degrees, with one room ~68 degrees. Upstairs hallway and bathroom between 65-67, and bedrooms 62-65.

 
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lsayre
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Post by lsayre » Fri. Dec. 13, 2013 10:52 am

kstills wrote:2 day totals: 134 total lbs of coal used, which adds up to 1.51lbs coal per DD heating. Assuming that I actually use 10.5lbs per day for DHW an ~2lbs for idle, that yields 1lb coal per dd.

Which sounds really really low to me.

I'm actually running the primary line through the indirect hot water tank, so my DHW requirements are probably not accurate.

Main floor is 71 degrees, with one room ~68 degrees. Upstairs hallway and bathroom between 65-67, and bedrooms 62-65.
I wouldn't try to factor out anything for idling consumption. Are you really using 10.5 lbs. of coal perday for DHW alone? I figure the average family uses about 6 lbs. of coal for daily DHW.

 
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Post by kstills » Fri. Dec. 13, 2013 11:36 am

lsayre wrote:
kstills wrote:2 day totals: 134 total lbs of coal used, which adds up to 1.51lbs coal per DD heating. Assuming that I actually use 10.5lbs per day for DHW an ~2lbs for idle, that yields 1lb coal per dd.

Which sounds really really low to me.

I'm actually running the primary line through the indirect hot water tank, so my DHW requirements are probably not accurate.

Main floor is 71 degrees, with one room ~68 degrees. Upstairs hallway and bathroom between 65-67, and bedrooms 62-65.
I wouldn't try to factor out anything for idling consumption. Are you really using 10.5 lbs. of coal perday for DHW alone? I figure the average family uses about 6 lbs. of coal for daily DHW.
Well, over the summer I got about 14 days out of 200lbs, running DHW and idling. Based on the BTU consumption per person you listed, with 6 folks under the roof, I'm going with 10.5lbs per day. I would expect my winter time idle to be much less than my summer time, so if I'm idling 4lbs in the summer, I factored in 2 lbs in the winter.

My coal consumption indicates a heat loss at ~20deg of 27250btu per hour, which sounds absurd to me for a brick house with 26 windows that was built in the 1920's. It has been insulated, but still.....

I'm recording daily usage now, so I'll update once a week (because it's fun to compare :) ) and see how much it flucuates.

The last two days have been the coldest I've seen here since this boiler was installed.

 
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lsayre
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Post by lsayre » Fri. Dec. 13, 2013 3:04 pm

kstills wrote:My coal consumption indicates a heat loss at ~20deg of 27250btu per hour, which sounds absurd to me for a brick house with 26 windows that was built in the 1920's. It has been insulated, but still.....
27,000 BTU's per hour to heat your home under the current weather conditions sounds very mainstream realistic to me.

If you are still using only 27,000 BTU's per hour when it hits -20 degrees outside, that would shock me.

 
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Post by kstills » Fri. Dec. 13, 2013 3:37 pm

lsayre wrote:
kstills wrote:My coal consumption indicates a heat loss at ~20deg of 27250btu per hour, which sounds absurd to me for a brick house with 26 windows that was built in the 1920's. It has been insulated, but still.....
27,000 BTU's per hour to heat your home under the current weather conditions sounds very mainstream realistic to me.

If you are still using only 27,000 BTU's per hour when it hits -20 degrees outside, that would shock me.
I guess the issue I have is when I run the heat loss calculator, admittedly a very imprecise tool, I have to input a very high level of insulation in order to reach 27k per hour heat loss at 20f. I just don't my house has that much going for insulation wise, but then again I've only been charting coal use accurately for 2 days now, so maybe it all makes more sense after a month of doing this.


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