Solar Thermal Install

[Onoff]

Just putting it out there...

If I were to build a wooden pergola, directly outside these French windows I could mount the 3 solar thermal panels on that.

It would allow me to not touch the hip end for if and when I convert to a gable.

Furthermore if I made it wide enough I could use as a "scaffold" to stand on if I ever do do the gable.

Downside is I'd lose some solar gain through the French windows as the panels would act as a brise soleil. With low winter Sun I should still get some though.

Thoughts welcome as ever!

Cheers

 

[Onoff]

Thinking mounting the panels like this on a pergola.

Saying that...are solar thermal panels "kept warm" by being sat against a tiled roof?

Thinking if mounted in "free air", on a pergola type frame, then losses will be higher. This aside from the pipe run to the tank having to increase in distance.

 

[gaz1]

you have a garage roof is it clear of trees for them to be used there ?

as ive seen your other pics

a garage rear view roof can be changed into an apex to give you more solar space

it can also be extended as well to include a room for charging and also used for a boiler room

 

[Onoff]

you have a garage roof is it clear of trees for them to be used there ?

as ive seen your other pics

a garage rear view roof can be changed into an apex to give you more solar space

it can also be extended as well to include a room for charging and also used for a boiler room

Garage roof is clear but to site the boiler etc there would mean a run of insulated, underground pipe work. No?

Garage shown to the left:

 

[gaz1]

yes

but it means advantages that you have a boiler room fitted out with 4 cylinder tanks thats easy access to maintain instead of trying to find room in a house where there is none

any time it fails in its lifetime the house dosnt get the mess but the boiler room does

piping underground pipes is easy nowadays and its nominal losses between the house and garage in your case

also solar electricity can be used

 

[JimmyS]

You could stick them on pergola I suppose. Need to lag pipes back to HWC in something like armaflex class 0 insulation. Would fill loop with Glycol.

 

[JimmyS]

For below ground pipe you would be better installing it in copper with armaflex I'd recon as the solar can get very hot. It can be over 100 deg C. I installed vacuum tubes on roof of last house. Surprising how hot they can get. Seen the grey pipe lagging melt and fall off the pipes in past as well.

 

[gaz1]

ive dug @brewdexta post out for you

having an external boiler room is handy

Pellet stove for the workshop?

It's coming up to the time I have to winterise the workshop by smearing the lathe and mills with thick oil to stop condensation. No point using a dehumidifier as I would be dehumidifying Yorkshire, the workshop is too big and its not completely air tight. The workshop has heaps of insulation...

www.mig-welding.co.uk

other info

Solar PV, hot water, combi boilers and storage heaters

This is a question for the plumbers and electricians on here. I have 3.8kw of pv, conneted via a gizmo that diverts power that would otherwise be exported to my immersion heater. Our boiler is a conventional one, the system works really well, the water is piping hot by midday. I would really...

www.mig-welding.co.uk

 

[Trevorleach]

Been up 8 years now

 

[Mikes]

Have you looked at the potential output from those solar panels? Unless you have a large steady usage for your domestic hot water, you rapidly heat the cylinder and then have problems with the panel circuit overheating which frequently will be enough for a safety valve to lift and dump some of the fluid. Those evacuated tubes are very prone to exploding if hit so make sure they are located where tree branches etc can't drop on them.
Unless you really have a high hot water demand, then personally I would ditch the solar hot water and instal PVs. Use either battery storage if you have space to benefit from the load and use immersion heaters to heat your hot water. No chance of overheating the water and a 'useable' free energy at all times. Win win in my book. just initial cost.

 

[Onoff]

Been up 8 years now

View attachment 335364View attachment 335365

This is what I need, real world experience of solar thermal.

Can you give some insight into how it's been for you? Savings, how many months does it exclusively do your HW etc.

What is it, 5 year glycol changes?

All I ever get told is go for PV. Excess can heat a greenhouse if necessary afaic.

I got these panels for free so they're being fitted!

 

[voipio]

Between March and October last year, using two solar thermal panels, each 2m^2 in area, almost south-facing on a sloping roof, connected to the lower coil of a twin coil 250 litre unvented cylinder, the boiler was only needed to supplement the solar on maybe a handful of occasions. Unsurprisingly, clear blue sky days gave the highest tank temperatures, reaching the 75degC set limit in the summer months. On those summer days, with blue sky all day, the pump would then shut down, and the panel temperature would reach over 130degC. The system is pressurised to 1.5Bar, with propylene glycol in the heating loop. It still boiled in the panel when the highest temperatures were reached. Just the other day, when we had a blue sky day, the lower tank temperature sensor reached 52degC, starting from about 17degC in the morning.

 

[gaz1]

Between March and October last year, using two solar thermal panels, each 2m^2 in area, almost south-facing on a sloping roof, connected to the lower coil of a twin coil 250 litre unvented cylinder, the boiler was only needed to supplement the solar on maybe a handful of occasions. Unsurprisingly, clear blue sky days gave the highest tank temperatures, reaching the 75degC set limit in the summer months. On those summer days, with blue sky all day, the pump would then shut down, and the panel temperature would reach over 130degC. The system is pressurised to 1.5Bar, with propylene glycol in the heating loop. It still boiled in the panel when the highest temperatures were reached. Just the other day, when we had a blue sky day, the lower tank temperature sensor reached 52degC, starting from about 17degC in the morning.

but if you added another cylinder with the option of being tank fed

that system would heat that tank up then be cooled by the cold water tank fed from the tank above

or feed the extra water into a hot tub therefore cooling the cylinder down that can be either an ibc tank homemade hot tub but not used for that as its just more of a cooling tank of water

 

[Onoff]

What happens when the glycol boils? Does this get taken up by the expansion tank?

 

[Trevorleach]

This is what I need, real world experience of solar thermal.

Can you give some insight into how it's been for you? Savings, how many months does it exclusively do your HW etc.

What is it, 5 year glycol changes?

All I ever get told is go for PV. Excess can heat a greenhouse if necessary afaic.

I got these panels for free so they're being fitted!

Well Sevenoaks aint to far from Maidstone so if you want a look let me know.

Pretty much now we start to get some foc hot water, and it gets better as the year goes on.
Tbh I assumed as the coolant was red it was OATs so had in my mind its 10 year change interval same as cars running OATs.
During the summer the solar will heat the entire 150 litre tank to over 60 degc
There are at least 3 to 6 months where we use literally no gas at all.

I think PV is good, but not that good at hot water until later on in the year.

The hot water tank was 90 litre, I changed it to a twin coil 150 litre tank, FIL has solar thermal and his has a tank before the hot water tank so you dont need a fancy twin coil tank, he has had his system for over 40 years.

 

[Trevorleach]

Crap pic of my crap hand writing showing a reading every month when I remembered written through the dirt.
If you can make it out it is sort of interesting!
We would use less gas if I could switch off boiler for them hot months, but as she has a bath she moans if the hot water starts to run out.

 

[JimmyS]

The Glycol in our old system never boiled as far as I can remember - as the pressure rises to counteract this - kind of like an engine cooling jacket. You would want to fit a solar rated safety valve, it the pressure rises too high it will blow off. The SV discharge is normally run into a container so it can be used again. With an unvented cylinder you want to fit a manual reset high pressure cut out to shut off the energy supply to the cylinder to stop the actual HWC boiling/ Overheating. We did have the cylinder getting pretty hot, lot hotter than 60 deg C, that was with a 300litre unvented Cylinder.

 

[Onoff]

but if you added another cylinder with the option of being tank fed

that system would heat that tank up then be cooled by the cold water tank fed from the tank above

or feed the extra water into a hot tub therefore cooling the cylinder down that can be either an ibc tank homemade hot tub but not used for that as its just more of a cooling tank of water

That's food for a mad thought...I figure I'm amongst like minds!

I've the lounge diner from Hell. Ostensibly two separate rooms for now. The diner is the very original house. It's 9" solid brick with a suspended timber floor over dirt. The lounge, a later addition is 9" block wall. Neither the ceiling, walls or floor line up between the two rooms.

Plan is to knock through at some stage. The lounge floor is interesting. 5/8" chipboard (yes, honestly). 4x2 joists. A dwarf brick wall, one brick high, then a concrete slab. If anyone's seen The Money Pit, I did once sink through the carpet. Where I went through:

Quick repair:

They got the levels wrong so there's a slope up from the diner into the lounge.

Found a plan of the ground floor I did a while back. The red is the single pipe central heating system:

How about, when I dig out the lounge floor I bury one or more, heavily insulated water tanks as a thermal store?

 

[knighty]

how much hot water do you use?

honestly... best advice is to keep it simple

and cheap, no point spending more than it'll save you?

 

[Onoff]

how much hot water do you use?

honestly... best advice is to keep it simple

and cheap, no point spending more than it'll save you?

Daughter lives in the shower / bath. If there's copious hot water they'll user it. Dumping heat to the hot tub is certainly an option. Or garage even.