Solar Thermal Install

[gaz1]

Heres one I did earlier
in effect a box inside the stone shell

if im being honest

i like the stuff to a degree but i dont like the fire issue side of it

lost about 8" around the walls

a french drain inside of the house filled with pebbles and all leading to a sump pump drain

 

[addjunkie]

The fire issue I can understand, but your wooden frame and kingspan have a fire rating due to the plaster board over the top. And if its on fire, would you hang about inside? I wouldnt.

 

[gaz1]

yeah only 1/2 hr for one plasterboard and plastered

1hr for 2 layered plasterboard

its a different beast with synthetic crap
2010

2021

 

[Gareth J]

I'd prefer EWI. No risk of interstatial condensation, no interior space lost or even decorating required and huge thermal mass. Alas, the roof overhang isn't huge and neither is the budget.

But we digress!

 

[Onoff]

I'd prefer EWI. No risk of interstatial condensation, no interior space lost or even decorating required and huge thermal mass. Alas, the roof overhang isn't huge and neither is the budget.

But we digress!

I'd only ever do Rockwool ewi personally. Grenfell etc

 

[addjunkie]

I'd prefer EWI. No risk of interstatial condensation, no interior space lost or even decorating required and huge thermal mass. Alas, the roof overhang isn't huge and neither is the budget.

But we digress!

Looks pants too when you live in a national park and everything around you is old stone!

 

[knighty]

So maybe a phase1, install solar panels to heat the pool, see how that goes and then think about stealing some heat for the house and hot water system, I think a wind out blind over the top of the panels will be essential.

I overlooked this earlier... if you're more keen on heating the pool than the house then just heat the pool - you'll get the most heat out of the panels that way because you'll be running at lower temperatures

a quick google just said you'll want about 30'C pool temp - you'll get much better heat transfer heating your 30'C pool than your 60'C hot water tank

I'm not sure on the numbers, but the panels will put out more heat too, the hotter they are the less efficient they are

 

[Gareth J]

I'd only ever do Rockwool ewi personally. Grenfell etc

Anything flammable should be fully encapsulated by some kind of masonry. Far less likely to cause issues than internal insulation with a similar gypsum (plasterboard) protective layer. But yea, there are non combustible options. And wood fibre too, which is somewhere in between.

 

[Onoff]

Had a chat with my lad last night. He's up for helping me rip these tiles off this hip to re-felt and batten. Never done anything on this scale tbh, roof wise. Seems silly to fit panels onto a dodgy roof that might leak later on. The mortar on the hip tiles is all shot anyway and needed redoing. Felt edges by the gutters are knackered and so on. Can't see me getting to convert to gables in the short term, if ever.

@roofman , should I aim to use new battens?

Ideally I'd like to do just this hip now and the rest of the roof later. Don't know if there's a dry hip system that would allow this or some clever trick. From what I can see the dry systems have a self adhesive flashing.

 

[Onoff]

Anything flammable should be fully encapsulated by some kind of masonry. Far less likely to cause issues than internal insulation with a similar gypsum (plasterboard) protective layer. But yea, there are non combustible options. And wood fibre too, which is somewhere in between.

Along with I think, horizontal fire breaks as you go up, between floors.

 

[JMS1972]

Had a chat with my lad last night. He's up for helping me rip these tiles off this hip to re-felt and batten. Never done anything on this scale tbh, roof wise. Seems silly to fit panels onto a dodgy roof that might leak later on. The mortar on the hip tiles is all shot anyway and needed redoing. Felt edges by the gutters are knackered and so on. Can't see me getting to convert to gables in the short term, if ever.

@roofman , should I aim to use new battens?

Ideally I'd like to do just this hip now and the rest of the roof later. Don't know if there's a dry hip system that would allow this or some clever trick. From what I can see the dry systems have a self adhesive flashing.


View attachment 337027

If you are refelting then I doubt the old battens would be any use once they've been ripped off?

 

[gaz1]

I overlooked this earlier... if you're more keen on heating the pool than the house then just heat the pool - you'll get the most heat out of the panels that way because you'll be running at lower temperatures

a quick google just said you'll want about 30'C pool temp - you'll get much better heat transfer heating your 30'C pool than your 60'C hot water tank

I'm not sure on the numbers, but the panels will put out more heat too, the hotter they are the less efficient they are

but matchless faces the issue of the pools salt

which will wear the parts of the solar unit if direct

personally id create another tank and feed 1-2 solar units into it using glycol heat the water high as you need more flow with boiling the water and then take another feed from the pool feed and cool it down using the thermostatic bypass valve

solar glycol can be run alot hotter best heat is under 250f

basically your connecting 2 hot water cylinders together and running them in series one tank been the preheater the second tank heating the water up even more

the coil is the solar glycol and can be run alot hotter best heat is under 250f

or you make your own tank and coil system or use a vortex system

i cant suggest the heat exchanger as it may have issues with the salt yet again

 

[Gareth J]

Along with I think, horizontal fire breaks as you go up, between floors.

Might be only required on buildings over a certain height? Never seen it mentioned on domestic systems.

 

[DAPPH]

Hmmm, must mend the mower!

So maybe a phase1, install solar panels to heat the pool, see how that goes and then think about stealing some heat for the house and hot water system, I think a wind out blind over the top of the panels will be essential.

My pal borrowed the garage roof's from two council owned garages adjacent to his garden to put up four 1200 x 1 mtr wide solar heat panels , used copper rod heating elements in a simple box of aluminium painted matt black the heated water was sent by a solar pond pump into the 12 foot dia pool x 1100 mm deep . It was amazingly hot even in mid winter .

 

[Onoff]

My pal borrowed the garage roof's from two council owned garages adjacent to his garden to put up four 1200 x 1 mtr wide solar heat panels , used copper rod heating elements in a simple box of aluminium painted matt black the heated water was sent by a solar pond pump into the 12 foot dia pool x 1100 mm deep . It was amazingly hot even in mid winter .

Music to my ears that. There's a lot of doubters where solar thermal is concerned. I've DIY'd my own small scale system and it was amazing to get that much free heat into the water.

I'd rather have excess heat to dump / store somewhere than not. If it gets hot enough to boil water then you could potentially drive a turbine generator and store in batteries.

 

[DAPPH]

Indeed. I did the maths too. I worked on 1800kwh, but near enough the same. Doesnt fly. Even at proper kwh prices. I think a lot of people would be happy at 16p. Even at triple that, it doesnt work. I dont have gas.

Where insulating becomes problematic is with an old solid wall house. Most of the insulation solutions will cause more problems then they solve. And can only be effictive up to a point. Which will be well short of a decent new build.

Shame. Free heating forever. If only the capital cost was sensible......................

The way energy is rising in cost the old, " Too long a pay back naysayers " may well be proved extremely wrong in just a few years. Even if it took 20 years such schemes if they last say 50 years or longer will mean 30 years of free heating because someone had the sense to invest in the future.

 

[gaz1]

glenfell

external cladding normally coated by cement

take a good look at the pull back of flames and it does have the rocket effect

 

[Matchless]

but matchless faces the issue of the pools salt

which will wear the parts of the solar unit if direct

personally id create another tank and feed 1-2 solar units into it using glycol heat the water high as you need more flow with boiling the water and then take another feed from the pool feed and cool it down using the thermostatic bypass valve

solar glycol can be run alot hotter best heat is under 250f

basically your connecting 2 hot water cylinders together and running them in series one tank been the preheater the second tank heating the water up even more

the coil is the solar glycol and can be run alot hotter best heat is under 250f

or you make your own tank and coil system or use a vortex system

i cant suggest the heat exchanger as it may have issues with the salt yet again

One problem I thought of if I ran pool water through the panels is freezing overnight in winter, or when the pump failed, I run a stainless steel heat exchanger for the house gas boiler to also heat the pool when the motorise valves are set, that has been in service for 25 years, I would need a second heat exchanger for the solar input, I have an underfloor pump room that has plenty of space for additions,

 

[gaz1]

One problem I thought of if I ran pool water through the panels is freezing overnight in winter, or when the pump failed, I run a stainless steel heat exchanger for the house gas boiler to also heat the pool when the motorise valves are set, that has been in service for 25 years, I would need a second heat exchanger for the solar input, I have an underfloor pump room that has plenty of space for additions,

thats why you use glycol or it back drains out of the panels

the issue is the chlorine ( salt )

stainless isnt a good conductor of heat copper pipe is but suffers wear over the years

glycol wont be good for the swimming pool but if you swap out your heat exchanger

 

[DAPPH]

Music to my ears that. There's a lot of doubters where solar thermal is concerned. I've DIY'd my own small scale system and it was amazing to get that much free heat into the water.

I'd rather have excess heat to dump / store somewhere than not. If it gets hot enough to boil water then you could potentially drive a turbine generator and store in batteries.

I did a lot of research wrt energy use and storing heat before I got crippled in 1995 , as we'd purchased an old railway gate crossing house on a 30 foot high embankment that was to be our forever home .
Even if it meant demolishing the 27 inch thick walled three up/ 3 down original gate keepers building and reusing the Old Fletton yellow bricks to build a nice big new bungalow on the well settled double track bed & small siding area . The railway embankment was planned as a 120 x 301 litre plastic barreled heat store filled with Glauber's salt liquid and an 80 mtr 2 inch gravel filled U of 1 mtr spun concrete pipes sunk in and insulated 2 mtrs below the ground to have gently sucked in hot air from a dedicated 150 mtr long x 8 mtr wide poly tunnel as a quick air source heat store . We only had to dig down 8 mtrs in the garden till we struck live wet silt that was 6 mtrs thick sitting on an ancient peat bog some four metres thick on top of blue clay . I found on a 1921 TFL ordnance survey map that there was a deep dug brick lined well in the garden , further research in the county library showed it was put in in 1864 when the embankment was made ( under compulsory land purchase under the railways act ) any excess heat was to be put back into the well after running it in alkathene pipes 1 .5 mtr below the gardens