Reading that makes me tired. I fill my 5 cf boiler twice a day if it is REALLY cold. I'm finding it hard to believe you are putting 3 cords of wood in that boiler a day. If you are, there is something seriously wrong. That is 60 million btu's per day of dry wood or 24 million btu's of wet wood!
Yes have looked at poly ducting. Investing in that this summer for sure. Makes sense about the stacking of the exchangers. I learn more everyday. Thanks so much everyone
Hydro. I think your best bet right now would be to slow the water down going through the boiler so that you are always feeding 180+ degree water to your heat exchangers. Your heat exchangers are designed to use a certain inlet temp and CFM of air to get the most efficiency and output. You may also need to throttle back the blowers on the heat exchangers so you don't take too much temperature out of the water.
Well I am going to start with drying wood. Going to be using a spare room in my barn to kiln dry the wet wood. Going to put a makeshift door on a 12 x 8 room. Going to fill it with wood and let a torpedo heater run in there overnight. Will report back. Can't wait to not have to do all this next year and just start with seasoned wood lol. Ahhh farm life.
Sorry bud over night with torpedo heater won't do it. There's a few kiln threads on here you should check out. Solar kilns and such, I'd say if you have the time abd resources you could build yourself a room like your saying and put a wood stove even a barrel kit stove inn the room and fill it with wood and really cook the moisture out for a week or better, like get it so hot you need to run in fire up and run out. A couple vents for new fresh dry air and fans. But at that your better off with just buying seasoned wood for the rest of the year. Invest in a moisture meter first to know exactly what your buying
Well last year I put a truck box upside down with a torpedo heater in it and closed off the one side with tarps. All the wood burned much better. I also called a logger who delivers wood and he has a small shed with a 220k torpedo. Runs it for 6 hours per 2 cords and has decent results. At this point anything will help I feel. I will let you all know how I make out.
Problem is I have little budget left and still have 8 cords of 8 foot logs sitting in my yard. Otherwise I would buy seasoned wood last week lol.
I hear you first year is always terrible. Bear through this year best you can and make next year all you can
No I can't burn fossils inside greenhouse, good thought though. It's because I am working on getting certified organic. Will be the first organic certified hydroponic greenhouse to service minneapolis area! Once I get this figured out I will never have to leave the house! Neighbor raises beef and I can grow veggies year round. I could handle steak and veggies for 3 square meals a day lol
It sounds like you know what's needed going forward but for now I would supplement the wood you have with as much dry wood as you can scrounge such as old pallets and old lumber etc. We have a company down the road that builds trusses. They sell a pickup load of trimmings and scrap 2x4's up to 2x10's (usually 1-3' lengths) for around $35.
please explain how they are insulated. not trying to be a jerk, but there is lots of ways to insulate, some better than other, some worthless. can you give some numbers for in/out temps directly at exchangers and water temp going INTO boiler when they are running. concerning is the 110* temp you give, and idk exactly where/how you are measuring this. if you cool the boiler off too much it will have a very hard time recovering. should aim to have boiler return temp at 140-150*. and most heat exchangers are designed for a deltaT of 20* when supplied with 180*. if 110* is return to boiler, to raise this temp you need to slow fans down or increase flow by either upsize pump or increase line size. it may need to be a combination of these to some extent and slowing fans down might not give you the heat you want. restricting the flow so that less volume of cold water goes into the boiler is something easy to try, but it likely wont get you the BTUs you require to where you need them in hte greenhouse. your stated 44gpm pumps does not mean you are circulating 44gpm. if you can give the circ model and length of you 1" lines we can go from there. also, its hard to match up BTU numbers of wood boiler to othere heaters as the OWB run at such aweful efficiencies when compared. and sorry, but yours is certainly no exception. you know you have a wood problem. but that might not be the whole story...
You definitely can get significant drying quite fast when you add heat. I put a green piece of red maple next to my stove on December 21. 20% of its loss to date happened over the first 24 hours. 50% happened in 5 days. I'm sure you can see similar or better in a room with a torpedo running. Still not best but getting 50% of your potential drying in is certainly better than nothing. Keep in mind that a moisture meter is useless on green wood wood. There is almost no measurable change in electrical resistance until the moisture content is in the mid thirties. Oak and red maple fresh from the stump can easily exceed 80%. If you are measuring green wood you might as well forget about it. Drying will be uneven also if you are only kilning for a day or two. Your meter can only read the spots that you test and they will vary significantly if the wood is only partially dried. A scale will do you better on figuring out how much water you are removing if you want to judge the effectiveness of torpedo kilning.
I am planning on building a wood shed in the spring. I hope to incorporate some solar kiln technology into it as well. Thinking of using some Lexan pieces on a couple sides and a roll up side of greenhouse poly on the south side. Faster drying times on firewood!
So you had a double barrel kit In the green houseLast year? If so why not put it back in and buy a pick up load ofr dry wood and stack a couple cord around it off your wet stuff split down to decent sizes and a fan or two blowing on it you'll win twice in all your heat from the barrels helping to heat the greenhouse abd Also helping to dry wood out for the boiler? Just a thought. Also how are you liking all the damm wind today!?! At least it's a warm wind!
My dad has a 6048 and I've noticed how you load it makes a big difference in how it performs also. On a reload I rake all the coals and burning chunks to the sides and front I'll roll big or green chunks in the back and put drier smaller stuff towards the front. I'll try to block off (not totally) the exhaust in the back to slow the draft down and let the drier wood in the front burn well in front of the draft inlet. 1/2 to 3/4 loads seem to work and last as long as packed full loads also.
