Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

1 Posts
Dec 6, 2007 07:50 pm
Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

Has anyone used a tankless water heater to replace an oil furnace baseboard heating system ?  Can you recommend a MFG to contact about this ? Or any threads I can review ?

Thanks in advance,

Craig
 
462 Posts
Dec 7, 2007 11:33 am
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

Craig, I don't think that a tankless would have the heating capacity to be used for heating. A normal oil burner will put out a continuous 150000+ BTU's to heat water for heating at temperatures around 150-180 F. Though you would get some heat, it would not be enough to heat a house. You may also have to modify it to be used with a thermostat.
« Last Edit: Dec 8, 2007 10:13 am by Tom Mayrand »
 
184 Posts
Dec 7, 2007 11:47 am
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

I am not aware of tankless water heaters for the purpose of heating your home.  My tankless experience was not good.  I wrote about it here: 

http://solarjohn.blogspot.com/2007/10/environmentally-friendly-products-are.html

John
 
Dec 8, 2007 07:11 am
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

Craig,
We've been heating our house with an Aquastar tankless heater for 4 years. Works well, using a 24 volt 8000 series
Sureflo pump into a 40 gal elect. waterheater for storage.
Than a small 24 volt circulator from tank to radiant heat in floor. This allows you to run lower temps (110F-130F)
Chris
 
1 Posts
Dec 14, 2007 06:07 pm
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

Craig,
It is not a good idea to use a tank less hot water heater to heat your house for several good reasons. The water on demand systems are designed to run for short periods of time heating a house usually demands a longer one time. It shortens the life spam of the tank less heater. And almost all MFG will void the warranty if used to heat a house. 
Like the previous post most baseboards need at least 140F-180F temp on the other side radiant floors can use low temp water anything above 70F. I have tried using a low temp in several baseboard applications 120F to 130F you might get some heat from the baseboards not usually not enough to heat a room to comfort level for most people.
If you want a small compact high efficiency boiler I like the NTI Trinity Gas boiler. You can add an option for DHW on demand.  I know several people who have installed these boilers and love them.  A friend in northern WI install one last spring and he said a typical year he would have to filled his LP twice by Dec and so far this year he has only filled once backing April and looks as if he can make into part of next year.

http://www.nythermal.com/Products/boilers/gas/trinity.htm
« Last Edit: Dec 14, 2007 06:14 pm by Joe Boettcher »
 
462 Posts
Dec 21, 2007 10:04 am
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

Another bad thing about the new tankless heaters is the fact that you have endless hot water. If you can stick to your 5-10 minute showers, great. But most people, or kids if you got them, will tend to stay in the shower longer, all day if possible, and thus use more energy than normal. They can also be good for baths or large tubs, but once again, tubs or worse yet jacuzzi tubs, can hold one or two tanks of hot water. If you really want to save on hot water, and since this is a RE site, try considering solar hot water.
 
1 Posts
Jan 29, 2008 04:18 pm
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

We have the same problem, and there is no option to convert from an oil boiler to a gas boiler on our street.  There are electric boilers (not tankless) on the market, and I wonder if one of those would work.  The price of heating oil keeps going up and up!!
 
462 Posts
Jan 30, 2008 11:05 am
Re: Tankless water heater to heat baseboard heat in house.

David, you could change to propane and have a tank installed if you wanted to change from oil. But in reality, you pay the same per BTU no matter what fuel you purchase. It all comes down to being more efficient and reducing your usage if you want to save money. Think of passive gain for heat and lighting, closing off rooms at night, insulating drapes for windows and between rooms and of course solar hot water and hot air for heating and PV for lowering electrical demands.
 

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