Recent content by wildlife

Your shop looks great. Thanks for the link. We don't have as much insulation but we hope it is enough for Maryland winters. Our heat load is about 35,000 btu. How did you size your collector to your load?

Thank you all for sharing your experience!

I am still thinking it through so I am sure there are situations I am missing. Draimback makes sense but I was hoping to avoid more complications If I have the correct number of panels can I just dump heat into the slab all day and it won’t overheat the collectors. I guess I might need to cover...

Thanks. This will not be connected to any other system. Just fill with glycol and run solar through water heater and slab. Was thinking of running a little pressure and not a drain back. Would like the solar collectors on the ground and freeze protection in shop for if power was out for a while...

The pumping away stuff I have been able to find is helpful. Thank you. I have never seen the supply feed into the Space between the air scoop and expansion tank but it makes sense. The heat loss we calculated to 35k btu. Going to try a 40 gallon, 40kbtu propane power vent hot water heater...

We do have more steel than mesh to stiffen the floor. What kind of plumbing did you run on your solar? What controls your pump? What is your plan if it gets too hot?

Happy New Year! It has been a while and I am ready to figure out the rest of my system. I have the metal building up over the slab that has 1/2 inch pex on 1' centers with three equal loops of 270'. What tools are available for me online to figure out what size heater and pump etc. I will...

Thank you for the replies. I ended up ordering the pex and manifold from pexuniverse. I think the source makes a difference if one has more defective products (leaks) or if they have different flow rates.I didn't get any replies about that so i went with cost and availability. If they are all...

highbeam and others, what are the better fittings to use? i will only have a handful and might as well order the better ones? thanks, wildlife

Hi Guys, Another question. I have drawn it and can get three 300' loops of 1/2" to fit on twelve inch spacing. Thanks for the advice on here to stick with 1/2 over 5/8. Any tips on good online sources for the pex and manifolds? several places show manifolds and not sure which are a good...

Thanks for the response Highbeam and Stingry. What is the downside to using the larger pex, say 5/8 or 3/4? Would larger pex require a stronger circulation pump? What about performance difference? My instincts are to over build and am concerned about future solar.

Hi, This is my first post and while the search feature is helpful, it doesn't respond when I search for pex. I am sure there is a better way to search and read more. Please forgive me as I imagine asking about pex size and spacing is a common topic. Any advice would be appreciated. I just...