Its started :)

[walrus]

Been using Killz oil based primer, got my walls(OSB) all rolled, still have to touch up around garage door and in corners. The fumes from that stuff is awful, could only stand it so long. Should be painting final coat next weekend. Then I can finish electrical and build shelves down one wall, maybe 2 walls

 

[walrus]

So painting has taken longer than expected, screwing up my shoulder hasn't helped the progress any but 27 gallons of paint later, I've got the majority of it done.12 gallons of oil based killz, 11 gallons of white and 4 gallons of gray. Door frames and windows need to be trimmed out but electrical and shelves come first as does Compressor. Can't wait to get my tools in place.
Couple of pics of the inside and one of the view out my west windows

 

[rieferman]

I love this thread, everything is so well done. Nice view in that last pic too!

 

[walrus]

Got some stuff done, electrical and some storage shelves. Started moving some stuff in, nice to get some tools in there. Next up, more electrical and trimming out windows and man door. Been thinking about trimming the door out in red oak to make the dead bolt a little tougher to break out

 

[walrus]

I'm close to being done, building my bench right now, pretty simple bench.

Had a fire in the stove last Sunday, haven't been back in there until this morning. Temps outside in the 20s, low 30s during the day, teens, 20s at night for the whole week, shop was at 50 when I went in there this morning

 

[Possum]

Nice. Love this build. Can wait until you get started on that solar radiant setup.

 

[walrus]

Nice. Love this build. Can wait until you get started on that solar radiant setup.

I bought a bunch of copper and fittings, I'm about to pull the trigger on a pump and a differential controller. I need to figure out a way to build the collectors directly on the south wall. I'm worried about covering the copper with aluminum and getting the aluminum tight to the copper. Once it warms up and I recover from shoulder surgery I'm going to get started.

 

[Possum]

Great - post all the info you can. I am working on doing this too. Are you building collectors similar to this? -

http://www.builditsolar.com/Experimental/CopperAlumCollector/CopperAlumCol.htm

If you got time build a fixture for your clamps check this method out -

http://www.builditsolar.com/Experimental/TomPress/TomPress.htm

Or go the easy route -

http://www.blueridgecompany.com/radiant/hydronic/316/rht-heat-transfer-plates

I am guessing you are going to do a closed loop system? Are you planning on a thermal storage tank?

 

[walrus]

Yeah, thats what I plan to do. The vice grip method gets you a pretty tight fit and more coverage around the pipe. My collector is going to be 16 feet long and 8 or 9 feet tall. No storage tank, my tank is going to be 22 yds of concrete. If I was going with a storage tank I'd go here,

http://www.americansolartechnics.com/

I bought some aluminum to experiment with, not going to make that press out of steel. Will use some red oak and a router to make a form to press the aluminum into with a round steel bar and a hammer

 

[walrus]

Pics of finishing windows and man door. Note the red oak strip up the door frame. Its screwed and glued especially around the dead bolt. If they want to break in they're going to make some noise
Trimmed out windows and started my bench. The top is 1-5/8 glued and biscuited red oak planks that were cut off the property. My dad had them sawed 15 yrs ago or so. I found them under a pile of rotted soft wood planks out in the woods. The red oak was on the bottom and in surprisingly good shape. Brought them in last fall to dry out and planed them a few weeks ago. They aren't furniture grade but they are tough so it should make a good top. Got my vise mounted, still have to mount wood vise and some drawers.

 

[4StarCstms]

Very nice..love the insulation..should be able to heat it with a match almost. That workbench is really nice too!!

 

[walrus]

I'm starting the solar, been putting stuff together as I can. Going to be more money than I thought but if it works I'll be happy. So far 300 ft of 1/2 copper, 40 feet 3/4 copper, 60 3/4 by 3/4 by 1/2 tees, some ells, couple unions, solder and flux. Made life a little easier by chucking fitting brushes into a cordless, didn't have one leak upon air testing to 80 psi. I did blow a test plug out twice, causing a broken fitting when it twisted it up. Was able to fix easily though. need some clamps but its in the frame. The monotonous part is still to come, making the aluminum to go over the 1/2 inch risers. The plans came from Gary at
www.builditsolar.com He has been very helpful. I can buy the aluminum already formed but am going to try for myself first.

 

[RbrtAWhyt]

Tell me you're going to cover that copper up. Around here the crackheads will steal that so fast it'll make your head spin...

 

[walrus]

Tell me you're going to cover that copper up. Around here the crackheads will steal that so fast it'll make your head spin...

You won't be able see that copper when done.

 

[A_Pmech]

Any updates on your solar heating system, Walrus?

 

[walrus]

Any updates on your solar heating system, Walrus?

Oops
Didn't see your post, I have been doing other things so no real progress. If it rains tomorrow I may finish the inside plumbing, install pump and air vent.

 

[walrus]

Made some progress on the solar, did the inside plumbing, have an air test on it right now, hopefully it holds over night. The Pex has been tested, the Collector has been tested in halves, now I'm testing the whole system. Next I have to finish the collector

 

[A_Pmech]

Looking good!

I'm VERY interested to hear about the performance of your solar system this winter.

I have some plans in the works for solar myself.



Oh, and can we have some details on the collector construction?

 

[walrus]

Go back to post 52 and you can see the collector. Its built on a south facing wall, I orientated the shop specifically for the collector. I wanted it on a wall as I'm only using it for space heating and not DHW. I have collectors on house roof for DHW so I have some experience fiddling around with solar. I'm wrapping the 29 or 30 upright 1/2 copper with Aluminum flashing just like Gary did at www.builditsolar.com . Gary has been very helpful to me explaining what he did. Check out the picture of my jig and how I bent the flashing. I expect you do can do better if you have a press. I put down a layer of urethane foam, 1/2 thick, than a layer of white flashing to cover the foam and to keep any water out of my wall. The copper is over that. I painted the inside of the formed flashing to keep the copper separated from the aluminum. I also glue the aluminum to the copper with small amount of silicone. This should keep any water out of the layer between dissimilar metals.

 

[Motown 454]

Nice job on the collector

 

[walrus]

Been trying to get a good air test on the complete system all weekend. First I had some 3/4 sweat unions leaking, thought I fixed those on Saturday, ramped the air up again and found another union leaking. Lost like 2 psi over night so it wasn't bad but fluid would have been lost. Ramped the PSI up to 42 psi and found a pinhole leak in one of my sweat connections, luckily it was near a union, took apart and repaired. Put 42 psi on it again yesterday, was ok last night but need to look again later to see if its really ok. I like 24 hrs for a real test. Temp changes will cause some loss but when the sun comes out it better be back where it was or keep looking until find the issue. Its easier to fix when only air has been in the system, once fluid is in there it ***** to fix

 

[walrus]

Filled the system with No Burst and water today. Hopefully I'm at or around -20 with slush protection to -50 so no broken pipes. Having trouble getting air out but I knew that would happen, should have had at least one more coin vent in the system, had to use a union instead. Letting it sit now, hopefully air rises to the vents I have so tomorrow I can get some more out. I'm wondering if my Taco 009 is big enough? Might have to go to an 011

 

[Possum]

Its getting cold down here and I need to build myself some panels! How about some updates my fellow mammal?

 

[walrus]

If I get a chance later this week( in a hotel room right now, working out of town) I'll post some pics of what the collector looks like now

 

[walrus]

Finally got my collector going. Still have a ways to go inside, need to get the wiring done as I just threw it together to get it in operation. Need a 12 volt power supply instead of a car battery but it works, collector temps as high 120, my floor has gone from 53 degrees to around 60 in 2 days. Hopefully this is going to keep my shop from going below 32 once winter hits.

Decided not throw any more money at the collector until I'm sure its going to work. I used some old strapping I had to secure the glazing, was going to use flat aluminum bar but that costs so...

 

[Warg]

You might want to get those solar collectors at an angle instead of vertical... Actually they would be better off on the roof. I just read a paper a couple of week ago and it stated that efficiency would rise at least 30% at a 45 degree angle over a vertical mount.

-Paul

 

[walrus]

You might want to get those solar collectors at an angle instead of vertical... Actually they would be better off on the roof. I just read a paper a couple of week ago and it stated that efficiency would rise at least 30% at a 45 degree angle over a vertical mount.

-Paul

No, I'm using them solely for space heat, I need the solar when the sun is at its lowest angle, they're right where they should be. When the sun is high I'm going to have the collector covered. Having them vertical means I'll also get some gain from reflection off the snow, I've heard as much as 30%

 

[Warg]

You must be way up north from me... Here we place them at about 45 degrees, and way up north they go for 30 degrees. Snow reflection is not that much with liquid collectors, I've read. With an electrical solar panel you can get a 15-25% increase from snow reflection, but that's a whole other thing.
But then again, if you get the energy needed for your purpose you're fine.

-Paul

 

[walrus]

You must be way up north from me... Here we place them at about 45 degrees, and way up north they go for 30 degrees. Snow reflection is not that much with liquid collectors, I've read. With an electrical solar panel you can get a 15-25% increase from snow reflection, but that's a whole other thing.
But then again, if you get the energy needed for your purpose you're fine.

-Paul

I have collectors at 45 degrees for my Domestic Hot water on my house but 45 is the best of both worlds angle, get it in the summer and winter, I 'm looking for heat in the winter and don't want heat in the summer. If you really wanted to chase the sun you'd have them on brackets where you could raise or lower panels, laying flat would work the best in the summer . The sun is barely over my trees in the dead of winter. I doubt I'm north of you, 45th parallel is within miles of me
Whether I get the energy I need remains to be seen, I'm hoping.

 

[walrus]

Been cold here lately,8f last night. My shop still hasn't been done below 45 degrees. The solar is doing its job as we had 2 sunny days in a row( a miracle so far this winter, been wicked cloudy) , this morning I put the tractor in there so I could put chains on for plowing(blizzard warning tonight) and it was 50 in there, yesterday it was only 46 so the solar must have done something. Right now I have the woodstove cranking so it will be toasty to finish installing the chains. I'm still thinking the solar is going to blow me out of there by 1st week in February , once the sun is up alittle. Can't wait to find out. In the meantime I'm thumbing my nose at Opec

 

[Zick]

Nice build walrus!
How's the system been running?
Love the solar setup. I'm looking to do the same thing with our garage. I've already got the pex in the slab but never hooked it up to the house system yet.
Just picked up 4 used solar panels cheap last month and probably build a system this summer.

 

[79stang514]

looks awesome, are you posting this on builditsolar.com as well?
i'm building the same setup except starting with 4'X12' panel and passive heat, and then will add another 4'X12' panel after

 

[socapots]

great topic man. some real good info. checking stuff out for a passive panel in my shop, But this looks like a great idea for a new place (if i ever get to build. lol)

 

[MrAmbitious]

Hey Walrus, any updates? It's the middle of February and I am anxious to know if your solar panels are giving you the heat you want. You did exactly what I plan on doing on my shop, once the building part is done. Great job.

 

[walrus]

The solar did its job, I'm going to say the average temp out there all winter was close to 50. We had a normal or colder than normal winter.

We've had a bunch of sunny days in a row this week, temps in the 40s daytime, teens 20s night, shop temp today 58. I'm kind of disappointed its not higher but thats plenty high enough to work. I'm pretty happy with the results. If you wanted to heat the building completely I'd probably half to double the collector size but I think total heat would be doable with solar and a tight well insulated building.

 

[JackB]

Nice garage! Quite like mine actually. I like the water/solar heating system but I wonder why you don't have an accumulator tank ? With a sizeable tank you can take advantage of the midday sun and it'd heat even when the sun has gone down. I don't know how big the tank needs to be but I imagine 100gallons would help a great deal.

 

[Zick]

The solar did its job, I'm going to say the average temp out there all winter was close to 50. We had a normal or colder than normal winter.

We've had a bunch of sunny days in a row this week, temps in the 40s daytime, teens 20s night, shop temp today 58. I'm kind of disappointed its not higher but thats plenty high enough to work. I'm pretty happy with the results. If you wanted to heat the building completely I'd probably half to double the collector size but I think total heat would be doable with solar and a tight well insulated building.

Thanks for the update, I hope when I get mine setup that it will perform at least that well.

Nice garage! Quite like mine actually. I like the water/solar heating system but I wonder why you don't have an accumulator tank ? With a sizeable tank you can take advantage of the midday sun and it'd heat even when the sun has gone down. I don't know how big the tank needs to be but I imagine 100gallons would help a great deal.

I was kind of wondering the same thing about using a buffer tank or not for my future setup. My thought for not needing one is that the system isn't big enought to get floor up to the desired temp before running out of sun light. So it would never be able to heat both the floor & tank at the same time without enlarging the solar array.
Seems the floor would use all the available heat the undersized system made.

But maybe I'm not thinking about it right.

 

[JackB]

I agree with you on that Zick. I just assumed (maybe wrongly) that the array would collect enough heat for both the floor and the accumularor during the day. But that would require calculations and engineering I suppose, which might be prohibitive cost-vise.

 

[walrus]

Nice garage! Quite like mine actually. I like the water/solar heating system but I wonder why you don't have an accumulator tank ? With a sizeable tank you can take advantage of the midday sun and it'd heat even when the sun has gone down. I don't know how big the tank needs to be but I imagine 100gallons would help a great deal.

I have 22 yds of concrete for a tank, its a closed loop every ounce of heat goes into the slab. The thing thats good about a huge "tank" is that my collector will heat the slab at relatively cool temps. Its easy to get the collector to run when the slab is 50 degrees, I have my controller set at 10 degrees differential so when collector hits 60, I'm putting BTUs in the slab. IF I had a 100 gallon tank with my a 10 by 16 collector I'll bet I could boil the tank. I base this on the fact that I have 2 3 by 8 collectors on my home. This week with lots of sun and 40s I can get my 150 gallon tank up to 145 with showers, dishwasher, laundry and dishes being done.

 

[walrus]

Finally started another lean to addition on the west side of my shop. Never have enough room