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Bart, anti-freeze and drinking water - smart to disassociate?
What fun is that?
Scout "Scotty" wrote in message news  Can you ask Seaward? "Scout" wrote in message oups.com.. . Uninstalling and analyzing this heater is a good thing. Further inspection may just exonerate the design. If you look closely at the bottom tubes in this picture, http://sports.webshots.com/photo/291...97509592UoBucA you'll notice that they enter the tank through two very loose sleeves. Check out the ample clearance between the coil ends and the sleeves they pass through. I need to find a way to determine if what appears to be an exageration of sloppy pipe fitting is in fact a clever design intended to drain any chemicals away from contact with fresh water should the tubing leak for any reason. It is possible that the design is a tube inside a tube, with the outter tube being an non-pressure path out of the unit. If that's the case, I can see why the hot water heat is so slow to come up to temperature, but the added safety feature would be worth the wait. As an experiment, I'm thinking of suspending the tank with the tank face parallel to the floor, so that any drop of water in the tank will drip from the boiler drain. Then, I would feed a stream of water into the sleeve and see if it eventually begins to flow from the other side. If it does, and if it never flows from the boiler drain, then I can conclude that there exists an isolating compartment, which is vented to atmosphere, between the anti-freeze filled tubing the fresh water tank. If I find that to be true, I'll connect to the engine again without losing sleep. Scout Jeff wrote: I think Seaward made two versions, SS and Aluminum. I have a galvanic isolator, and use the non-toxic anti-freeze. Scout wrote: How many here have a hot water heater that works with the engine's coolant system as a heat source? It is a very thin line separating that toxic material from your drinking water supply. The closed engine coolant loop may reach 15 psi when hot, and could easily outmatch the force in the fresh water system, especially if you run dry or turn off your on-demand pump for any reason. A pin hole or a crack in the hw heat exchanger could have deadly results. In my work as a boiler tech, we were never permitted to use toxic anti-freeze in boilers that produced domestic hot water (summer-winter boiler packages). I've replaced tens of those coils due to leakage! Just a thought, but Bart's recent comment about galvanic isolation got me thinking. Maybe I'll get that RedDot heater that Ole Thom has mentioned, remove the anti-freeze loop from my fresh water supply, and use those lines to supply aux heat in the cabin. Scout |
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