Dave Lotte

Finally had the water meter moved into the new house.
Had to do some work in the old crawlspace,  came out all covered in fiberglass dust and debris. So i thought i would take a nice hot shower...
Turned the water on, started washing,  and the water flow slowly became less and less.
What the heck  Brand new shower, brand new pipes , brand new house ! ... I'm thinking we broke the water meter or something.
Finished my shower, and remembered that when i installed the shower head, it had a really fine water filter in there...

Found the problem.

My guess ?  Moving the water meter knocked a bunch of stuff loose in the pipe, and it was flushed down where it was stopped by the filter.  Clean the filter, and i am back having nice long hot showers.

Matthew Nistico wrote:Excellent.  Enjoy your 15 minutes of fame! ; )

Thank you.  Just don't hit the "refresh" button on your browser.... the a.i keeps changing the text. 😁😁

Well guys and gals....
It is official.
The google A.I has noticed me.  Not sure if more and more people are googling " undergroundandlovinit " , but it is now listed by the A.I when you do a google search.

This is including a reference to Permies.  Your welcome. 😁

Matthew Nistico wrote:

Dave Lotte wrote:
Back porch now turns on the water heater !

Am I getting all that right?

Yup.
The Elsid pump i have here , only uses 10 watts per hour, while a grunfos pump easily uses 100 watts an hour.  Your " lots of power " to do a small job theory....
The Elsid pump is also 20 years old, and only showing 3 lights, when running at full capacity ( properly )  - it should have 4 lights.  So its not running at full capacity...
Going to soak the little filter in vinegar for a few days and reinstall.  It is there for a reason...,
350 $ for a new pump or 1,000 $ for a new water heater.... not a tough call.

Testing all 6 zones of the house heating, and still finding the back porch does not have enough flow to turn on the water heater ( by itself ).
Before buying another 350 $ low voltage circulating pump, thought i would remove this teeny - tiny filter.  
Since it is in a closed loop system,  there should not be a whole lot of crud in there  (??)

Back porch now turns on the water heater !

After realizing that i could track my power usage by looking at my hydro meter ( duh ! ), i went out and took a video of it cycling through the numbers.

Started at 767 kilowatt hours.  Tried to leave it for 24 hours, but kinda forgot about it.  35 hours later, with the heat on in the bedroom, and having a 40 minute infrared sauna session then a nice hot shower, i checked it again....  sitting at 796 kilowatt hours.

So, did another test.  Turned the heat on in the bedroom, turned off the dehumidifier and only microwaved my breakfast.  11 pm to 11 am .... 808 kilowatt hours.

Looks like either way i am burning about 1 kilowatt per hour.  

Going to have to see how this house compares to the old farm house.  On a -20 day it would usually use 1 megawatt a month in the winter 1,000 kilowatt hours.  I think that is the right term ....

Time will tell.

About the only priority i have when heating the house, is too keep my kitties warm.  Siamese do not like cold.  Main bedroom is being kept at 74 F.  Main house will try for 72.

That being said, trying to figure out the heating bill, so i started to crunch some numbers.

Water pump with only main bedroom running can move .4 gallon a minute.
.4 x 60 minutes = 24 gallons an hour.
Energy rquired to heat 25 gallons per hour up 30 degrees ( floor is 65 water temp is around 95 )  ... 6250 b.t.u.
1 kilowatt of energy equals 3412 btu.
This is just a wild guesstimate.
I do realize that there are btu/hours and kilowatt/ hours,  and trying to figure out the flow and all that, but overall, it does not sound like i will be using very much energy to keep my kitties warm.

Matthew Nistico wrote:Those are some stripped screw heads!

Yaa.  20 years old...

I'm feeling a little stripped as i get older too.

Matthew Nistico wrote:

So how were you able to overcome the minimum flow cut-off built into your heater?

This works right into my next post, because apparently this is why it was shutting off....

I still like Stiebel Eltron water heaters.

Installed the brand new flow sensor in my 20 year old water heater, turned on 2 zones and it ran flawlessly all day.
Once the 2nd zone shut off, after a while - the water heater stopped heating !

Time to do some troubleshooting...

Now, i knew the flow sensor was bad, when i tapped the old one with a screwdriver and it came on - thats fixed...
Works fine with 2 or more zones - so it does work...
Must be the flow.

Read the 20 year old - paper - owners manual, and found that there is a fine water filter at the base of the cold water inlet.
Opened that up, pulled the filter and of course since its 20 years old, it was half clogged with stuff.

It now has more flow ( built in flow meter on manifold )  with only 1 zone running, and the circulating pump is running a bit cooler now too...

Thank you Stieble Eltron !

The plan is to use the 20 year old on demand water heater from the old house, to run the radiant floor heating in the new house.
Ran into a bit of a snag.  The water heater has worked flawlessly all this time, but when moved over and installed, the slow ..., steady flow of water was not enough to turn it on.   Turns out the flow sensor was the issue.
All searches led to the same conclusion ... discontinued, no longer available.... just when i thought i was stuck with an orphan - i contacted Stiebel Eltron U.S.A.
Not only did they quickly locate the part i needed, but then worked out a discount as well.

The heater is now back up and running, ready to heat the house for the winter.

The president in the U.S.A may be despised by most, but i don't blame the people who live there.

Now awaiting the bill for the tariffs.