Reiner Kunkel

Just read your post from 5 years and also the one from 3 month ago.

Some years ago I helped a friend of mine to establish a camping site with maty pitches spreading over many acres. We installed 2 shower blocks with 2 showers each and 2 water heaters similar to your description, one for each shower. We also had 2 washing up stations with a water heater in each, so a total of 6 water heaters. The showers were in general abused by the campers running them for long periods of time, as they were included in the stay.

The water supply had a high calcium content, so the heaters got "furred up" regularly, every 2 month. Each week the shower heads were removed and decalcified in a pot of commercial descaler used for boilers. They clogged up most regular.

The water heaters are more difficult to descale.

After the first season I made up a device that temporarily gets patched into the supply line.

This consists of an inline water filter housing with a filter cartridge. The inlet and outlet of the filter unit are fitted with flexible tap connectors that have service valves inline. After placing the cartridge into the filter unit the space between the cartridge and the wall of the filter is filled with acid crystals, all the way to the top.

Filter and unit are than screwed into the top.

The pipes are connected to allow the water to flow through the crystals, dissolving some of the acid on the way, than trough the filter, holding the undissolved crystals back, giving a saturated solution.

When connected to the heater, this will dissolve all calcium deposits. When used, it used to descale a heater in 5min at the most, with the heater working.

The chemical I used had a chemical indicator that turned from yellow, when active to blue when exhausted. The flushing with water afterwards will only take a few minutes.

This was done every four weeks in a season.

The good side:

1) Once the plumbing has been installed to fit the filter in line, there is no interference with the boiler needed.

2) All preparations can take place off stage.

3) Fast service time, little out of service time.


The not so good side:

1) Primary outlay of installation cost.

2) The heat exchanger on the boiler will suffer if made from copper or brass, less so if manufactured from stainless. ( few affordable ones are)

3) Plan for replacement heat exchanger if descaled more than 20 times this way. If other descaling acid is used it might be different .


The advantage I found with this method was:

The driving water pressure forced the water through the heat exchanger getting the acid to all parts the of the coil.

The water gets heated and becomes more reactive once the heater kicks in.

As the water flows through filter faster, less acid gets dissolved.

With taps in feed and drain, the filter unit can be left fully charged until next use.


I hope this will help someone who experiences a clogged heater,

all the best, Reiner.

25 years ago my family moved to our current location with great thoughts of removing the current house and replacing it with a new design. Once we had lived in the present house for some time, we came to like it and kept it as it was.

The idea was to use a building system that combines round timber as load bearers in upright position, with a shutter applied straw and clay slurry as wall fabric. The timbers used are spruce thinning, or coppice timbers with 150mm diameter. The main posts are made from four such timbers set as two facing one way and two facing the opposite way to keep the post dimensions continuous and tied into a square.
The wall fabric is made from straw, the last case used linseed straw, but any straw will do as t is for binding. A good source of clean clay is important.
The clay is made into slurry with a tub and a slow stirrer, or a cement mixer with a dustbin lid covering the hole.
The slurry is then mixed with the straw in a trough the African way ( feet or wellies). This will coat the straw with the clay slurry and make a brown mess.
The effect that takes place: The wet clay slurry will coat the straw and transfer some of the moisture to the straw, making it malleable. This will than be compacted between shutters, forming the walls. The posts will be inside the wall, this meaning that there is a cover of the frame work to protect against fire.
I build a wall like that here in England in the 1990ies when straw bail walls became popular, after having a dispute with a building inspector about fire hazards related to walls containing straw.
After drying, that took ages, I set a propane powered space heater 6” away from the wall with an output of 15Kw + and left it there for 60min. The surface in the immediate area of maximum heat turned red and after an hour the area had glazed but there was no noticeable increase in temperature on the other side of the wall.
However, the straw had burned and left the clay structure to 50mm deep, the timbers were unaffected and retained their stability.
Advantage:
1) Sourcing close by local materials, like spruce cuttings, straw and clay.
2) No sawmill required to square off timbers.
3) Life expectancy of 200Years if weather cladding is applied. (render or timber against rain)
4) Can be fully composted after use.
5) Earth quake proof.
6) Odour free.

Disadvantages:
1) As stated above, planning red rag to a bull.
2) Needs protecting from flooding, and if flooded can settle.
3) Messy to construct.
4) Difficult to dismember and can not be burned.
5) Challenge to contemporary builders minds.

If you have money and no time, stick with bricks.
If you have materials like above around and lots of time and little money and don’t look at your home as an investment, but a harmonious place to live and be, consider it.
With hope for a good outcome.

Anne Miller wrote:Free energy is a touchy subject...

I have seen other post here on the forum about that pump conception ... it that free energy?

The only example I know of about free energy is when sunlight warms a room.

What is perceived as free energy is generally based on the way we perceive it as so called free. It just depends on the way we experience hardship or benefit.
Take the room filling with light from the sun. The room needs to be build first. It will have to have a window or opening to let the sunshine in. It will have to have to have some insulation to keep the heat within. It will have to face the direction of the light.
All the above conditions are generated by investment of energy, the hardship part of the equation. When the design is such, that natural sunlight can not reach the room, different measures can be taken.
51deg north where I live, sun shines at a shallow angle in winter. We have a pond away from the house at an angle that reflects the light into the house in winter. We also have leaved trees. In summer the light gets reflected at a steeper angle, and the light reflected from the water does not enter the room, so it remains cool. Also, when the trees are in leaf, they stop the rising and setting sun shining directly into the rooms.
So by providing the conditions, the investment, we obtain the benefit as a trade-off. Recognition of the fact that all energy is free, but the conversion imposes an investment that is generally monetised, kept secret, guarded, copyrighted and sold, fake and true.
I hope that we can pool our knowledge to further wise investment through discussion and explanation in non convoluted terminology with least abbreviations and simple thought. ( common sense) .
With growing knowledge the responsibility to share also grows. Most of my clients are scared to ask questions at first, in order not to appear stupid, once they know that I do not judge them, they unpack.

Some ideas are workable.
The diameter of the container is relevant, but not at the dimensions stated. The syphon will come to equilibrium at the point where both water levels are the same height, the one in the suction pipe and the one in the tank. There will be a very small difference in level because of capillary action. However, if the pipe diameter of the suction pipe is reduced to 0.001mm the lift could be achieved.
progress would be extremely slow,
Graph below



;  

You say there is only room for 3 meter depth before the clay ends and the water in wells at location is alkaline. Rainwater has a tendency of being oxygen rich and acidic.
I would top up the rainwater with well water in search of a neutral pH of 7.
Use a pond liner or a potable storage tank liner as a barrier. Clay will dry out in a dry summer or winter. We always assume drought only occurs in summers.
The absorption rate of your filler is easily ascertained weight. Fill a bucket of known volume with your filler, compact it, weigh it, fill it with water until saturated, weigh it again and hey presto you know how much water it has absorbed. 1L = 1Kg. The Venetians had water on both sides of the clay most of the time and a completely different climate.
I just hope this will help.
Reiner.  

Further to my last posting above with regards to self starting ram pump.

Interesting idea and very common. I had this problem before and came to a solution.
Problem:
Water below the house of potable (drinking water) quality running at 16L/min. Animals need water in the fields 200m away on either side and 10m above the spring. The spring is 10m above the house and 100m away from the house.
The setup:
All water from the spring is collected in a sanitised installation and send to 10000L tank by the house. The water overflows from the tank (most time at full flow) to a drive tank for a ram pump. This is made from a plastic street gully with a rain proof lid. I only used this as it is the cheapest solution as I needed at least a foot of space in diameter. The drive pipe to the ram pump is fitted to the bottom of the tank and reaches into the tank with a 1 inch thread. The drive pipe to the ram pump is 12m long and 1" bore stainless. This will not flex and diminish the ram effect. The ram pump is made entirely of stainless steel, but the expansion vessel. The supply pipe from the pump feeds a tank on top of the farm that supplies all fields above the house with animal water, everything below the house is supplied from the storage tank by the house direct.
As the animal water for the field below the house is drawn from the tank that feeds the ram pump, the ram pump water supply will be interrupted. That is where the extended thread into drive tank (as mentioned above) comes into action. On the end thread inside the tank is a elbow facing upwards that has 1.5" modified checkvalve on it that is fitted in its blocked direction. The modification is such, that an eyelet has been fitted to the plunger, allowing it be opened. On the eyelet is a piece of wire that connects to the handle of petrol can as a float.
Here is how it woks:
When there is enough water filling the drive tank, the petrol can, working as a float, opens the reverse checkvalve and lets water into the drive pipe, operating the ram pump, as it will have no resistance if the pipe is empty. If the checkvalve in the pump is good and has retained pressure and the supply pipe is full and not draining the back pressure, all will work.
Now, when the drive tank lacks water, the float will lower and stop the flow into the pipe. The valve will be sucked onto the seat, and if there is seepage the remaining water in the drive tank will keep the drive pipe full as long as there are no air leaks into the pipe on the way to the pump.  
Using solar power for pumping is less complicated. All you need is a 12V 60W caravan shower pump and 2 100W PV panels, one facing  SSE the other SSW and you will have 60W some of the day, feed the output of that into the delivery pipe via a check valve for protection.

Hope this might help. All the best,
Cesar.