Oil Furnace / Hot Water Question

[Modeps]

Every winter, when showering in the morning, the water is luke warm. This is because the water from the furnace also goes to heat the house. We do not have an external tank to store some extra hot water, it all comes off of the coil from within the furnace.

If I want to remedy this situation in the most cost effective manner possible, what options do I have?

 

[skull]

I've never seen anything like what you describe. I don't know how or if you could hook up a tank to it. Water heaters are like $250 at home depot there easy to install if you can handle soldiering and hooking up a little bit of a electric. It would probably be around $800 or more to get one installed since you have never had one.

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: skull
I've never seen anything like what you describe. I don't know how or if you could hook up a tank to it. Water heaters are like $250 at home depot there easy to install if you can handle soldiering and hooking up a little bit of a electric. It would probably be around $800 or more to get one installed since you have never had one.

Really? I was under the impression that this setup was actually fairly common as my parents' house also has it, unless of course I just did a poor job of describing my setup... which is possible because I am pretty sleepy.

 

[Anubis]

Originally posted by: Modeps

Originally posted by: skull
I've never seen anything like what you describe. I don't know how or if you could hook up a tank to it. Water heaters are like $250 at home depot there easy to install if you can handle soldiering and hooking up a little bit of a electric. It would probably be around $800 or more to get one installed since you have never had one.

Really? I was under the impression that this setup was actually fairly common as my parents' house also has it, unless of course I just did a poor job of describing my setup... which is possible because I am pretty sleepy.

our water heats our house, its in the floor called radiant heating, we have the same issue

turning up the hot water temp helps

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: Anubis
our water heats our house, its in the floor called radiant heating, we have the same issue

turning up the hot water temp helps

We've just got baseboards for the heat, not anything in-floor. I've tried increasing the thermostat, but I'm almost thinking that has an adverse effect considering the hot water for the shower is now being used for the heat of the house.

 

[skull]

Originally posted by: Modeps

Originally posted by: skull
I've never seen anything like what you describe. I don't know how or if you could hook up a tank to it. Water heaters are like $250 at home depot there easy to install if you can handle soldiering and hooking up a little bit of a electric. It would probably be around $800 or more to get one installed since you have never had one.

Really? I was under the impression that this setup was actually fairly common as my parents' house also has it, unless of course I just did a poor job of describing my setup... which is possible because I am pretty sleepy.

Maybe its just where I live. I've seen plenty of boilers in houses but i've never seen hot water in the house heated by the boiler.

 

[waffleironhead]

storage tank

this is what is used when a boiler is running double duty.

 

[Geekbabe]

we have hot water provided by our oil burning furnance and have the same issue.I find if I wait to shower till about 1/2 hour after the heat kicks on in the morning that the water is hotter.

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: waffleironhead
storage tank

this is what is used when a boiler is running double duty.

Something like that would probably help out immensely. Do you know if electricity is required to keep it hot, or if it literally is just a reservoir? Also, how much would something like that run / cost to install?

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: Geekbabe
we have hot water provided by our oil burning furnance and have the same issue.I find if I wait to shower till about 1/2 hour after the heat kicks on in the morning that the water is hotter.

Good idea, I'll try setting my thermostat back a little while :thumbsup:

 

[radioouman]

I thought that radiant hot water heat was a closed system and not part of your house's hot water supply....

 

[Uppsala9496]

Wait at least 45 minutes after the heat has kicked on to shower.
If you have the heat go up before you get out of bed, by the time you go to shower, your hot water heater should have warmed up enough water for your hot shower.

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: Modeps

Originally posted by: waffleironhead
storage tank

this is what is used when a boiler is running double duty.

Something like that would probably help out immensely. Do you know if electricity is required to keep it hot, or if it literally is just a reservoir? Also, how much would something like that run / cost to install?

I see no hook up for heat so i think it is just a water heater without the heater part. i.e. a tank with insulation.

 

[freeway]

I have a oil fired boiler that heats both my hot water and my baseboard heaters. I have the same problem where the water in my shower will cool down to lukewarm for about a minute or two before heating up again. My parents have the same setup in their house and this cool down never happens. I tried raising the temperature of the furnace, but it gets too hot and blows the pressure release valve. I have a service contract on the furnace so I guess I will just have to call them out to see what is going on.

 

[Modeps]

Originally posted by: freeway
I have a oil fired boiler that heats both my hot water and my baseboard heaters. I have the same problem where the water in my shower will cool down to lukewarm for about a minute or two before heating up again. My parents have the same setup in their house and this cool down never happens. I tried raising the temperature of the furnace, but it gets too hot and blows the pressure release valve. I have a service contract on the furnace so I guess I will just have to call them out to see what is going on.

I actually also have a contract on my furnace, but never thought this would be included in their service. Let me know how you make out.

 

[PingSpike]

Our heat is baseboard and uses the boiler for hot water as well. He have a tank though. But now that the heat is going and the dishwasher and I'm taking a shower I sometimes get lower water pressure and luke warm water. Its not a problem the majority of the time though. If you don't have a reserve tank, thats probably the fix I would guess.

 

[Deathonastick]

You could try an on-demand heater for the bathroom.

 

[Number1]

Originally posted by: radioouman
I thought that radiant hot water heat was a closed system and not part of your house's hot water supply....

You are right.

I get hot water on demand trought my furnace. Works great here.

 

[OrganizedChaos]

what you have is very common in the northeast, my old house had what you want. I'm not sure if its legal/up to code today though. What we had was a 4 zone furnace, with each zone on its own thermostat and circulator. the furnace cycled however often as necessary to maintain aa minimum internal temp of 160 degrees. Now this seems wasteful but when there was no demand, and thus all 4 circulators off, it didn't have to cycle very often.

zones 1-3 were parts of the house, zone 4 is what your interested in.

what we had was your standard issue 60 gallon electric water heater, except with the heating coils disconnected. Instead the thermostat of the electric water heater was connected to relay box. This relay box drove the zone 4 circulator. Heres where things get a little complicated. The water heater had 4 pipes coming off it. 1. cold water in. 2. hot water out. 3. circulator in. 4. circulator out.

when the water heater thermostat decided it was time to heat the water, zone 4 circulator clicked on. this pumped the cold water from the bottom of the tank through the furnace(which remember is always kept at least 160 degrees year round, shuts off at 250) and back into the top of the tank. the great thing about this setup is the water heater can extract as much heat off the furnace as it needs. with a 160,000 BTU furnace we had pretty much unlimited hot water.

 

[Batti]

I had a system like that, with the same problem. I ended up separating the hot water out to a regular natural gas water heater. That works fantastic. I priced out the indirect tank (storage tank shown above) but the install was too expensive at the time. Those tanks run the coil from your current hot water into a closed loop in the storage tank, acting as a heat exchanger to the domestic hot water supply.

Having my water heater on a different fuel has the advantage of the water still being hot when there's a boiler issue.