Batch Style Solar Water Heater

On August 25, 2007 in Uncategorized

As all extensive projects do, the solar cabin build has stagnated while good deals are found on the required materials.

In the true spirit of being broke, a new project was undertaken today. There was an older propane fired 30 gallon water heater out back by the barn, so I stripped it down to start preparing it to be a “Batch Style” solar water heater. Currently I am undecided as to whether I will use a glycol solution and just use this to help heat the house, or if we will use it as a preheater for the water heater we are using now to reduce energy use.

The way our house is currently oriented it would be rather easy to pipe a heated solution through the wall to a baseboard heater or old cast iron radiator. However, the bathroom is in an odd spot, but pretty close to the South West corner. Hard to tell what I will end up doing with it.

The tank started out like a regular old propane water heater, although a bit cruddy.

Like this (not the actual water heater I used):

Then I stripped the outer metal cover off, revealing the inner insulation. This step was rather labor intensive but would’ve been easier if I had succumbed to the urge to break out the power tools. As it was I made rather short order of it and had it stripped off in around 15 minutes. I found the easiest way to approach this part is to take off the top “cap” of the water heater and then split the outer casing down it’s lengthwise seam. Unfortunately I didn’t get any pictures of this step.

After removing the outer casing, I got to work on stripping the insulation. I was hoping it would just be fiberglass insulation like on the bottom, but the top was styrofoam and seemed like it had been poured between the outer casing and inner tank when wet, and then left to harden. Needless to say, this part was a messy step. I would suggest doing it in your garage or somewhere other than the lawn where you are going to get bits of styrofoam everywhere.

Here is what it looked like at that point:

And here it is after being totally stripped of insulation:

After cycling some water through it with a garden hose to make sure it wasn’t too dirty/rusty inside, I had to come to work. Tomorrow I will wirebrush and spraypaint it and then make an enclosure and get the plumbing done.

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