[Greenbuilding] Solar thermal hot water messed up

[Reuben Deumling]

Could you have a broken dip tube? A wild guess, but part of your scenario
sounds like that to me: hottest water coming off the top of the storage
tank, followed/interrupted by cold water that should have been introduced
at the bottom of the tank if the dip tube is functioning.

On Sun, May 24, 2015 at 11:10 AM, Ktot g <ktottotc at gmail.com> wrote:

> Being a holiday weekend, I cannot reach my installer for a few days, thus
> my question here.
>
> I have a solar thermal hot water system with (of course) panels, a large
> tank, various pumps, and a Rinnai for backup.
>
> The Rinnai is not coming on as the meter I adjust to cause it to turn on
> is set at 100 degrees and the temp is staying above that even though it’s
> pretty cloudy out. So I’m thinking the Rinnai is not the problem.
>
> I can get very hot water; when the upstairs meter is at 140, for example,
> the water is very hot, as it should be. But it lasts only two or so minutes
> then gets cold. Obviously this makes for very short or very cold showers,
> makes it hard to effectively wash dishes and so on.
>
> The pressure gauges by the tanks look fine to me (two tank ones around
> 140, the pressure tank at 32—should be about 30. And the solar thermal
> panel pumps are working (get hot, vibrate).
>
> There’s a Grundfoss pump just past the Rinnai that seems to always be
> flashing between 6 watts and 0 gym, even when I turn on a faucet and run
> hot water. So I’m wondering if that’s the problem.
>
> Or if there’s anything I can try to at least diagnose, if not fix, this
> myself. I live very far from the installer so if I have to have him out
> it’s going to cost me a fortune. Plus I prefer understanding how things
> function, fixing them myself, if at all possible.
>
> Any suggestions?
>
>
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