Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
John Rumm wrote:
The only thing going is that they are cheap as long as you can handle
a thin trickle of hot water to one hot tap or shower at a time.
I'm sorry but that is utter nonsense in relation to modern combis.

Alas in this area TNP is no different from Dribble - both true
believers, and neither is going to let inconvenient facts get in the way
of their dogma.

I'd like to hear of a combi which can fill a bath as quickly as two 3/4"
taps, one of which is supplying water at 60C, and the other cold. And feed
another hot tap or two in the house at the same time.

The thing with a storage system is you can design it to do near enough
what you want - assuming you can site the header tank reasonably.

What header tank? mines 32 miles away and a 100ft higher..

Any
instant system has practical limits.

Yes.

tony sayer wrote:
All as maybe.. but the Gas now is coming from the other side of the
channel, the coal is here under our feet....
And, according to what I've been told by people who should know, because
of the way the pits were closed, it will not be economically accessible
at any time in the foreseeable future.

The pits round here were closed with what was then a couple of centuries
of accessible reserves, but which is now totally unusable due to tunnel
collapses and the possibility of digging a bit too far and letting water
in with a head of a thousand feet or more from a tunnel they don't know
about.


All of what we have?..

Pretty much, yes. Certainly round here, it was all deep mines, some up
to half a mile down. All the pits (Originally a couple of hundred
pitheads, at closure one superpit, with four pitheads.) are linked
underground, too, so when one pit flooded, so did all the others. I
don't know the figures offhand, but I'd be surprised if you could get
more than halfway down to the coal nowadays.

List of seams at Hanley Deep Pit:-

WINGHAY 4/6 FT THICK AT 129 FT
BILLY COAL 1/6 FT THICK AT 275 FT
ROWHURST + RIDER 12 FT THICK AT 508 FT
BURNWOOD 5/2 FT THICK AT 589 FT
TWIST 4 FT THICK AT 650 FT
GRANVILLE'S 7 FT THICK AT 1120 FT (Birchenwood)
MOSS 3/10 FT THICK AT 1190 FT
MOSS CANNEL 3 FT THICK AT 1225 FT
FIVE FEET 2/3 FT THICK AT 1272 FT
YARD 3/6 FT THICK AT 1409 FT
RAGMAN 3/10 FT THICK AT 1432 FT
ROUGH SEVEN FEET 2/3 FT THICK AT 1448 FT
HAMS 4/6 FT THICK AT 1517 FT
BELLRINGER 2/6 FT THICK AT 1646 FT
TEN FEET 5/6 FT THICK AT 1786 FT
BOWLING ALLEY 4/3 FT THICK AT 1942 FT
HOLLY LANE 3/6 FT THICK AT 2036 FT
HARDMINE 4/6 FT THICK AT 2126 FT
BANBURY 3/6 FT THICK AT 2418 FT
COCKSHEAD 7/4 FT THICK AT 2583 FT

7/4 means 7 feet 4 inches.

Not untypical of local conditions. Add to that the fractured nature of
the rock round the seams, and now *in* the seams due to tunnel collapse,
and you'll see why the pits would be impossible to re-open.

Some of the pits elsewhere that survived the closures are still
producing, and there's a bit of open cast that's getting to be worth
going for.

--
Tciao for Now!

John.

On Mar 13, 12:07*pm, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
harry wrote:
On Mar 12, 6:59 pm, tony sayer wrote:
In article
ps.com, Andy Dingley scribeth thus

On Mar 12, 8:40 am, harry wrote:
The age of gas is finished.
I have some sympathy with this view, but are you going to nip into
your Tardis and go back to tell Thatcher not to build our energy
generating capacity on gas too? * If you follow the web links that TNP
has been posting lately, it's amazing just how much of total grid
output has been coming from gas of late.
If the gas is finished, or if Putin turns the tap off again, not only
will the heating go off, but the lights will too.
I'm quite surprised that a fuel like Gas is being used up much faster
than what it ought be whereas coal is plentyfuel..
--
Tony Sayer

Gas power stations are much cheaper to build than any other sort.
No boilers etc. just a gas turbine. They can be quickly started too in
an emergency. (Thought this is undesireable)

Wrong on both counts. CCGT sets do have a boiler and a steam turbine on
the back and are in fact designed as fast start emergency backup as well
as continuous operation.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Only if combined cycle.

Not untypical of local conditions. Add to that the fractured nature of
the rock round the seams, and now *in* the seams due to tunnel collapse,
and you'll see why the pits would be impossible to re-open.

I suspect that if it was wanted then they'd develop way to get it out
which I suppose will cost more then what it might have done otherwise.

So what is the percentage of UK coal reserves open cast available to
deep mined thats accessible?..


Some of the pits elsewhere that survived the closures are still
producing, and there's a bit of open cast that's getting to be worth
going for.


--
Tony Sayer

On Mar 13, 3:27*pm, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:
I'd like to hear of a combi which can fill a bath as quickly as two 3/4"
taps, one of which is supplying water at 60C, and the other cold.

I don't need to fill a bath that quickly, so the question is moot. I
just need to fill a bath quickly enough that it's ready for me by the
time I've got undressed. Anything else is just superfluous.

harry wrote:
On Mar 13, 12:07 pm, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
harry wrote:
On Mar 12, 6:59 pm, tony sayer wrote:
In article
ps.com, Andy Dingley scribeth thus
On Mar 12, 8:40 am, harry wrote:
The age of gas is finished.
I have some sympathy with this view, but are you going to nip into
your Tardis and go back to tell Thatcher not to build our energy
generating capacity on gas too? If you follow the web links that TNP
has been posting lately, it's amazing just how much of total grid
output has been coming from gas of late.
If the gas is finished, or if Putin turns the tap off again, not only
will the heating go off, but the lights will too.
I'm quite surprised that a fuel like Gas is being used up much faster
than what it ought be whereas coal is plentyfuel..
--
Tony Sayer
Gas power stations are much cheaper to build than any other sort.
No boilers etc. just a gas turbine. They can be quickly started too in
an emergency. (Thought this is undesireable)
Wrong on both counts. CCGT sets do have a boiler and a steam turbine on
the back and are in fact designed as fast start emergency backup as well
as continuous operation.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Only if combined cycle.
Not many OCGT sets around...because of high fuel cost they are only used
in extreme '**** we are about to have a blackout, start the diesels
captain' sort of situations.

tony sayer wrote:
Not untypical of local conditions. Add to that the fractured nature of
the rock round the seams, and now *in* the seams due to tunnel collapse,
and you'll see why the pits would be impossible to re-open.

I suspect that if it was wanted then they'd develop way to get it out
which I suppose will cost more then what it might have done otherwise.

So what is the percentage of UK coal reserves open cast available to
deep mined thats accessible?..


we mined all the easy stuff of any quality out in the 40s and 50s.

In short there is a lot of coal BUT its all completely inaccessible *at
low cost*.

The sad truth is we cannot feed ourselves or keep ourselves warm without
imports.

Andy Dingley wrote:
On Mar 13, 3:27 pm, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:
I'd like to hear of a combi which can fill a bath as quickly as two 3/4"
taps, one of which is supplying water at 60C, and the other cold.

I don't need to fill a bath that quickly, so the question is moot. I
just need to fill a bath quickly enough that it's ready for me by the
time I've got undressed.

well that takes about 5 seconds.

Anything else is just superfluous.

Agreed: sub one second bath times are superfluous.

In article
,
harry wrote:
What is the point of a combi AND a hot water store? None I would say.

I could see it being useful. If say the storage was a long way from the
kitchen and the boiler close. Use the combi side just for kitchen hot
water.

--
*The severity of the itch is proportional to the reach *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

In message , John
Rumm writes
On 14/03/2011 10:06, harry wrote:

Precisely. These are all things one needs to consider. In my case, a
conventional gravity fed storage system won't hack it - no space for the
header tank and not enough head. Combi (alone) won't hack it either -
not enough peak delivery. Hence mains pressure storage system, or large
heatbank with substantial HE and possibly a combi as well is what fits
the bill.

What is the point of a combi AND a hot water store? None I would say.

Its one possible solution that would tick most of the right boxes.

Ultimate design will have two baths, three showers. Peak flow
requirements are high. Mains water flow rate and pressure availability
are high. There is a large airing cupboard available for a substantial
size of cylinder, and no loft space at all. Airing cupboard is right
next to downstairs shower room, and right under main bathroom, which is
right next the en-suite - all nicely concentrated in the middle of the
house. Kitchen and utility room are at least 40' of pipe away at the
back of the house.

Heating needs three zones in total, two heating with independent
programmable room stats, and one for water. Split temperature operation
is required for cylinder recharge, and full weather compensation with
external sensor.

So a system boiler plus unvented cylinder, or heatbank with flowswitch,
pump, and large PHE could adequately provide the required peak flow for
baths / showers. However there would be (as now) a significant dead leg
to get hot water to the kitchen. So given there is little difference in
price, or complexity between a system boiler and a combi, one could use
the latter, and have it HW output feed just the kitchen and utility
room - in which it would be located. You could also then set it to
provide hotter water there than that set on the main blending valve on
the output of the cylinder, and you would also get pottable hot water.

Fit an under sink heater? It solved similar issues for us. I actually
fed it from the hot supply to take advantage of softened water.

A bit of nifty work with some isolation valves would also allow for a
bit of two way backup. If the combi part failed, you could route
cylinder water to the kitchen, and if there was a cylinder problem you
could route combi water to the baths/showers. If the boiler goes
totally unserviceable, then a couple of immersion heaters in the
cylinder can take over.

Can you suggest a better solution?

What me?

regards


--
Tim Lamb

In article ,
harry wrote:

What is the point of a combi AND a hot water store? None I would say.

Alpha flowsmart is a combination of both

http://www.alpha-innovation.co.uk/pr...mart/991603208

25 or 50l Store is used in the feed to the boiler via a blending valve - idea
is that the combi is fed warm water so doesn't have to work as hard. When
incoming feed is icy cold in the winter it makes a difference.

Darren