Solid Fuel Swimming Pool Heating
 

Hi,

After much pressure from children I am seriously looking at getting a
http://www.poolstore.co.uk/ishop/691/shopscr138.html low cost above ground
swimming pool.

The Sister in law purchased one 5 years ago and I have to say in terms of £
/ unit pleasure / year it's been very good value....though it's now at the
end of it's life.

The main negative is that it's darned cold. Children seem relatively
immune, but for me the temperature removes the fun.

I am however the proud owner of a HUGE pile of oak logs after some recent
tree maintenance. I reckon there are multiple Gigajoules of energy therein.

Any suggestions as to how to transfer this energy from logs to pool? It
takes the edge of a G&T when your body core temperature gets too
low.........

My thoughts:

2nd hand log burning stove with back boiler Indirect HW tank pool. I
have however been told in the past that it's not good to have pool water
passing through copper pipes. Something to do with ions !?!?! Is this
true or is it horse****?

Any other ideas or suggestions?

(BTW I have a Solar plan too)

D

On Mon, 21 Feb 2005 08:38:35 -0000, vortex2 wrote:

I am however the proud owner of a HUGE pile of oak logs after some
recent tree maintenance. I reckon there are multiple Gigajoules of

Well that pool 15' dia by 3' deep roughly has about 5,000l of water in
it. So you need 5,000 x 4.18 = approx 21,000kJ of energy (6kWHr) to
raise its temperature by 1C (in 1 hour) but that is *not* taking into
account any losses. I expect the losses from such a pool are going to
be quite high... and you're going to want a bit more than a 1C temp
gain.

So you want a swim in water at 15C (slighly warmer than summer UK sea
temp) starting with water at 10C and you are willing to keep the wood
burner stoked and burning well for 5hrs. Lets assume 50% losses, I
wouldn't be surprised if they are higher mind...

Energy is 5000 x 4.18 x 5 x 2 = 210,000kJ over 5 hrs = 42,000kJ/hr or
roughly 12kWhr, that is quite a large but not impossible wood burner.
But it will need feeding fairly frequently over that 5 hrs to maintain
12kW output.

(BTW I have a Solar plan too)

Google back in here to last year? A couple of threads about solar pool
heating, seemed to be pretty cheap and very effective. The power
levels are no where near as high as the wood burner but lower levels
for much longer periods and without effort have a lot going for
them...

--
Cheers
Dave. pam is missing e-mail

On Mon, 21 Feb 2005 08:38:35 -0000, vortex2 wrote:

I am however the proud owner of a HUGE pile of oak logs after some
recent tree maintenance. I reckon there are multiple Gigajoules of



Solar will give more heat for far less trouble and far less expense. It
really is the way to go with pool haeting. All you need is a huge
length of plastic pipe and a pump. And for greater output, some ali
foil.

Lay ali foil down
Coil pipe into a huge coil, but with a pipe's width space between every
turn. The combination of this spacing plus the ali gives a lot more
output per pipe length)

Add pump, away you go.


But before heating it, it would make best sense to stop throwing all
the heat away and fit a pool cover.


NT

Dave Liquorice wrote in message ...
On Mon, 21 Feb 2005 08:38:35 -0000, vortex2 wrote:

I am however the proud owner of a HUGE pile of oak logs after some
recent tree maintenance.

You might be surprised how quickly you get through the huge pile. We
heat our house all the time with oak, woodburners get through an
enormous amount.

I reckon there are multiple Gigajoules of

Well that pool 15' dia by 3' deep roughly has about 5,000l of water in
it. So you need 5,000 x 4.18 = approx 21,000kJ of energy (6kWHr)

snip rest of useful stuff. Just posting to say that I am currently
researching this too, and I also have vague ideas of trying use a
woodburner to heat a sauna and provide some heat for a pool. I'll post
again if I get anywhere with it. Don't go away Dave, I'm impressed by
your sums :-) If by any chance anyone has ever had a combined
sauna/pool system heated by a woodburner, do tell....

Holly, in France.
Holiday home in the Dordogne,
website: http://la-plaine.chez.tiscali.fr

wrote in message
oups.com...
On Mon, 21 Feb 2005 08:38:35 -0000, vortex2 wrote:

I am however the proud owner of a HUGE pile of oak logs after some
recent tree maintenance. I reckon there are multiple Gigajoules of



Solar will give more heat for far less trouble and far less expense. It
really is the way to go with pool haeting. All you need is a huge
length of plastic pipe and a pump. And for greater output, some ali
foil.

Lay ali foil down
Coil pipe into a huge coil, but with a pipe's width space between every
turn. The combination of this spacing plus the ali gives a lot more
output per pipe length)


Cover pipe with polythene sheeting to retain heat ... then

Add pump, away you go.


Also replacing the ali foil with something like Airtec or thin Kingspan will
avoid heat loss to the ground.

Mike wrote:
wrote in message
oups.com.

Solar will give more heat for far less trouble and far less
expense. It
really is the way to go with pool haeting.

Cover pipe with polythene sheeting to retain heat ... then

Also replacing the ali foil with something like Airtec or thin
Kingspan will
avoid heat loss to the ground.


Those would be advisable for DHW solar panels, but counterproductive
for pool haeting panels.

Pool solar panels operate at 2-3C above pool water temp, so covering
with poly would block out more light than any losses. And insulation
underneath would achieve nothing. Better to spend the tenner on more
pipe.


NT