Gas heating boiler – warmth and comfort of your home

Recommendation points

• Gas heating boiler – pros and cons
• Choosing a gas heating boiler – choosing the right one
• Automation in gas boilers
• Which heating boiler to choose: wall-mounted or floor-standing?
• Which type of chimney is best?
• Ignition type

The article contains answers to questions: how to choose a gas boiler; mounted or floor – what’s the difference; how to calculate the required boiler power; what types of gas burners are; necessary and “extra” automation; principles of capacity building; types of ignition systems; the advantages of individual gas boilers over central heating; economic expediency.

Another cold season is over. It’s time to start preparing for the next cold weather, as the saying goes: “prepare the sled in the summer, and the cart in the winter.” Despite the differences in character and habits, in winter we all want one thing – to keep our homes warm. Since I don’t really want to rely on central heating from the local heating network in this matter, to put it mildly, we switch to individual heating boilers and decide for ourselves when to start the heating season and when to end it.

So, the decision to install your own heater has been made. It remains to solve a few more questions: where to get the required amount for the purchase and installation of an individual heating system, find masters to calculate and install it, choose the best type and model of a heating boiler. If I cannot help you in solving the first two questions, then I will be able to help you in choosing the optimal boiler.

Gas heating boiler – pros and cons

According to most parameters, the best type of heating boilers will be gas heating boilers and this is why: natural gas is cheap, economical, it pollutes and corrodes the boiler less than other types of fuel, does not require manual fuel loading and storage, unlike solid and liquid types fuel, no need to take a special place (subject to central gas supply).

The efficiency of a gas boiler is the highest – 90-95%, in contrast to the efficiency of solid fuel (58-60%) or liquid fuel / gas (70-80%) boilers.

Modern gas heating boilers can operate the entire heating season in automatic mode, without the need for constant monitoring. The undoubted advantage of a natural gas boiler will be the complete absence of any odors during its operation (the familiar smell of natural gas means that a leak has appeared somewhere – you need to call specialists!).

The only downside can be the absence of a gas pipeline in the vicinity of the building, in which it is necessary to install an individual heating system. This situation is developing in new-built cottage settlements – no, their gasification is expected, but only after some time (it is better to clarify the prospects for the future with the local administration).

By the way: if the issue of gas supply is nevertheless resolved in the foreseeable future, the best solution would be to install a boiler operating on any of the two types of fuel – liquid or gaseous. A universal heating boiler will cost more than one that runs only on gas or only on liquid fuel, but it does not have to be changed when supplying the central gas supply, which means that this option is more economical (despite the lower efficiency and large dimensions of the boiler).

Choosing a gas heating boiler – choosing the right one

First of all, we calculate the required boiler power in relation to a specific apartment / house. Power is usually expressed in kW. To heat an area of ​​10 m2, 1 kW of power will be required (provided that the premises are sufficiently insulated and the ceiling height does not exceed 3 m). When choosing a gas-fired heating boiler, it will be right to opt for a more powerful one than required. There are two reasons for this:

• Gas boilers are designed to operate with a nominal gas pressure of 13-20 mbar (100% power is achieved). Due to the fact that the real pressure in the gas supply network is often only 10 mbar (sometimes even lower, despite the requirements of GOST – at least 13 mbar), the boiler efficiency decreases. Those. the boiler produces no more than 60% of the power – high power will compensate for the low pressure in the gas network;
• The power reserve (from 15% or more) will increase the service life of the gas boiler, because continuous operation at full power increases wear.

Pay attention to what type of burner is installed on this gas boiler. There are two types of burners: atmospheric and pressure (turbocharging): the first type supplies gas to the furnace using the existing excess gas pressure in the network; the second type of burners provides overpressure independently, due to the installed air blower, providing more complete gas combustion and increasing the efficiency of the heating boiler.

Compared to atmospheric burners, pressure burners require high pressure in the gas network to a lesser extent, because able to lift it on their own. However, turbocharged burners are more expensive than atmospheric burners, are sold separately from boilers and their operation is accompanied by loud noise – the reason why the room for them needs to be soundproofed. The compensation will be fuel savings – up to 30%.

Automation in gas boilers

Most important: automatic shutdown in cases when the gas supply is cut off or reduced to a level below the minimum. It would be nice if the boiler turns on also automatically – when the gas supply is resumed. In addition, an autonomous gas boiler must be equipped with flame controllers (its presence), overheating, chimney draft level, automatic shutdown in any situation corresponding to an “emergency”.

Other automation – nothing more than unnecessary “bells and whistles”. The purchase of boilers capable of responding to changes in the weather, equipped with a sensor for determining the temperature inside the premises, has no practical sense. One composite sensor cannot perform a correct analysis of the total temperature in any way, because it is different in each room.

The automation of heating boilers is sensitive to voltage drops in the electrical network; to protect it, boilers must be equipped with stabilizers.

Which heating boiler to choose: wall-mounted or floor-standing?

It all depends on the size of the living space that needs to be heated.

Hinged gas boilers are compact, easier to install and operate. However, their power does not exceed 100 kW, they are all equipped with a steel heat exchanger and can only be equipped with an atmospheric burner. Therefore, their cost is about 2 times lower than the floor ones. By their design, hinged boilers resemble a miniature boiler room, are equipped with automation and, as a rule, have a stylish design. Such boilers are perfect for heating and / or hot water supply of a small cottage or apartment, allowing you to save costs for central hot water supply (often very questionable in quality).

The family of floor-standing gas boilers has great capabilities compared to hinged boilers, if only because they have a large capacity. But the difference is not only that. Floor standing boilers are more conservative, take up more space, are equipped not only with steel, but also with cast iron heat exchangers – less susceptible to corrosion, more resistant to wear, but also more fragile. They can be equipped with expensive, but more efficient forced draft burners, increasing the capacity of the gas boiler to several thousand kilowatts, which makes it possible to use such gas boilers in buildings of medium and large areas. Floor standing gas boilers with pressure burners can operate on two types of fuel: liquid and gaseous.

Gas boiler systems of both types can be single-circuit and double-circuit, i.e. in the first case – either to heat the premises, or to heat water for domestic needs, and in the second – to perform both tasks simultaneously (thanks to the built-in flow-through heat exchanger).

Floor-standing and wall-mounted gas boilers are produced as single-stage (one power level), two-stage (two-level power) and modulated power (smooth power regulation). The models of the last two types are more profitable in operation, since the need for the boiler to operate at full capacity is no more than a third of the cold season. In addition, a boiler with a two-stage system, compared to a single-stage boiler, has a longer service life (the burner wears out less when it is turned on / off), saves fuel and its payment, pollutes the atmosphere less, and allows expansion of possibilities due to the addition of additional boilers to it..

Which type of chimney is best?

Gas heating boilers are produced with both forced and natural draft. The second type, one might say, is classic: the chimney is brought out to the roof of the house. Forced draft has been used not so long ago and is more effective: boilers with such a draft are easier to install, and the exhaust of combustion products is performed much better – draft is created by a built-in fan through a special coaxial chimney (only a hole in the wall is required). The coaxial chimney has two functions: the exhaust itself and the return air supply to maintain combustion in the boiler – it is double (a kind of pipe in the pipe).

According to the combination of its capabilities and low cost, it is better to choose a heating boiler with a coaxial chimney.

Ignition type

Modern boilers are equipped with one of two ignition systems – piezo ignition or electric ignition. Electric ignition is more advantageous: constant combustion of the pilot flame is not required, in case of a sudden power outage, the boiler will be turned off automatically (during piezo ignition, it must be turned off manually).

On the Russian market there are gas heating boilers from the world’s largest manufacturers: German brands “Bosch” and “Buderus”, “Viessmann”, “Vaillant” and “Wolf”; Italian brands “Ariston” and “Baxi”, “Beretta” and “Biasi”, “Ferroli” and “Fondital”, “Lamborghini” and “Sime”; French brands Chappee, Frisquet and Saunier Dival; the Belgian “ACV”; Swiss “CTC”; Spanish “Roca”; Czech “Mora”, “Dakon” and “Protherm”; Japanese “Rinnai” and South Korean “Kuturami” – there are plenty to choose from. Gas heating boilers are offered by domestic factories – ZIOSAB CJSC and Zhukovsky Machine-Building Plant.

And if you take a closer look at the future of central hot water supply and heating, the transition of homeowners to independent heating and hot water supply to their homes is justified from any point of view:

• utility pipelines for decades of service are seriously worn out and not repairable;
• utilities do not have sufficient funds to completely replace pipelines and, in the foreseeable future, are not expected;
• the amount of annual payments for heating and hot water supply, given the low quality of service, is unreasonably high.

In any case, the final decision on the issue of switching to individual heating is yours..