Opinions on replacing old boiler

[Oliman]

I'm looking at replacing a 25 year old oil-fired boiler and an electric water heater. I've decided to go with natural gas and have the gas company installing a gas line and meter in a couple of weeks. I live in a ranch style house in the Milwaukee, WI area where the temperatures can get down to -10 degrees F in the winter. It has stone walls and newer energy efficient windows. There is about 90 ft of fin-tube baseboard that heats about 1450 sq. ft on the main floor and a 20 ft run of fin-tube that heats a 500 sq ft rec room in the basement. It's all on one zone currently.

A friend of mine does commercial HVAC and recommended looking at a Boderus GB142 Boiler with DHW to replace the electric water heater. Since he hasn't done much residential work, he suggested I ask you guys what you would recommend.

What other boilers would you recommend that would be of comparable quality and more economically priced?

Is it worth the cost of going with a 90+% AFUE condensing boiler or should I go with a conventional boiler thats about 84% AFUE?

Since this seems to be a relatively new model boiler, has anyone had problems with a GB142?

Would you go with the DHW option with the boiler or would I be better off with an instant hot water heater?

Thanks in advance for any opinions or recommendations you have. Let me know if you need any other info.

Jim

[sysint]

I think you mean Buderus.

Fin tube is high temperature. I'd have to check to see what a Buderus outputs for temperatures.

Buderus also has a website forum you may want to ask your questions there too.

[cmajerus]

I think you mean Buderus.

Fin tube is high temperature. I'd have to check to see what a Buderus outputs for temperatures.

Buderus also has a website forum you may want to ask your questions there too.

Buderus will do high temp. We installed one on baseboard, works awesome. definetly go with the DHW tank. Also have them install an autofill and spirovent, with no capacity in the boiler itself any air in the system and the spirovent burps it out, the unit locks out on low pressure, with auto fill it will prevent this, although I am scared to leave the autofill on 100% of the time in the off chance you spring a leak, it can flood a house in a hurry. I leave em on for a couple days then have the HO shut the valve, then if they have low pressure again, they can just open the valve leave it run for a while then come back and shut the valve again.


Best part is it vents in PVC

[Oliman]

I did mean to say Buderus.

Thanks for your reply cmajerus. I'm glad to hear that the Buderus works well with baseboard. I wasn't sure if it was worth the extra cost to go with a condensing boiler. It would be nice to free up the floor space since this can mount on a wall.

I believe I currently have an airtrol and an air vent valve to remove air from the system. Is a spirovent the same thing or should I specifically ask to have a spirovent installed?

Since my house is stone, I thought it would be easier for the installer to install a concentric vent/intake since only one hole would have to be drilled through it. Since this would be installed in the basement, it would come out just above ground level. Can a concentric vent be routed up after it gets outside the house to get above snow level or does it always just go straight out the wall?

[karsthuntr]

This is a Spirovent:



Here is a Buderus oil boiler I did 2 weeks ago with spirovent installed in the pumping away configuration.

[Noel Murdough]

Nice piping work!

Noel