I am looking for information on installing a water heater to provide heat to my driveway. The former owner removed all the michanical equipment just before the bank forclosed. I don't have a choice about heating or not heating as the driveway is too steap to plow, snowblow, etc. The toubing installed in the driveway is in good shape and the cannections are in the garage, I just dont know what to hook to them, Any help will be apreciated.
I don't know anything about heating driveways ( I HAVE seen pictures of snow), but the immediate thought comes to mind of the enormous number of BTUs necessary to raise the temperature of several dozen tons of concrete just one degree.
Are heated driveways common? Or at least not rare?
plowing and salting are costly.here in pittsburgh they are becoming more common.
one slip and fall accident i had 10 years ago cost me dearly. knee surgery, will need knee replacement too. Had arthrospic knee surgery and nearly died in recovery after undiagnosed sleep apnea got me to quit breathing.... it was a very close thing.
missed lots of work.
you only need to get the slab a few degrees above freezing
The OP probably meant that it is too steep for plowing or blowing to be sufficient. IOW, it is too steep to use when it isn't completely clear of snow and/or ice.
No, not just any boiler will do. I don't know much about snow melt systems, but I do know that most boilers don't like to see any cooler than about 130 degrees F on the return water temp. With a snow melt system, I would guess that you could see 50 degree or cooler. You will need a special boiler made for that application, and of course you will need to fill the loop with glycol instead of pure water. As to the concern with water pooling up at the bottom of the driveway, I think that with most driveway snowmelt systems, the moisture contained in the snow will evaporate into the air as it is melting, so the water wont have a chance to run down the driveway and refreeze. That's what someone told me when I was asking questions about snow melt systems a few years ago. Like I said, though, I don't have any experience with them so I don't know for sure.
You need to find a company that is experienced in this type of thing to help you. Good luck.
No way, no how if it's going to melt any amount of snow at all is all the water going to be evaporated. W/o a drainage if it's allowed to cool below freezing again, it'll be a skating rink wherever there isn't drainage when it cools below freezing again.
To get the amount of heat you need, the right equipment is a boiler with enough output. An inefficient one is going to cost about $3000 to $4500. An efficient one will cost even more. If you have hot water heat in your house it may be possible to add an indirect fired hot water heater with circulator, sort of like having an additional zone on the system. It would be a closed loop since you'd use glycol for outdoors. The tank alone is in the $1000 range, plus some controls and labor.
In any case it is going to be costly to operate if you get large amounts of snow. I'd go for a shovel and sand.
Maybe a plumber? Possibly a friend might be able to help, at least get more ideas. Make a list of tests that will give the results you need to troubleshoot. Do you have any manufacturer names on any of the items? Hire a mechanical dynamics technician. Any movie grips in your area?
Years ago we moved to a house in NE Ohio that had a heated driveway. Since the driveway wasn't on a slope, I surmise it had been installed strictly for convenience. The circulated water was heated by a dedicated oil-fired boiler. There was a 6 or 8 inch wide grate at the foot of the driveway that ran the full width and emptied into the storm sewer, to dissapate the drainage water. I never measured the surface temperature, but I do know that we never had an accumulation of snow on that driveway in the 8 years we lived there. The walkway in front of the house was similarly treated, but with no drain, as the water ran into the grass on the treelawn.
Steap is something you do with a tea bag on a hill Toubing is a tube made from exotic imported material Cannections is the name of his recycling bin for those metal food containers
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