I have a clear plasic water hose that drains water from my furnace. When I had finished my basement I disconnected the humidifier both from its water source and unplugged the electrical cord, however, water still comes out of this clear plastic hose in large amounts (aproximatly 4 gal. per day) Where is this water coming from?
I would greatly appriciate anyone’s thought on this.
Furnace spec.: Gas, vented to the outside.
-Chief of all sinners.
Replies
If it is a high eff. (>90%) gas furnace and it is vented thru just a PVC pipe vs. flue, what you are seeing is the water vapor produced by CH4 combustion condensed to water. That is how they get the efficiency over 90%, taking the heat out of the 'steam' that is a product of combustion.
edit add on
HHV = higher heating value = total value of energy recovered from combustion of a fuel when the H2O products of combustion are condensed.
LHV = lower heating value = total value of energy from combustion when H2O vapor is allowed to escape.
Some unscrupulous marketing types take the recovered energy from a condensing furnance and divide by LHV to get very high efficiencies - that is OK to compare an old to a new furnace, but is technically incorrect as to efficiency of the device.
Edited 1/25/2005 8:52 pm ET by JUNKHOUND
Like JH said.
BE aware that the condensate is somewhat corrosive so it should be handled appropriately - it won't burn your skin or anything, but over time it can cause damage to stuff it touches.
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Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace
Edited 1/25/2005 10:37 pm ET by Bob Walker
This produces 4 gallons a day?-Chief of all sinners
I was just redoing my utility room so I had the condensate line on my 90+ dumping into a bucket last week - it was pretty cold during the week and it was outputting almost 5gal a day.
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Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace