The battle station is armed and fully operational! Seriously though, I got the glazing on got water flowing the past few days and did a test run today since there were periods of clear sky.
I filled the reservoir with plain water & took a long time fiddling with it to get the water all the way through the loop & work out the bubbles. Like hours. I ended up using a shop vac of the outlet side to help it through. Had a section of pex I forgot to cinch. I think the real key was clearing out the bubbles in the short section of pipe before the pump so it could create enough pressure. No leaks that I could find. I'll have to keep an eye on the revevoir level for a while as I'm sure it will continue working out bubbles. I'll eventually add the glycol to the reservoir & dump the water as it comes out till it runs glycol. No big rush since it's for freeze Protection.
The glazing installation was easy. They fit right into place and connected to the next one with polycarbonate connectors over the 2x4 glazing supports. I used gray roofing screws every 2 ft horizontally and every 1ft vertically. I then sealed the edges on the outside with black silicone caulk.
Running it today a few take aways:
1.The temperature didn't get over 100f, the high sun angle and the big tree shading it don't help.
2. I think my vertical collector sees higher temps due to more air temperature stratification height. The horizontal shape seems to give lower temps but they don't swing as much.
3. I'm really impressed by the heat exhange to the tank. I adjusted the controller to turn the pump on with a delta T to 16f and worked fine compared to the other collector that had to have a delta T of 50f to work similarly. I got 14f tank temp increase over the day of 100 gal, so 11,662 btu.
4. I think the vertical, wide profile will really help with preventing stagnation in the summer. With that tree perhaps too well. It might have to be cut down & maybe some reflective material on the ground. I think in the Winter & lower sun angles it will be a real beast.
