Commercial DHW Systems, storage tanks vs indirect/direct fire

[Ngriswol01]

Hello, I do a lot of commercial service and installs. I frequently see DHW boilers (a LOT of burkay copper coil) to one or two storage tanks for buildings hot water. I rarely see an indirect or direct fire water heaters. I am curious what the advantages are to the storage tank system vs. an indirect or direct fire tank type. I’ve done lots of googling and can’t find anything.
Thanks!

 

[Fitter30]

Raypac and locIInvar copper fin tube worked on them a lot with storage tanks. Tanks are for volume. Hotels, commercial kitchens or retirement homes any place that uses lots of dhw. Take a 500k heater heat up 500+ gallons. Biggest problem is lack of maintenance cleaning the copper tube heat exchange out water side. Mineral build up gets to thick the tubing will warp, create hot spots and starts to leak. The fix either replace the coil but most time the whole heater because they can't have the down time.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[John Gayewski]

A storage tank is an indirect type of water heating.

The reason the tanks aren't heated is becuse the cost would be a lot higher. Buying a water heater that also stores and haeats 500 gal of water is probably astronomical in cost and engineering. Vs having another unit do the heating and just having an insulated tank hold the water that is readily used. Add a circulator and your done. Imagine the burner on a 500 gallon tank.