Best Of
Re: Can I improve convection?
simply
Covering any emitter will reduce the output. If the heat doesn’t go to the room it winds up back in the boiler, + or - a small %.
As long as the rooms not cold there’s no reason to change it.
pecmsg
Re: AquaSmart 7600B lockout freezing my tenants half to death, jury rig fix?
Thanks Ed,
So the supply pipe is a decent enough proxy for the water temp in the boiler to use the strap on Aquastat, given the circulator will be constant on?
Re: Boiler Running Full Tilt, Cold House
Something does not add up. There is no way you have an 8.5 CO2 with only 27.700 BTU's with 100% modulation. I would even speculate that you can't even get ignition with the amount of air entering the burner. Your gas/air ratio would be so out of wack if you did get ignition it would be rumbling.
pedmec
Re: Can I improve convection?
I'd vote to remove the cover altogether! And if you want, install a shelf above the radiator for storage.
Covers have two purposes in my opinion. To keep kids from touching hot radiators and to dampen/disperse the heat out of the radiator.
You'll feel the heat radiating from it faster but it isn't going to add any additional btu's to the room. It might just "feel" hotter, quicker.
Re: TRV near wall
You can also get various types of remote actuators with remote sensing bulbs or remote sensing and setting.
mattmia2
Re: Running Hydro Coil & Plated Staple-Up Radiant at the same temperature
If you can actually make that work, that would be lovely. Big if. Generally speaking, a radiant floor will be much happier almost all the time at a lower, but steady temperature. At the same time, a hydrocoil is almost certain to want a higher temperature to avoid a feeling of — if not the reality of — a cool draught.
Now… all this means is a little extra plumbing and some slightly more sophisticated controls and one extra pump (well, maybe two, for flexibility). Will this make the setup more expensive? It will — but in the overall scope of your project, not that much.
What wants to happen is, basically, three loops: your primary boiler loop, the secondary radiant floor heating loop pulling off that with the usual temperature controlled mixing valve to mix return floor water with feed from the primary loop to get constant flow in the floor at an optimum temperature, and another secondary loop off the primary loop feeding the hydrocoil units. That one doesn't need to be mixed down.
With some intelligent controls and a good mod/con, you should be able to keep the return to mod/con down around 80 or 90 or so, most of the time, run the floor at perhaps 90 to 100 or so, and the hydrocols at as much as 140 to 150. It's all a matter of controlling firing rate and flow rates (and, for the hydrocoils, fan speeds).
Re: Running Hydro Coil & Plated Staple-Up Radiant at the same temperature
grab the spec sheet on the hydro coil and check the btu/ hr output at that AWT
130 SWT at 20 delta gives you 120 AWT. So enter the chart at that temperature
Same concept with the radiant, the R value of the floor and the btu output required determines the floors required SWT.
If anything the hydro coil may need higher SWT. You can buy air handlers with different coil size and capacity based on that SWT
It is easy enough to run a two temperature system.
hot_rod
Re: Can I improve convection?
Effectively, the covers make the radiators smaller, improving convection would make them bigger. Changing the size of the radiators doesn't affect system efficiency. The only reason to do it would be if the radiators are undersized with the covers and can't maintain temperature on the coldest days.
Re: Can I improve convection?
I don't believe you will see any improvement by modifying those covers. Spend your efforts elsewhere like improving venting and sealing the heating envelope.
Re: Help in placing one last cold air return..
Should be fine if the spaces are open to each other. You could cut the return in to the wall at the baseboard too. It is more work but it doesn't take up floor space.
mattmia2