Best Of
Re: Seeking Engineer for Off-Grid Religious Facility Heating in the Mountain States
Not a heating pro, just a homeowner/mechanical engineer.
I will ask a question for the pros to weigh in on. Would gravity hot water not be the simplest option from a control point of view? With a steam system, you have no heat unless you get the water temp up to 212, and then you have the usual problems with venting, etc.
Seems to me a gravity hot water system would be more forgiving, since you can get heat from water at almost any temperature, so your supply water temp can vary widely and you don't have to be as fussy. Also, with the large water volume that you would have for such a large building, you have a large thermal storage mass in that water that can release its heat gradually over many hours, unlike steam that has essentially no thermal mass except the radiators and pipes.
And you have no vents to worry about, no balancing, no water hammer, no searching for the improperly pitched pipe that's causing trouble.
Room temp control can be as simple as TRV's on the radiators, and then it doesn't matter what the water supply temp is. You just fire up the wood boiler in the morning, get it hot enough for a reasonable supply water temp, and let it gravity circulate with the radiator TRV's doing the local temperature control. Then add wood to the boiler periodically throughout the day.
Am I missing something?
jesmed1
Re: Steam not reaching 6th floor
Well let's see. I suggest @JohnNY / He's in New York. Or maybe @clammy or @EzzyT /
In the meantime…
First, you don't need 3 psig. 2 psig is ample — and probably unneeded.
Second, you mention that the autofeeder feeds after it reaches the 3 psig. Where does that water go? If you are adding water on pretty much every cycle and the boiler isn't flooding, you have a leak somewhere — possibly a pretty big one.
Third, as noted by others above, pressure will not — cannot — cause water to back out of a properly piped boiler in any great quantity.
And last — a cycle of only a few minutes isn't going to heat all the radiation, even if the boiler is sized properly. Just not going to happen. Something else is amiss. Probably more than one thing.
You need boots on the ground who know what they are doing.
Re: EDR Calculation Help - In Need of a New Boiler
8-way is great, but not until the water is clean. Then it will help it stay clean.
Re: strong smell after boiler install
Could it be some oil etc in the water line causing the oil smell then coming out main vents or radiator vents depending on pipe system. Maybe this would explain why on all floors you are smelling it.
Re: Not Really a Radiator Vent. What am I?
Probably could get away withit with the huge chunks of iron they called boilers in those days.
Gonna have to take a hard pass on asbestos filtration though.
Re: Steam not reaching 6th floor
Shouldn't need 3psi ever. What are the size and length of your mains and what main vents do you have in place? Have you tried slowing down the lower floor radiators?
Re: Benefits of insulating the mains in the basement...
@ethicalpaul My Mom also grew up in Saskatchewan on a farm outside of Saskatoon. I enjoy tracking weather on my weather app for various cities so noticed indeed just last week they were less than -30F multiple nights and just hit -40F one night. Not too abnormal. I recall standing at the bus stop as a kid in Vermont at -35F which is the coldest outdoor temperature I have experienced (they didn't cancel school in those days). In college I worked in an ice research lab so would fiddle with ice samples in a cold box at -50F. For a minute or two was nice in the summer…
@Powe The coldest temperatures I am talking about here in Michigan are about -10F this winter. My recovery is artificially broken up by thermostat programming turning the boiler on and off for a series of 1/2 hour increments. Radiators are still putting out heat during the off cycles so temperature steadily rises. I also have an oversized boiler to deal with. Works fine for temperatures down close to -10F. Any lower I would likely reduce the setback for that night. If I were experiencing -40F I likely might not do a setback since I don't think my system would keep up on the recovery given the radiation I have in the house was not designed even back in the day for those temperatures plus some of the radiators have been moved around reducing the overall standing radiation in the house from original. I would likely also lower my swing temperature to 1/2 degree when that cold since otherwise individual cycles might start building pressure in my case. Sounds like you have a much more properly sized system and thus can still get away with your setbacks at that temperature.
Re: Uponor UFH
There is a misconception that radiant floors feel "hot."
Floor surface temps with radiant will be in the range of 70-75F, you skin temp is between 80-82F, so it feels cold.
Without radiant floor heating, the floor surface temp is usually between 60 and 65F, so yes, the floor will be warmer with radiant but not "hot"
I also try not to pay alot of time to the air temp, turn it up or down until you fell comfortable. Cover the digital display with some painters tape and adjust….don't peek. do this for about a week and now you will have a basepoint.
The radiant in my house feels comfortable to me at and air temp 69F, but at my in-laws, they like it at 73.
It will also depend upon the thermostat being used, you want tight or small differential setting or at least one design for hydronic floor heating. A basic warm air stat has wide differentials and therefore creates a wide air temp in the house and the radiant floor could be off for hours cooling down while the air stat is still within the band.
Dave H_2
Re: What's the heat-loss benefits of blown-in cellulose insulation into outside walls?
So my only decision was to swap from oil to gas and keep the steam. That's what I wanted to do. I had a general contractor to some work (recommended from a family member) who had an idiot foreman with a big mouth. He scared me about 'sweaty pipes' and all the pipes running on the perimeter of the basement. So he suggested forced air.
My first question was price. The price was higher than a straight conversion but it wasn't so high that I couldn't consider it. I know we can't discuss prices here. I thought it would be cool to get central heat and air and would modernize the house. The thing is that you can only make such a decision once. If I did the conversion, then HVAC later wouldn't make sense.
I made my decision based on price only which was bad. I had no idea to factor windows, insulation, etc. Just to sanity check, I got a second estimate and it was the same. (Don't laugh but my second estimate was from Sears Home Improvement that I saw in Valupak! - I wasn't too bright here but I had no idea who to call.I figured Sears is reputable). So I thought I did my due diligence.
So steam system is ripped out first. Then there were all kinds of gyrations around where to run ducts, where to put the furnace. On the onset it seemed simple - furnace in the attic and one in the basement with ducts in each. No ducts in wall . Simple! But how many vents are needed? The sun room had no decent access from the basement. Where should the furnace be located? I started to see these guys had absolutely no idea what they were doing. I fired them but not without having no heating system. I thought about suing. But I can't prove that they convinced me to go with HVAC. they could say I agreed to it. Which I did.
Only then did I find this forum and then realized that i should have kept the steam. HW was probably better than forced air because of the age of the home.
Complete and utter nightmare emotionally and financially. I had an infant daughter to care for, full time job, unemployed husband... didn't need the strain. Then on top of that got screwed by an incompetent heating contractor who put in a debacle of a heating system (another family recommendation - never going to my in laws for contracting advice!). I have to remember to count my blessings i life in order to not get completely depressed about this. Have to borrow money from my parents now to get this fixed.
But that's the story of how I lost my beautiful steam system. Also the emitters were convectors, buried in the wall. So they didn't even stick out that much. I have no idea how the steam system worked. But I'm sure it was just fine. In retrospect, I would have kept the oil for one season and tested it out. I was a complete IDIOT. I just can't believe how completely, completely stupid I was to just trust people without vetting them out. Idiot of the year award should go to me!
josieT
Re: Lennox Pulse Furnace “tune up” parts
Parts are no longer made for that furnace for a very good reason. Lennox stopped supporting that furnace decades ago. You might be able to find parts somewhere but its well past the point where that furnace should be replaced. It's a 43 year old furnace with a tendency to fail and cause carbon monoxide poisoning. One of my customers dog died from CO poisoning from a Pulse furnace.
Don't waste your money on parts. Budget towards replacing the furnace and buy some low level CO monitors.
