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Re: Height difference between primary and emergency low water cutouts
@Gateacre said: Hey folks. Is there a standard for the height difference between a primary and emergency lwco? When our boiler was installed we were having issues with surging tripping the primary cutout. Rather than addressing water quality issues that were likely causing the problem, our contractor simply raised the primary cutout but not the emergency. As a result it takes about 20 seconds for the emergency cutout to trip when doing a blowdown leading to excessive fresh water being taken on.
And I had the same thought as @109A_5 has here:
" I've not been able to measure but I estimate I'm losing over 10gal every time I blowdown the cutouts. "
That is insane.
My M&M 67 trips the switch in seconds, like maybe a quart of water.
But then I looked at the geometry and understand the problem.
Once you get the water quality issue solved and have the surface properly skimmed, the surging will stop and you can put the LWCO levels closer together.
Re: Y-Pipe strainers
On Y strainers it's quite handy to put a blow down valve on them so you or building staff can blast out the shmutz more frequently, but like @109A_5 mentioned, they shouldn't really be installed upwards like that since they wont work properly that way
Re: Y-Pipe strainers
Larger strainer(s) may give you a longer service interval.
I think I would clean out the original strainer more often and see how it goes.
At least the strainers are doing something, IMO they are installed wrong.
109A_5
Re: old water heater
Hi, About pressure, I'd put a pressure gauge, the type that has a separate needle showing the highest pressure the gauge has seen, and put it on the tank's drain or some other hose bibb. This will let you know if pressure is really a problem. I like to see 40-60 psi and never higher than 80.
About the magic tool that will tell you the condition in the tank… it's the anode. It can be "read", so you have a very good idea of the tank's condition.
Yours, Larry
Re: Cutting a concrete radiant slab
I looked st sll the options fir routing and the line does run to an ejector pump located in the shop that is connected to this space . I looked at an over the top product also, but height is tight.
The cutting was easier than I thought, took about an hour and 1/2
Splicing and crimping took a lot longer
It was as much about the challenge as the destination.
Loop flow is under 1/2 gpm, so the 80 couplings are not too much of a restriction to flow
hot_rod
Re: Steam radiator valve and convector valve difference
you would need a union or a valve with a built in union if you don't have enough space for both.
mattmia2
Re: How to properly Purge with caleffi Fill/Purge cart?
It depends on how you have purge valve set up. Are you doing a zone by zone, or the whole system at once. You can buy purge valves, Webstone is one brand. Or build your own with a ball valve and two hose valves.
Get a Webstone, they have good purge cocks, better than a boiler drain for pumping into.
Shut off the fill valve
Fill the tank with about 10 gallons of water.
Pump into one valve, purge back into the tank from the other valve/ hose.
If there is a lot o0f air in the system you may need to top off the tank. As air comes out water from the tank replaces it.
You can also add a cleaner to the tank and circulate that for a day, if you have a dirty system.
This graphic shows pumping DI water into a system.
hot_rod
Re: Replacing cast iron piping
My house had the same monoflow fittings, they came apart fairly easily with a big pipe wrench.
Do you have past fuel consumption data for your house? That is a great way to check your heat loss calculation.
Re: Replacing cast iron piping
The pipe may seized but they likely aren't very corroded so if you break or carefully cut the fitting off a pipe or pipe out of a fitting you should be able to adapt to copper. Since it is a closed system the corrosion should be minimal unless there were leaks that were ignored for years.
If the emitters are cast iron radiators you may need return water temp protection on the boiler.
Sizing the boiler to match the loss will keep the heat more even.
With the monoflo system you need to have enough circulator to have enough flow in the mains so that the water takes both the main branch and the branch to the emitters. The main branch has less resistance than the loops out to the emitters so it is common to inadvertently under pump monoflo systems and have issues with some of the emitters heating.
mattmia2