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Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
the steam piping and return look pretty ok. Skimming is not draining and yes your gauge glass shows signs of oil requiring skimming.
The makeup water piping is a horror show but that won’t affect your boiler’s performance
Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
Did you start out with the statement that your boiler needs water weekly. I would think that your boiler is "losing water abnormally".
And your contract says "We hereby state that the work we have proposed will correct the problems associated with the improperly piped boiler and that all of the radiators will heat thoroughly and evenly, the boiler not lose water abnormally, the boiler water will stop surging and the boiler will stop short cycling. In the event that the work we complete does not improve the situation then all monies paid for our work shall be refunded in full."
Based on that line in the contract, I think you need to apply for the "refund in full" in writing. See how fast they start looking for that leak.
Start keeping a written log of how much water you are adding and how often.
In order to know how much water you are adding, you can mark the water line with tape on the gauge glass. Then mark the spot where the LWCO stops the burner by removing that much water into a bucket. From the bucket, measure how many quarts or gallons that much water is on the gauge glass. (For example 1.5" on gauge glass = 2.7 gallons or something like that)
Now every time you need to add water you know how many gallons you are adding and you can write it down with the date and keep a record of it.
That info will hold up in court if that boiler is still losing water in 3 years when it gets to court.
But it won't get that far. I had the same thing happen on a church that used 999 gallons of water in the first 6 weeks of operation. I found a buried wet return in a crawlspace that was rotted away. All the return condensate from that section of the building was draining into the crawl space under the sand. The church agreed to pay extra for that pipe repair. And that repair solved the boiler water loss problem.
Re: Boiler oversized, should I turn it off?
If the baseboard are warm or hot when the zone isn't running, then that's what we call a heat rise. There should be a Flo valve on the boiler that prevents the hot water from traveling through the zone unless the circulator comes on.
You can also make the aquastat cold start. High 160°, Low off.
Looks like I'm being redundant.
HVACNUT
Re: HTP Boiler short cycle
You need to provide the p/n of the current board. I'll ask them how old it is and how far it was from the current board………….if I can get the fellow I was working with back then. It's been 7 years now.
LRCCBJ
Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
Valves are easy
If valve is leaking at the valve stem :
First, try tightening the top (packing) nut 1/4 turn. That's usually enough.
If it's still leaking, turn boiler off, remove the packing nut and use a pick , like a nut pick or dentist's pick to remove the old packing; get some new thin valve packing at the hardware store and wrap around the valve stem while stuffing it gently onto the gap where the old packing was. when you get to 1/16 or so over the top replace the packing nut and SLIGHTLY tighten. If you can't turn the handle you tightened it too much. If it's still leaking, tighten a little more.
Vents unscrew. Again Boiler off, unscrew old vent, put some teflon thread tape on new vent(be careful not to occlude the port) and screw in. Vent should be vertical- only hand tighten these.
Maid -o-mist and Gorton are decent rad vents. Get them at Supplyhouse.com- NOT your local Home Depot.
The red circle is your main vent
This should be removed and the pipe replaced with a 3/4 street elbow to at least an 8" nipple. Put a Gorton #1 main vent on the end. Your installer should do that for a reasonable fee.
Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
If they excluded it in their quote, then it was fair.
Re: Boiler oversized, should I turn it off?
This is a cold start setup.
The boiler is MORE efficient because you are not maintaining 160F when you don't need it. The boiler sits idle until you DO need it and then it climbs to 180F.
I do think you don't need anywhere near 180F to heat that building. Experiment with 170F for HL. If that works, experiment with 160F. Somewhere, you will not be happy because the boiler won't heat the building. I cannot tell you if that value is 160F or 170F or 180F. It depends on the outdoor temperature. For the greatest efficiency, you adjust HL based on the season. You need higher HL in the dead of winter but you certainly don't need it in September or in April.
LRCCBJ
Re: Boiler Heat Gauge Inquiry
The temperature rise after shutdown isn't that uncommon, if the circulating pumps shut off at the same time. This is particularly true of older, heavier boilers which have a lot of cast iron which gets nice and hot.
This is not to say that the aquastat may not be functioning properly! But if the temperature rise is after the burner and pumps shut down, it may be more or less normal. The solution is a post firing purge with the pump — but that may be more trouble than it's worth.
Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
As I have been heard to say… one drip every 10 seconds is a gallon a day.
Re: new crown gas fired steam boilers - water needed every week
Well they should have put checking/replacing any bad vents in their boiler install quote, are you sure they didn't?
To see if vents are working, you set up a long call for heat, like make the system have to gain like 5 degrees. Then you run around to all the radiators to see if they are filling with steam. That tells you the vent is letting air out like it should.
Then you keep running around to all the radiators until they start to completely fill up with steam all the way to the vent. When steam gets to a vent and makes it "steam hot" the vent should close and not allow any steam to escape. You can hold a spoon in front of the little hole in the vent to see if it's letting out steam.
Also check the valve (note the difference between a steam vent, and the radiator's valve that has a handle on it) to see if it is leaking, hissing, or dripping.
You don't want to see any hissing, fogging of the spoon, or dripping anywhere because you should only be having to add like a gallon per month to these boilers.