Welcome! Here are the website rules, as well as some tips for using this forum.
Need to contact us? Visit https://heatinghelp.com/contact-us/.
Click here to Find a Contractor in your area.
If our community has helped you, please consider making a contribution to support this website. Thanks!
Best Of
Re: San Francisco steam help
It looks like your steam pressure is set too high. Please take a close-up photo of the two gray boxes that say "pressuretrol" on top of the boiler. Those vents are supposed to operate at three psi or less.
bburd
1
Re: To those with more knowledge than myself, would you install a new gas or heating oil system ?
Some additional info. Compare fuel costs here.
https://coalpail.com/fuel-comparison-calculator-home-heating
The EIA website has fuel costs for various areas of the country with data going back 20 years or more to get past fuel cost trends.
https://coalpail.com/fuel-comparison-calculator-home-heating
The EIA website has fuel costs for various areas of the country with data going back 20 years or more to get past fuel cost trends.
hot_rod
1
Re: To those with more knowledge than myself, would you install a new gas or heating oil system ?
Hello all, first post….thank you for all the info provided here.https://www.maine.gov/energy/heating-fuel-prices
We are buying an old home in Maine, it presently has no heat system in the home and I’m looking at gas fired and heating oil systems, trying to determine which one to use. I’m thinking baseboard hot water on the exterior walls. Either system will need the fuel delivered by truck. The basement foundation is brand new, house is old and wall are stripped.
I’m interested in possibly the latest state of the art quality system that you would choose for yourself.
Thank you for any input or opinion
Propane is about 25% less per gallon but propane contains about 40% less energy per gallon.
Re: Why my 85% efficient cast iron boiler is really only 78% efficient
and unless the chimney is lined to take it -- stainless steel -- it will live a short and unhappy life. Replacing it will eat any savings you might make.
Re: Why my 85% efficient cast iron boiler is really only 78% efficient
To me you are incorrect in your assessment because when you are measuring your flue gas you are only measuring sensible heat, not latent heat. The process by which there is water vapor would mean that the heat energy required to create a water vapor is already absorbed, the latent heat of vaporization. so that heat has already lowered the flue gas temperature. That would be why you are not deducting the 7%. the products of flue gas that you read in the flue have already completed the process of combustion and latent heat of vaporization. You gain that 7% when you condense the flue gases in the secondary heat exchanger of a condensing boiler (7% is a number you are using so i will use that) .
So i totally disagree with your statement. That's is why anybody that has combustion analysts of boilers and furnace for 25 years like myself will tell you that i never see an actual 95-97% efficiency number because the combustion analyser cannot measure the latent heat, only sensible heat. And i have done well over 1000 test.
So i totally disagree with your statement. That's is why anybody that has combustion analysts of boilers and furnace for 25 years like myself will tell you that i never see an actual 95-97% efficiency number because the combustion analyser cannot measure the latent heat, only sensible heat. And i have done well over 1000 test.
pedmec
1
Re: Why my 85% efficient cast iron boiler is really only 78% efficient
You have also hit -- I suspect accidentally -- on why condensing furnaces running on gas can advertise high efficiencies -- they are capturing the latent heat in the water vapour, so if you are playing with the higher heating value all the time, the numbers work. This is also, however, one reason (there are others) why you don't see condensing furnaces on fuel oil: the amount of water vapour produced is much less, relatively speaking, and so the higher heating value isn't as different from the lower heating value, and there isn't much point in trying to capture it.
Re: Uponor toilet stop
This is my best guess....You have it just about right here.
Still seems weird.
What you do is cut the uponor pex to length and the chrome piece shorter.
Place the funnel type fitting large side up.
Put the expansion collar on and expand it. That's why the piece is shaped like a cone. You need the room to put your expansion tool in there.
Lastly. Install the valve like any other uponor expansion fitting.
The chrome piece of pipe is meant only as a cover over the pex pipe. You cut to length the chrome pc to fit.
Intplm.
1
Re: To those with more knowledge than myself, would you install a new gas or heating oil system ?
@chrisj Tens of thousands of Amish homes without indoor plumbing. I really don't care what some bureaucrat says is "legal" or not. In my house, I am the law!Never thought I'd be having an argument with someone about the importance of indoor plumbing.
Regardless, those Amish homes don't have forced air.
Strange argument..............
Vacation home I'm thinking wood stove is best choice but forced air would probably be fine. I haven't put any thought into such situations honestly.
ChrisJ
2
Re: To those with more knowledge than myself, would you install a new gas or heating oil system ?
I think my dad just said he paid $1.77 a gallon for LPG in PA.Hello all, first post….thank you for all the info provided here.Quality is determined by the installing contractor.
We are buying an old home in Maine, it presently has no heat system in the home and I’m looking at gas fired and heating oil systems, trying to determine which one to use. I’m thinking baseboard hot water on the exterior walls. Either system will need the fuel delivered by truck. The basement foundation is brand new, house is old and wall are stripped.
I’m interested in possibly the latest state of the art
quality system that you would choose for yourself.
Thank you for any input or opinion
Are you going to use this as a primary residence or weekend home?
LP can and usually is very expensive, with your choice's id go with oil.
He was amazed how cheap it was.
ChrisJ
1
Re: Cannot get air out of hot water heating system
Sorry for the bad pics, there is only a couple of feet of space in front of the furnace so I cannot get one picture that has everything. There are several plumbing pipes that have nothing to do with the furnace that are right above the furnace so it is probably hard to tell what is what. The pipe with the green hose on it is the return line. The out of the furnace pipe is to the far right of the picture. The smaller pipe between the return and heat out line is the water fill pipe. From what I can tell the heated water goes straight up and then hits a T. One line of the T feeds the baseboard radiators on the front of the house and the other side of the T feeds the back. They meet at the other side of the house and then return in one pipe down the center of the house and back into the furnace. About half of the baseboards have bleeder valves. I have tried to bleed from those but just a small amount of air comes out each time I open them. It did not really seam like I was getting anything done bleeding at the radiator. The radiators farthest from the furnace and toward the back of the house were hot, but the farthest radiators toward the front of the house were barely warm.
=================================================================
OK here we go;
You have hot water boiler and a steel compression tank that is painted black and a Maine Coon Cat for a plumbers helper? I had 2 female Maine Coon Cat babies that lived to old age.
The steel compression tank works differently than a bladder expansion tank and has more water volume.
The red valve under the steel compression tank is a Bell & Gossett Airtrol valve.
The Airtrol valve allows the air bubbles in your system to exit the boiler and rise into the pipe connected to the Airtrol valve and be absorbed in the water in the steel compression tank.
The Airtrol valve has a drain valve in the base of the valve the allows excess to be drained from the steel compression tank to achieve the correct air to water ratio in the steel compression tank to create the point of no pressure change so that your circulator will work properly.
It sounds as if the root of all your trouble is the steel compression tank is waterlogged and needs to be drained correctly to create the correct ratio of water to air.
NOW; shut the boiler off please;
1. please shut off the blue handled globe valve under the steel compression tank just hand tight.
2. (a) open the drain valve under the Airtrol valve, by doing this it will allow the excess water in the tank to drain out and create the correct air(1/3) to water(2/3) ratio in the steel compression tank to create the point of no pressure change.
I do not remember if the brass drain valve is 5/16" or 3/8" as I have not had to deal with a water logged tank in many years.
3. after the correct amount of water has been drained from the steel compression tank air will begin hissing from the tank, now you need to close the drain valve on the Airtrol valve.
4. open the blue handled globe valve under the steel compression tank and then turn the boiler back on and turn the thermostat way up in the home and you will have a warmer home in a little bit as the air bubbles will rise from the boiler into the airtrol valve and the cool water in the tank will fall back into the system to replace the air bubbles.
Once you have very hot water in the baseboard loops in a couple of hours you can turn the thermostat back down; I hate hydronic baseboard because it has less thermal mass.
You will have a warm home and a cat that wants to hog all the baseboard in the house because it is hot.
Once you have the excess water drained out of the steel compression tank you will not have to mess with anything and you will have heat every year.
Please purchase the following three books from the Heating Help Bookstore to help you understand your heating system and how it works. You can purchase these books safely with a debit or credit card.
CLASSIC HYDRONICS, PUMPING AWAY, HOW COME? Classic Hydronics is a wire bound book that allows you to easily flip the pages and set the book down while you look at your heating system to see how it is plumbed and how it works.
All profits go to the author-Mr. Holohan and there is no middleman like amazon and the books are shipped directly to your home.
Happy heating.
leonz
1