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Re: Back-up/supplemental heat

so after all of this discussion, I have decided to duct tape the problem for this winter and take @EBEBRATT-Ed advise on electric space heaters. I found 1500watt electric ceramic heaters on sale for $33 each and bought six of them. My math says that will give me nearly 31,000 BTU’s. My plan is to locate them throughout the house, each on separate/unused circuits, prior to leaving this winter for a couple of months. If the heat goes down, my house monitor can just turn them all on and contact a repair person. In addition I am also going to use 3 of them in my great room the next cold snap and see the effect of adding an additional 15,000 BTU’s to the room does.

I will sleep better knowing the $200 I just spent on heaters, could possibly prevent a serious problem with frozen water pipes while waiting to get the system back up and running while I’m away.

This also gives me plenty of time to figure out what’s next for a more permanent solution in needing additional BTU’s in my great room and a backup heat source.

ColdHouse

Re: Converting Steam System Back To Hot Water

If you go with a small pex redo, a homerun piping method works well. Or in some cases a basement could use an extended homerun manifold and cut down on the amount of pex leader lengths.

TRVs on each radiator give you ultimate adjustability. Multiple radiators in the same room could be served by a single TRV.

Here is an example of a homerun and extended homerun manifold system. Note the radiant zones also if you get your supply temperature requirements within 10° or so degrees.

With a lot of zoning a mod con is my choice or possibly a buffer with an on/ off boiler like cast iron.

hot_rod

Re: noisy Beckett AFG

"scraping" sounds like the blower cage (wheel) is rubbing on something, and Yes, I have found dehydrated bats and mice in blower wheels. sometimes if you (with POWER OFF) lift the igniter you can spin the wheel by hand and see the problem. then loosen the motor bolts and deal with it. If you choose to pull the motor, find something, a small box, container etc. so you can rest the motor on it as not to hang it on the wire. Then while holding the motor steady apply power and see if the motor is noisy on its on.

If you pull the motor out, the motor coupling is going to separate in one of four places. It is a tube with a coupler at each end, one that connects to the motor and one to the pump. as HVACNUT said, they can be a pain to get back together. Do it on a warm day so you have time to take the complete pump coupling, if required, to an HVAC supply an they will help you select the right part. You will probably have to cut the new coupler tube to length, by comparing it to the old tube. Easy to cut with w PVC cutter.

While you have the moto and blower out, clean and hair and lint out of the housing. and clean the blower blades if needed.

Good luck and let us know what you find.

Robert_H

Re: Heat Pump good for -32F

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1880504#Comment_1880504

Depends on the dew point, no?

If the dew is -50 probably not much.

ChrisJ

Re: Article about ConEd's Manhattan steam network in "Works In Progress."

I thought that ConEd used steam from back pressure turbines? Sometimes I try to design thermocompression steam heat. Condensate may make satisfactory make up water for cooling towers. I suspect those giant oil refineries use a form of district steam heat?

jumper

Re: How much pressure - negative OR positive - should be immediately downstream of a trap?

You mention that this is a vacuum system? How is the vacuum created and maintained? That will determine the correct pressure downstream of a trap, which should be very close to the pressure at the vacuum source.

In an atmospheric two pipe system, the pressure in the returns downstream of the traps should be at or very very close to 0 psig. That said, again in a two pipe atmospheric system you won't see a pressure above atmospheric by much (half an inch of water column, maybe) as any steam escaping a failed trap will condense almost immediately. The exception will be if the failure is complete, or if there are several failures, and enough steam gets by to close the vents on the returns. In that case the pressure will rise and may be near the pressure in the mains.