Best Of

@Long Beach Ed

A better way to say this is that condensate-laden wet steam delivered into a radiator holds less latent BTU's than saturated (dry) steam delivered into a radiator.

This is a very important point. I am convinced that the output of the radiators is proportional to the percentage of water carried in the steam. I certainly don't have the ratio but I do believe it is more than a small amount.

Why?

Consider the fact that NOBODY on the forum who has selected a boiler accurately without oversize and piped it generously with a large drop header develops any pressure.

How could that possibly be? They all have 15-25% pickup factors. Surely the boiler will eventually shutdown on pressure during a recovery of 10 degrees!

BUT THEY DON'T.

The capability of the radiation is dependent on the water content of the steam!

A steam boiler must run longer with "wet" steam to satisfy the 'stat. The extra energy ends up as condensate.

Okay, Paul, then why bother with a header ?

I agree with everything you said, Ed and of course I try to practice it.

But out of curiosity, lets say your boiler isn't piped great, and lets even say there is some wet steam.

Where are those lost BTUs going?

As to grammar :

“More better” is a grammatically incorrect phrase that means “more more good.” Those who use it intend to communicate that something is “better than better,” but use the wrong word to express this. 

Just a grammatical observation I was corrected on in grade school, even though it sounded correct. By the way, even spell check will remove the word "more" in conjunction with "better"

Regards,

RTW

I am a stickler for proper Grammer and Splleing

to be clear with the proper Congiucjtion of good there are exactly 6 different stages:

Good, Gooder, Better, Betterer, Best, Bestest.

the superlitive for each is:

More Gooder, More Better, and Most Bestest.

So to use "more better" is not indicating the "most bestest" condition that can be achieved. However it is just slightly below Most Bestest and slightly above More Best in the heirarchy of the combination of the "More/Good" to "Most/Bestest" availabel combinations. To find out more on proper grammer and bestest splleing practises click on this link

Hi, I like what @clammy sez about "building envelope upgrades". Do that first, then play with the heating system. With good upgrades, maybe a couple of 150 watt light bulbs will do it 😄

Yours, Larry

The pump location is important. As low as possible. And the pump inlet as close to the boiler as possible.

Blow down complete, and water level is back up! That was easier than I anticipated. The water came out pretty much like dark tea at first but cleared very quickly and the LWC worked as intended. I did notice some "spots" on the sight glass that looked like a film, oil or debris, basically coating the inside of the empty portion of the sight glass and bouncing up and down with the water — anything to address there?

Also the baseray is 16 feet (!!) long.

I'll have to get some tools and plan to try @mattmia2's test with a non-heating rad next week. I'll check in before I do though, thanks!!

Thanks for that. In my observations there is no such thing as wet steam in residential applications. Or more accurately, ALL the steam is wet steam since it is on the verge of condensing, being at 212 or so degrees.

What everyone calls "wet steam" is actually surging/carryover and even if you are surging, then the BTUs will still escape the water as steam and get into the rest of the system (although it's not pretty and should be avoided). The whole idea of what we in this forum call "wet steam" is mythological. Any droplets in the steam fall out and land on the pipes very quickly, regardless of piping or insulation. They are not carried to the radiators. I know people don't believe this but I've seen it.

There is no way that the near boiler piping can radiate enough heat to condense very much water out of the steam, wet or not. The BTUs can't just go into the basement, they go upstairs, there are too many of them for the radiation of the pipes in the basement.

Again, full-blown surging is a different thing (but still must deliver the vast majority of BTUs to the radiators).

Thanks for listening, I'll stop hijacking now.

Agreed. Can I now complain about my Gorton and Hoffman Specialty vent failures?

What I can say, with reasonable surety, is that new vents do not last as long as old vents. (Also anecdotal, but I have more anecdotes).