Best Of
Re: Efficient and dependable cast iron boiler recommendation
OK, so a 130-year-old masonry house with little/no insulation and original windows explains your probably 27 BTU/hr/sq ft heat loss at 0 F outside air temp. You may be able to improve that with a blower door test that shows where your air leaks are. Sealing air leaks is the first step in improving the envelope of old houses.
Don't get too hung up on your boiler rating. You measured an input rate of 211,000 BTU/hr vs. a rated 245,000 BTU/hr, or 86% of rated input. That's not far off, and the boiler gas pressure regulator may be set slightly lower than max, which would reduce your input rate.
My sister had a Lochinvar Knight condensing boiler in the basement of her last house, and it was quieter than our Weil-McLain oil boilers with Beckett burners. Apples to oranges, of course, but I slept in a guest room next to the Lochinvar, and the (to me) fairly quiet whine of the Lochinvar wasn't bothersome.
You should also consider that you have an ideal setup for a condensing boiler: probably big old cast iron radiators and low water temperatures. So if you could find a condensing boiler whose noise signature didn't bother you, your low water temps mean your boiler run run in condensing mode for nearly 100% of the heating season, using outdoor reset, with probably significant efficiency gains.
jesmed1
Re: Powdercoating steam radiators
My wife and I recently had a very tall(45 inch) Rococo radiator sandblasted and powder coated and we are very happy with the results. As stated above they are extremely heavy, so I would have 3 or 4 guys to help. This was a first floor radiator and only required going up/down 4 or 5 stairs.
pjyorks
Re: steam Whac-A-Mole
@EBEBRATT-Ed pipe comes off the main vertical, then about 1.5' sideways with a backpitch to the main, then vertical to the radiator valve.
@Captain Who that's interesting and explains why nothing really wants to exit that radiator even without a vent. It also explains the seeming randomness of radiators coming offline. I did an EDR calc and got about 504 (some radiators were hard to match, but I think I was pretty close). And again, that's the number after shutting off one of the larger radiators in a bedroom that already had 2 large radiators - it was also based purely on the radiators themselves. This Burnham indicates 454 Sq Ft. Perhaps the pipe insulation will offset heat loss just enough to allow everything to fill properly? I imagine that's all I can do at this point short of replacing the whole boiler 1 year into things. I quoted with 4 different companies last year - not a single one of them made any indication that a sizing should be under consideration - all simply wanted to replace what was there. I assume they went with the IN6 because that's the largest power venting model that Burnham offers, but it could just as easily have been a matter of wanting to swap like for like as that was what was already here (and started an above water line leak - after less than 10 years!). I'll try the blanket test a bit later and see what that yields. I imagine this intense cold isn't really helping things.
Re: How a Hotel full of people get sick..
@Mad Dog_2 nice catch. I can hear the complaints now when it's corrected. Waters getting on the floor. It's making a mess. Hope they fix it properly and use a clip on strainer cup.
Intplm.
Re: Efficient and dependable cast iron boiler recommendation
is this steam or hot water? energy kinetics is not ci but is good if you want a conventional hot water boiler that is more efficient.
mattmia2
Re: Efficient and dependable cast iron boiler recommendation
Buderus still sells oil-fired cast iron boilers in the US, so are you asking about natural gas boilers? We have two Weil Mclain WGO-5 oil boilers that I plan to replace with Buderus G115WS's when the time comes.
Have you done a heat loss calculation for your application? Most existing cast iron boilers are 2x or 3x oversized. Our WGO-5's are 4x oversized. You may be able to heat your whole house with one G115WS/3 depending on how much your existing boiler is oversized. We could replace both WGO-5's with a single G115WS/3.
jesmed1
Re: Washing machine drain solution
it was wrong then too. a lot of times retrofits got done by people that didn't know what they were doing carpentry wise. that is why renovating a bathroom in structures like this is a can of worms and the rough work is frequently far more of the job than the finish work.
mattmia2
Re: steam Whac-A-Mole
If you do a long burn that results in every single vent in the system closing, and this troublesome radiator is still not getting steam then there has to be a blockage or major amount of water trapped inside the radiator/near radiator piping, even with an underpowered boiler. One more reason to get a proper pressure gauge.
Re: Series 63 steam boiler install — is diagonal near-boiler piping OK? Base rust/shim concern
blocks are fine. blocks of different sized with huge gaps or open cores that haven't been filled are not. most likely the effect of too much secondary air is going to be more heat going up then vent than should be.
mattmia2
Re: steam Whac-A-Mole
No I wouldn't expect it to fix this particular problem but you really need a 0-3psi gauge alongside your pressuretrol teed on the same pigtail.
If somehow it were reading correctly then that would mean there is some clog in the piping leading to your troublesome radiator, like the valve maybe, even though you believe it to be fully functional due to being new. We have to start thinking a bit outside the box maybe.