Cold outside, cold in the house!

Jim Eastman_2

Your doctor would ask you for more details!

What is the rated input of your boiler? Rated output?

Does the boiler cycle on and off when it is this cold?

How many feet of baseboard convectors do you have up stairs?

Can you hold your hand on the baseboard piping upstairs?

Do you have a "mixing valve" or injection mixing system to reduce the boiler water temperature for the radiant floors on the lower level?

Is the 110 degrees the temperature on the boiler temperature/pressure gage just after the boiler burner turns off?

From your post, it appears that the temperature for the sytstem is set too low to heat the upstairs with baseboard emitters but the temperature may be adequate for the radiant slab in the lower level.

Does the lower level feel comfortable?

These are just a few of the initial symptoms and information that the "heating doctors" on this site will need to help you with your problem!

Jim Eastman
Marmot Heating
Niwot, Colorado

ed_38

0 degrees outside - house won't get above 60

Hello
I have a 5 year old home, with a Peerless propane gas boiler with two zones. Basement is finished and has radiant floor heating, upstairs has baseboard hot water.

I normally burn wood during the winter months, but I have not this year, and this problem has really presented a problem with the very cold windy weekend we had.

The furnace has always seemed to cycle very frequently and it has struggled to keep the house warm. I had two people look at it with in the last couple of years with no real resolution.

(I would just stoke up the woodstove)

Anyways -- this weekend I would turn up the t-stat to 70, and upstairs couild not get past 60. As well, I turned up the downstairs to 70 and it hovered around 64.
I can hear the water circulator going continuosly with the furnace comming on to heat up the water. I notice that the baseboards are not especially hot - and one, I assume, at the end of the loop is hardly hot at all.

The furnace is running at around 98% eff, and the last guy turned down the water temp he told me. (something about the spread of when the water leaves the boiler and then returns)
I looked at a temp guage and it says around 110. Very low???

There is a LOT of windows in the house, but almost every outside wall has a baseboard. House is only 1100 sqf upstairs and 900sqf finished basement.

I am looking for a few suggestions that I can do as a handy homeowner, then if that doesnt work we'll call in the pros.

I looked in your business dir and the closest person in 70 miles away.

thanks!

R. Kalia_8

It's hard to provide a solution to "house is cold". It's like if you called your doctor and said "I'm not feeling well" and expected a diagnosis.

If your water temperature is 110, that is extremely low for baseboard (although not necessarily too low for radiant) and could cause the problem. You could try turning it up to see what happens.

singh

With 110º

going to your upstairs baseboard you are likely not getting much of any output.
With those temps. you would need alot of baseboard to satify your load and even that may not be enough. You most likely need to raise the suppy temps higher, 160º to 180º. Does not mean you can't go lower, but like I said you would need more element to compensate for the lower temps.
As for the radiant, many factors may be involved, is the tube in a slab, is there insulation under the slab? Was a heat loss done? Tell us more.
Sounds like a pinnacle boiler, your contractor may be trying to take full advantage of the condensing feature to achieve 98%, but even if you raise the supply temps you will get some benefit and savings being that it is a modulating unit.
Where are you located, someone here may be close but not listed.

BigRed

you can here the water?

If you can hear the water in your "furnas" its a boiler then there is air in with water you need to get that air out.

ed_38

reply from the patient to the heating doctors :-)

Here are some replies to your diagnostic questions.

J Crickett --- How do I turn up the water temp.

Sing -- Your right it is a pinnacle.
There are 4? tubes in the slab, with insulation under slab.
Dont know if heat loss was done.
Located in New London, New Hampshire.
Again how do I turn up the water temp.

Jim -- I will check the rates.
The boiler does come on and off when it is this cold. I
will measure the lineal feet.
I can hold my hand on the upstairs piping. Heck I can hold my hands on the pipiing coming out of the furnace.
There is a mixing valve. It is about 3/4 turned to the hot setting.
I will watch to see when the water is 110.
Lower level needs to be warmer.

JE --- I don't "hear" the water.

Some more hints--- even when it is 30 degrees outside, it would take about 2 hours to move the upstairs from 62 to 66.


Thanks

singh

Raising temps.

Try to get someone there, raising the temp is not difficult on the pinnacle but,not something you should be doing,in addition you need someone to really go over to room by room heat load calcs, to get the most out of you baseboard, and to evaluate the radiant portion.

R. Kalia_8

> J Crickett --- How do I turn up

> the water temp.


It has electronic controls and presumably you use the keypad, but you'll have to read the manual.

> Some more hints--- even when it is 30

> degrees outside, it would take about 2 hours to

> move the upstairs from 62 to 66.


That's quite fast, almost unbelievably fast if indeed you have 110F water.

The fact that your boiler is going on and off means that it is not getting a chance to produce as much heat as it can, even though the house is cold. This seems to confirm that the water temperature is set too low. However, if you increase the temperature, the radiant floor might become too hot for bare feet...although your mixing valve should prevent this problem if the system is correctly designed.

singh

pinnacle

He may not have keypad.
Even if you were able to raise temp, what do you raise it at, and
is the mixing valve manual or motorized, if manual,you are also
adjusting that also because supply temps change. Do you have a thermometer
on radiant side , what temp going through floor.
How is it piped BTW, can you post picture of your system.

lchmb

Ed

Ed who is your gas supplier? I am located in NH, not to far from you actually.

ed_38

More info for the heating doctor

I have more of the requested info and also some observations from my wife.

My gas supplier is Irving.

Observations from my wife. She says when it is windy and cold the house ALWAYS has a problem maintaining temp. Yesterday was VERY windy and zero to -4. upstairs could not get above 60. Today it was around 20 and I had her set the house to 68 and it was fine. tonite it is 10 and it is comfortable.
I live on a hill, above a lake, with the house facing North, with two sliding doors, a french door and 9 sliding 60x27in windows. This is 1100 sf house upstairs, with 3/4 basement finished.

Now for some specs.
Furnace is Peerless psc04stckwpc
max input 110,000 btu
doe htg 88,00
ratings 77,000 btu hr
Taco 007f5 circ upstairs with a watt reg.
Taco 007f5 circ downstairs with Sparko mixing valve on nbr 3

I have 88 lineal feet of baseboard upstairs.
Radiant in the floor heating of the basement slab

Did some analysis of burner /temps times
Tonight low wind - temp outside is 10deg

Boiler temp was 170, psi 4. Furnace was not running, circ pump not running
Turned upstairs t-stat from 64 to 66 at 9:31.
Circ pump came on and temp dropped to 160 at 9:38.
Temp recovered to 170 at 9:46.
Upstairs temp is 65 at 10;29. I can hear the circ pump still running.

So, I think alot of my problem is the windows, wind, facing north. BUT...... it does seem like it take a very long time to gain 2 degrees.

Do things sound ok?

Thanks for your insights.

Jim Eastman_2

Cold

Ed,

With 88 ft. of baseboard upstairs, you should be delivering approximately 44,000 btuh to 1,100 sq. ft of space. That provided approx. 40 btu's per square foot. That should be plenty of heat for a modern home! Does the lower level have as much glass and infiltration potential as the upper floor? Perhaps you should get someone to do a blower door test to identify where all of the heat is going!? I had a customer build a new home in the foothills of Colorado and claimed that we undersized the system (radiant and baseboard). On top of that, his propane bill was astronomical! He used many cases of caulk patching up the infiltration spots. Once he did this, his "heat finally worked" and his propane bill went down!

It looks like the boiler supply temperature is correct and the size of the boiler appears to be within the range expected for that size of home. I would work like crazy to correct the places where heat is ooozing out of your home and affecting your comfort and pocketbook!

Jim Eastman
Marmot Heating
Niwot, CO

Mellow_2

ed

Did you say 4psi on the boiler? That would give you no psi on the second floor. The boiler should be around 12 psi. When the boiler was 170 deg and the bb zones were running. do the returns from the bb zones get hot? Do the bbs get hot? Is the gauge wrong? mellow

singh

pinnacle piping

You should also have a third circulator piped
into the peerless taco 0010 ,The unit should be pipied primary / secondary
configuration,this would insure pinnacle has the required flow into unit.

4 psi is a bit low,standard is 12 psi, 1psi will raise the water 2.31 ft.
you may not have enough to get up to baseboard at 4spi.Circulators do not "pump water up" but only circulator the water around closed loop.

You don't need to raise temp , if what your saying is correct about the 170º
Was the 110º temp from the radiant.

I'm not a big fan of manual mixing valves,for large radiant zones, the colder it gets outside,the greater the load,the more output from the slab,the cooler the return water temps to the mixing valve, now the "setting" is wrong as the supply temps to slab are lowered. Think about it. :{ A smart mixing control,able to adjust to different temps. and maintain a constant supply is the way to go.

I agree if you have 88ft of baseboard and 170º supply,you should have no problem,look for areas with heat loss,more insulation in attic, etc

ed_38

Thanks for the advice.

Thanks for all your advice, one and all. I will definitely do some more weatherizing this year, and try to take care of my problem with the heat loss when I have those VERY high and cold winds from the north. Perhaps storm windows, or window quilts will be in order.
But thanks for verifying that my system seems to be in order.

Ed