Forced Convection Units

Albert Huntermark

I have a customer with an apartment house that has an addtion built on a concrete slab next to the main building. At the end of the addition sits a copper finned gravity convection unit about 4' long. It is fed with 3/4" steel lines. The lines are either encased in the concrete slab or underneath of it. Regardless, they can't be accessed. The problem is that the building was vacant at some point prior to the new owner purchasing it this summer and was not properly winterized. At some point these lines froze and broke. They are impossible to replace without major demolition. However, where the addition meets the original building, I am able to get new lines down into the basement at the point where the old ones originated from. On this wall I have enough space to put one of those high output Beacon Morris forced convection units that will provide sufficent heating capacity for the room. The only concern that I have is that the supply and return for the Beacon Morris unit is 1/2" nominal copper tubing. The exsiting 3/4" steel lines originate from a one-pipe system with an 1-1/4" x 1-1/4" x 3/4" moniflow tee on the feed side and returns into an 1-1/4" x 1-1/4" x 3/4" standard tee about 10" downstream of the Moniflow. In our area there is not many jobs that have used Moniflow tees nor one-pipe systems for that matter, so I am not that familar with them. My question is will reducing from 3/4" to 1/2" work? This small unit is my only alternative at this point. The room is a kitchen and because of cabinet space, appliances, and outside doorway, this is the only space that I have available for any type of unit at all.

don_173

If

I were you and could run my leader back to the boiler room I would put that convector on its on zone.

one the pressure drop for the convector is properly to great for just one diverter t and the other thing would be
the two different emitter on one zone.

One a fast respone with very little mass..the other castiron that heatup and cools very slowly.

Look to books and more to your left...there a book call how come this will help you to understand this type of distribution..

Good luck!