LOUD Hissing Vents

Norm Harvey

I would wonder what the steam pressure is in the boiler. You can ask your plumber friend to adjust the pressuretroll to a half a pound cut in, and 1.5 pounds cut out.

Steam heat can be a wonderfull experience if things are set properly. I would highly recommend buying one of Dans books here called "We Got Steam Heat" its a homeowners guide to coexisting peacefully with steam heat.

Its money very well spent and will give you a solid understanding of how things should be working.

Barbara Hutchinson

Hi all,

We are new homeowners (bought in July, moved in August) and have steam heat. About two weeks ago, upon adding water to the boiler, our system flooded as a result of the water pressure thing busting. Luckily our good friend is a plumber, was able to get the part that we needed and replaced it on Christmas Eve.

Because of our system getting flooded, we needed to replace all of our vents, he came today to put in new ones and now almost every single radiator is hissing and making noise. I am assuming that this is not normal?? We only had two radiators that made a hissing noise before but now it is about 6 of them, what is causing this? Will it go away or do we need to call our plumber again to see what else could be wrong?

I am really beginning to hate steam heat, I will tell you this much

Barbara Hutchinson

He said....

that is not the problem. We are hearing some hissing he said in some of the vents b/c of all the crap that was in there prior with it flooding out, however, the two main ones that are hissing which were immediately after the flooding might need an adjustable vent in his opinion to control the temp, he said the downside on this is that it won't get as warm.

I will tell you that the one that is majorly hissing (like a locomotive) is extremely warm.

I know we are going to buy the book b/c it has been a frustrating couple of weeks, we had no problems until two weeks ago and now it seems that everything is going wrong. My husband's parents have steam heat and had no major problems with it, I grew up on baseboard and am trying to enjoy steam however, it is getting hard with recent events.

Steamhead (in transit)

Do you have

big vents on your steam mains?

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John Ruhnke

They should make no noise at alll

Barbera,

The vents should make no noise at all. If they make noise the air isn't getting out fast enough or the boiler is oversized causing the steam to travel too fast.

Some times adding more steam main vents or bigger ones helps, different situations or causes require different fixes.

John Ruhnke

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Brad White_184

Gordo is right, Barbara

And so is Norm. Steam is a great way to heat when set up properly but few know how anymore. Except here

What Gordo is getting at, (if I may interject) is that if your mains are not themselves vented and generously, your radiator vents have that much more work to do. All that your radiator vents want to do is to vent the radiator volume plus the pipe which feeds that radiator. It is unfair to ask it to vent a 2-inch or larger steam main.

Where do you live? There is a corridor of good steam experience or at least clusters from Baltimore to Boston and to PA and Ohio. You can do an awful lot through this site too. If you have a diligent professional who may not be as well versed in steam as in other facets of heating, we can guide him or her.

Please be patient and do not be discouraged- you came to the right place.

Barbara Hutchinson

Yes..

we have two vents coming from the boiler, (our friend told us we have a 2 pipe system) he changed those vents as one of those was making a hissing noise, however, now the other one is making a hissing sound.

Would our problem lay there? It strictly is two radiators that are going crazy, one downstairs to the bedroom on the left and our master bedroom upstairs to the right.

He suggested getting adjustable vents? Should we go that route? He is not 100% sure with steam heat as he doesnt deal with it all that much, his dad has though.

We live in Bergen County, NJ, we feel bad b/c our buddy has been out to our house about 4 times in the last two weeks but seriously I can not live or sleep with this noise.

Barbara Hutchinson

And no

the vents on our boiler (the main 2) have the same vents that were placed in all the radiators.

Steamhead (in transit)

In gereral








2 pipe steam systems should not even have vents on the radiators! All of the venting should take place at the main vents in the basement by the boiler.

2 pipe steam systems were the top-of-the-line heating systems of the day. There were designed to operate at oz/in2 of steam pressure.

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John Ruhnke

Find a steam expert...........

Barbara,

It sounds like you are wasting his and your time. I hope he didn't charge for all those times. It sounds like he doesn't understand steam enough to handle the problem. He is not looking in the right areas. Like every one says he should be looking at the steam main vents not worrying about the gook. The gook might cause the vents to leak steam but not hiss air. He can't learn steam over night it can take years.

John Ruhnke

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John Ruhnke

Wrong vents........

Barbera,

The steam main vents are bigger in size or at least different looking then the radiator vents. You most likely have the wrong vents on the mains

John Ruhnke

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Brad White_184

Traps

Barbara, do you have traps on the radiators or at the ends of the mains back at the boiler? Traps may have been damaged by flooding (carrying debris aloft to settle at low points where traps tend to be).

Traps are act as air vents firstly, passing air out of the radiators via the returns. This is why 2-pipe steam pipes can carry more steam per size than one-pipe. The return has a separate path.

Indeed, get a good steam pro in there. You are at least in range of some good practitioners I would say.

Steamhead (in transit)

And if you're not sure what you have

take some pics and post them here. We can ID your equipment.

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Barbara Hutchinson

Will do...

when I get back home after work, got a long day ahead. Plumber is coming back tomorrow morning, will see if the valves (or traps I guess they might be called) are also full of water and flooded, the in-laws have steam heat and said that could be the reason of the loud hissing. Our buddy is going to work on the problem until we find the solution, I mean the damn things weren't hissing until the water pressure valve busted.

I'll take the pics tomorrow and post them as soon as I get home.

Thanks everybody for all your help. Both my husband and I are learning quickly about the lovely joys of home ownership!! It has been fun so far....haha.

Barbara Hutchinson

Well, here is the latest....

Sorry to have let this thread die and not post anything but I've had no time lately.

Well here is the latest situation with our radiators. The two that were extremely loud were lifted and pitched and adjustable vents were put in, that has solved the problem in those two radiators (the one in our bedroom now will hiss for about 5 seconds and then click off, I hope that is normal)

However, now all of our remaining radiators downstairs are now hissing, nothing too loud but the one in our bathroom and kitchen are getting louder each day. We are also hearing a lot more banging now but the banging occurs when the heat is not on. The plumber will come back and lift the other radiators, but what could be causing this. Again we had NO problems until three weeks ago when the system flooded itself.

Here are some pics of our boiler as previously promised.

Now I had told you that out of the two vents that come out from the boiler the one on the left had been hissing. Well he fixed that and I just noticed this morning that the one on the right is making like a gurgling sound. Oh the fun!

Steamhead (in transit)

Dear Ms. Hutchenson

You have been told your system is a "two pipe" steam system.

Please post pictures of your radiators and close-ups of your piping and valves to them.

If you indeed have a two pipe system, it generally was designed not to have ANY air vents on the radiators at all! Why are they there?

If you indeed have a two pipe system, it was designed to run on OZ. of steam pressure, not pounds! What pressure are you running the system?

Even a one-pipe system was designed to run at 2 pounds max on the coldest day of the year.

Please find out at what pressure you are running your system. Please.

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SpeyFitter

Hartford Loop, Bullhead Tee, and No insulation

Barbara,

You need to check the Hartford Loop. From the point where the inverted Y joins with the equalizer, it should be 2 to 4 in. below the normal waterline for the boiler. Measure it and tell us what you get.

The near boiler piping is incorrect. The riser for the first main joins the header between the two takeoffs from the boiler. This is called a "bullheaded tee". It needs to be redone.

It seems that all the steam pipes are uninsulated. This will generally cause lots of problems with wet steam and water hammer noises, gurgling vents, etc..

What manufacturer, model #, and size are the two vents near the boiler on the dry returns? You can read it on the side of the vent. What vents do you have on your radiators? Does each radiator have two pipes coming out of it or only one?

Barbara Hutchinson

Sorry

here are a few pics of 3 of our radiators. The vents downstairs by the boiler and on the rest of our radiators are Dole Model 80 Steam Vents with the exception of the two radiators that have the adjustable vents, No.1 Steam-Rite.

I do not know if there are two pipes coming out of the radiators, all I know is that our plumber told us we had a two pipe system. I can understand the banging is b/c we have uninsulated pipes, however, would the banging have been there before the system flooded itself? We had hardly any banging before 3 weeks ago.

Here are the pics of the radiators and the pressure thing on the boiler. It indicates that it is on the lowest setting.

I'm not sure what you want me to measure at the boiler. Could you explain it to me again? I'm sorry and thanks for all your help thus far.

Steamhead (in transit)

You have a one-pipe steam system


not a 2-pipe system, so the radiator air vents are needed. The vents may have been damaged by the flooding.

I would suggest that you add more vents to the already existing main air vents on your steam mains by ganging them on with tees...that is if you can't fit on Gorton #2 air vents.

Vent as much air as possible from the steam mains as quickly as possible and the radiator vents won't have to vent as much air (and they will be quieter and last longer)

I see by the picture of your pressuretrol that the cut-in is set as low as possible. Well and good. Please be aware that the PA404 pressuretrol can notoriously inaccurate and it may be letting the pressure get too high. LOW pressure, low pressure, low pressure always!

As Capt. Who advises, insulating your steam mains is an excellent idea. Folks who insulate their steam mains have only two regrets: 1) Their basement is cooler. 2) Why didn't they do it sooner?

Make sure that wet return going back to the boiler is free of sludge by flushing it out.



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ronJC

pa404

Gordo.,
What would you recommend as a good pressuretrol?

I have a similar one, and agree with you regarding its accuracy......
Thanks........

SpeyFitter

Barbara,

The two attachments below should explain what you need to measure. Hope I don't get anyone mad for posting this. I know I downloaded it as free sample pages at one time.

Definitely 1 pipe steam, not 2 pipe, as Gordo said. Only 1 pipe coming out of your radiators. Maybe your plumber is unfamiliar with steam and he's saying it's 2 pipe cause you have the main steam supply pipes and then you have the dry return pipes also.

The banging COULD be because your waterline is lower than it used to be before the flooding, exposing the hartford loop to steam. Just a guess. If you'll check the measurement and/or post a picture that is at eye level of the waterline in the sight glass (so no parralax) we'll be able to tell you for sure.

Also: check this thread: http://forums.invision.net/Thread.cfm?CFApp=2&Thread_ID=53688&mc=3

Steamhead (in transit)

I would use

a L408J1009 Vaporstat in place the PA404.

Here in Baltimore, the PA404 is excellent for boilers used to steam crabs! As for heating buildings....

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