main vent spraying water in two pipe steam system

bill skula

my daughter recently purchased a home built around 1932. it has a two pipe steam heating system. we had a plumber replace some of the traps on the radiators in addition to two traps located in the basement above the boiler. the main vent(could only find one) was also replaced. the heat is now good,but water sprays out of the main vent on a daily basis. the plumber tried removing an inverted bell type trap located above the boiler. the main still sprays water. in the last two days the automatic feed system read 32 gallons added. please advise.

John Ruhnke

Spaying Main Vent......

Bill,

It could be a number of things. It could be an oversized boiler or undersized piping. In such a situation the steam moves so fast that it sucks up water with it. It could be clogged return pipes, overfilled boiler, wet steam, improperly piped header or more. The main vent should not be leaking water in fact it should not be making noise at all. If it makes noise you need a smaller boiler or more main vents.

Steam is tricky. You should try to find a steam expert and have him look at it

John Ruhnke

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Steamhead (in transit)

That's a Vapor system

first two things I'd check are whether the pressure is too high, and whether the wet returns are plugged.

Try the Find a professional page of this site, under Resources at the top of the page, to locate a steam man near you. If you're in the Baltimore area, contact me.

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