Radiant Heat Not Working

Derheatmeister

Is this your first radiant system or have you lived with an system like this before?

Generally an radiant system will take much LOOOOONGER to react, you will not see an rapid temp rise in an half of an hour..

When did you activate the Aube?

how long ago did you install the Aube?

Was it "Programmed for the Heat cycle Rate?

To many things that it can be .ie. boiler not working,Circ. out, relay not pulling in, domestic "locked Up"...

Cold Up North

Radiant Heat On But Not Working

Hello,

We just arrived to our vacation home up North and the heat is not working. The house is 7 years old and has radiant heat in the floors that is propane fired. We have an Aube thermostat and switch that we can turn on remotely by calling our phone. When we arrived the flame syumbol was on , on the thermostat signaling that the heat was on, however after a half hour of being hear we noticed that it wasn't getting any warmer. Any suggestions for what and where to check?

Thank you.

Timco

If you have an auto fill, try opening the purge valves on the returns to get the air out. If no air, your pump may be bad. Either way, if the gauge on the boiler is reading hot, and you are not, no flow. I'll bet it is air. I have seen a few radiant floors that were air-bound and running the pressure up to 25# and purging the returns worked every time...

Tim

Cold Up North

Thanks Tim. You'll have to forgive me but I'm not very technical when it comes to radiant heat. Where would I find the return valves and how do I purge?

Thanks for the response Tim.

Cold Up North

I noticed there is a Taco System on the Wall with 3 Zones. Zone one is the Hot Water heater which is green. Zone 2 is the downstairs which is not lit and Zone 3 which is upstairs is Red. We never have the heat on upstairs as the radiant heat on the first floor usually heats the whole house. The pipes to the hot water heater are warm, however the copper pipes that heat the radiant plastic tubing are cold. Not sure how to purge the return pipes or where they are located. Som many pipes, valves and faucets that I'm afraid to do something that will do some damage.

Cold Up North

Derheatmeister,

Thanks for the reply. We're very familiar with the radiant heat as we've owned the home for 3 years. The fact that the furnace is not firirng more often and the pipes that feed the radiant tubing are cold downstairs has given us concern. The Taco switch is showing a green light for the Hot Water Heater, and a Red Light for the Upstairs. The downstairs which is our main living area is usually where we only run the heat. There is no light illuminated on that Zone currently.

Weezbo

up stairs is on

open the zone valve manually to the radiant.. you would have some heat in 4 - 5 hrs..

Taco zvc or SR 5 04 ?

Derheatmeister

Domestic Priorty??

Do you have plenty hot water but no heat is that going on?

What kinda waterheater is it?

Try turning the waterheater Stat Down!if heat heat work's then you are "locked" in the Domestic water production which you will not get heat until the domestic hot water is satisfied.

And or there is a little switch in the Taco Zone control Box that will Priortise that zone for the waterheater try turning it off.

Timco

A pictire of the boiler area would help. As I recall, the green light is for power on. The red lights are zones calling for heat. If no red light, no heat call and it may be a t-stat bad. To purge, there should be a hose-bib looking thing on the return manifold that you hook a hose to and open the valve. Air comes out and water is forced through the zone, but you need the auto fill on or to bump up the system pressure to get the air moving...


Tim

Derheatmeister

Taco "GREEN" is for the power to the Contol BOX

"RED" is when an zone is calling for heat

"YELLOW" is when the "Zonevalve" is fully open and the boiler is Told to turn on from the Taco zone control box..

BTW it is an Boiler not an Furnace!...

Cold Up North

Timco,

I am e-mailing photos to you from Kodak Gallery to yoru e-mail in the next minute or so. Thanks for the help.

Cold Up North

Derheatmeister,

Just sent you some photos. Hot water yes. Heat no.

Cold Up North

Just sent you some photos of the boiler etc. I have hot water but no heat to the radiant tubing.

Timco

The lights are out of allignment on your controller. Top is green, power. Second is red, H2O. Third is down, and last is up. Sounds like you have no call for heat. Are your t-stats set to heat? If you take the cover off the taco control, you will see the terminals for the zones (numbered) along the top. (NOT the bottom terminals for the pumps or valves) You can jumper a zone and see if it comes on. Until you get a call for heat, no use in trying to purge yet...

Tim

Cold Up North

Do you have a number where I can reach you?

klaus

Any luck yet?

As others have said, if the red light is not on your thermostat is not "calling" for heat. Possibly a bad thermostat. If you pull the green cover off you'll see the wires coming down from a thermostat. Those are the ones you need to jump across to try and bring heat on. Just touch a wire frim one terminal to the other.

If you don't want to try that and you have zone valves, try manually opening them. there should be a lever on the side or dial on top depending on the brand.

Or call in a local expert familiar with radiant and it should be an easy fix, if it was originally installed right.

Good luck and stay warm!

tim smith

Kinda sounds like stuck in priority so not heat to house.

I wonder if her aquastat is set to high on tank w/ a boiler running a temp that is too close to dhw setting. Ran in to that not too long ago. Boiler temp on dhw call was just too close to the settting for the dhw setting and would never come out of priority. Just a thought. Tim

Derheatmeister

THE AQUASTAT ???

I THINK.... that your Hot water is stuck in that position!
Three ways to determen if it's so
TURN YOUR POWER TO THE BOILER OFF FIRST!!

Just remove the wires that go to the Grey box on the front of the waterheater(Which is the Aquastat or a controller to you waterheater).. DO NOT LET THE WIRES CONTACT ANY PIPES OR METAL PARTS!! PUT TWO WIRE NUT ON THE ENDS! turn the power back on...

OR 1 NOTE the position of the dial in that little box!!

#2 Turn that dial "Down" or to an lower setting and take note if the "tubes"(Infloor) get warm

Or you zonevalve can be stuck open keeping it on!

Are you on a Well ???