steam system return pipe

john_217

Brad thanks for your quick response. I took some pictures. I'll try to send them from home tonight since we are not allowed to send pix from work. I have a one pipe system with returns off the main steam feeds in the basement. The baseboard looks like steel pipe with fins. Definately not copper or cast iron. The trap is attached at one end of one of the main steam feeds in the basement. The return line from the new baseboard section descends from the first floor to the main return pipe that is adjacent to the steam line mentioned above. The trap also attaches to this return line, which is near where the baseboard return attaches. The plumber also added another trap on to a main steam feed diagonnally opposed to where the first trap is attached. Hopefully this makes sense to you.

john_216

steam system return pipe

I have a domestic steam boiler. I recently had my plumber remove a regular radiator and replace it with a run of 16' of baseboard. As part of the job, he added a return pipe with a steam trap to the new line. I have an automatic water feed on the boiler. Since the new work was done,the boiler now fills to the top of the sight gauge. The plumber then placed a trap on another section of steam pipe to balance the flow of condensate going back to the boiler. The return water is obviously slowing down, so now the auto feed keeps adding water once the water in the boiler hits low water cut off.A rep. at McDonnell- Miller suggested to route the return pipe from the new work directly to the boiler and get rid of the other steam trap. He also suggested I contact you.

Brad White_203

Can you

post any photos of both the installation above the floor and below? While you are at that, a shot of the near-boiler piping?

Do you have a 2-pipe steam system to start with? Or is this now a hybrid? (Honey! We could not get a Prius, but guess what our heating system is now?

The replaced section that is now baseboard- is that cast iron baseboard or finned-tube type? (This goes to another potential issue you did not ask about yet, but also fills in the bigger picture).

If you have a conventional one-pipe steam system, one can add such a radiator but the supply has to pitch away from the main and be vented at that point. Then the return wants to drop directly to a wet return and not use a trap.

Hard to be specific without looking at it, but if your waterline has risen, I suspect a false waterline was created in this process somehow. Specifically, some condensate is being given a place to "stack" and setting a new waterline for the entire system. Yet....

That the LWCO is kicking in then fully the water feeder recharging says that indeed the "water back" part of the Linhardt Equation is not being met.

john_216

steam system

see attached pix.

john_217

steam system return pipe

Hi Brad, I posted pix. Any thoughts?