Main vent location

nicholas bonham-carter

i have no strainer on my vents, and i think the height above the steam main will keep any particles out of my gorton vents. also helpful in that regard, would be very generous venting, so as to keep the exit air velocity down to the point where it will be unlikely to blow debris into the vent, ESPECIALLY AT THE LOW PRESSURES ON WHICH THESE SYSTEMS WORK BEST [under 12 ounces]!!!!


you may find that 3 #2 vents are needed on the ends of eachlong main, to get the air out quickly of all the mains simultaneously. next time you better order the vents you want yourself, to ensure the correct part is installed. even though the cost may be questioned, it's a case of pay mr. gorton once, or pay the gas co. every month to remove the air. these are the most important vents in the system as they remove 90% of the system air [pipes, and boiler steam chest]. the radiator vents should only remove the air in the riser between main pipe and radiator itself--a much smaller volume. the desired result is: as steam fills the supply pipes, there is no back pressure to cause it to flow into any of the risers until THE MAIN VENTS CLOSE, and then the steam begins the SIMULTANEOUS ascent to each of the radiators.

thermostat location and anticipation play a role in correcting uneven heat problems, but first get the distribution adjusted, as described above.--nbc



PS the venting capacity of the dole #5 is .150 CFM and the gorton #2 is 2.2 CFM-quite a differance!! in this case, [not always] bigger is better.

McKern_2

Is this an acceptable alternative?

Prior to this week's service call to replace the ancient Dole #5 vents, I sent the first 3 panes of the attached picture to the condo board with the suggestion that the new vents be installed as illustrated.

The day after the service call I discovered that rather than moving the vents back from the elbow, he simply raised them another foot or so (as illustrated in the 4th pane), removing the plaster and lathe in order to make use of the space between the floor joists.

Will this arrangement function as intended (i.e., like the illustration in the first pane)?

FJL

FWIW . . .

I have a Hoffman 75 located as in Pane 2, but no water hammers. I also have a tree of three Gorton 1s located several inches before, as in Pane 1. In between those two vents, I have a riser that feeds the back half of the apt building.

nicholas bonham-carter

main vent location

he should have at least put in a couple of elbows to make sure there is not a straight shot for the water-hammered slug of water to hit the vent.

while we are discussing vents, are you sure you have enough venting? "condo" implies a big building, with long runs, containing large volumes of air to remove, and you can either pay messrs. gorton once, or pay each month to the gas co. to remove that air!--nbc

McKern_2

The proposal from the heating guy included replacing the existing vents with the same model (Dole #5). I recommended that he measure the mains to determine if those vents were appropriate, since uneven heating is an ongoing problem.

It quickly became clear that that was not going to happen because he didn't know what to measure. So, based on advice from you all, I recommended that the Dole vents be replaced with Gorton #2 vents. I know that one of the board members called Gorton--she reported that "Ken" had been very helpful. In addition, the Gorton vents were about a third of the price of the Dole vents. Nonetheless, the new vents appear to be the exact same model as before.

Go figure.

So, if I understand you correctly, if he added a couple of elbows, the vents could be left on the ends of the mains, correct? Is the additional height necessary? The vents are at least 18" above the return--if we could lose some of that pipe, there might be enough room for the y-strainer that is mentioned in the article regarding balancing the system.