just for fun....

jpf321

You know you're a steam junkie stuck to The Wall when:

<ul><li>You go over a friends house and ask to see his boiler.

</li><li>You check the temperature outside by looking at your signature.

</li><li>You suggest to your wife that we need to save money just before the UPS man brings your new 0-20oz gauge.

</li><li>You're up at 2AM suggesting that someone consider turning off their heat.

</li><li>You spend anytime not on The Wall reading <a href="http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=steam%20heating">books (</a><a href="http://www.archive.org/">www.archive.org</a>) that were written before your grandfather was born.

</li><li>Someone tells you you're under alot of pressure and you wonder if you have enough Dimension A.

</li><li>You hear the t-stat click on and break out your stopwatch

</li><li>You have burned your ear listening for a vent to close.</li><li>You notice that your Holiday Card list contains the Hoffmans, Gortons, Fitzgibbons and Baldwin and you wonder if they're related to inventors



I'll add more as they come up.

Please feel free to contribute your own.</li></ul>

FJL

Good Lord . . .

You hear the t-stat click on and break out your stopwatch



LOL.  I just did this today.  I got home from work early and was home when the boiler turned on to recover from the daytime set back. I wanted to see how long it took for the steam to hit each of the five risers in my second floor apt.  Here are the times (in minutes) from cold start:



Living Room Riser #1:  8:33

Living Room Riser #2:  9:15

Front Bedroom Riser:  11:56

Master Bath Riser:  12:28

Master Bedroom Riser:  13:05



The boiler sits basically underneath the living room.  Then we have a railroad style apt with the master bath and bed at the other end of the apt.  The living room risers are fed directly from the header.  The master bedroom is fed from the end of the main, which is about 50 feet long.

jpf321

these are times ..

are these times to the rad inlet valve? or to the main branch for each riser?

are you well vented along the main?

is everything accessible insulated?

do you plan on making changes after establishing this baseline?

also note the starting indoor and outdoor temp with these times...as it may make a slight difference on different days.

FJL

The Times

Those are the times that the steam reaches the inlet valve.  I timed it to when my hand felt steam in the riser, at a level about five feet above the floor.  The main and the branches in the basement are insulated with one-inch fiberglass and some kind of grey past insulation for elbows.  The risers in the apts are not insulated.



The main has a Hoffman 75 at the end and three Gorton #1's on a tree.  Each riser has a Gorton #1 at the top of the riser in the 3rd floor apartment.  The risers do not extend into the top floor apt.  They stop at the inlet valve of the rads for the top floor aptment. 



I did some calculations last year and concluded that I'm pretty well vented.  The steam gets to all rads within 5 minutes.  I don't know if that can be improved.  Maybe.



Right now, I'm working on getting the pressure set correctly.  I have a Honeywell vaporstat with a sliding scale so I can't set my pressure exactly.  I need to add a low pressure gauge to my boiler to know the cut out for sure, but I just haven't gotten around to it. 



Time to make dinner for the kid. 

jpf321

sliding scale?

i'm not sure what you mean by a sliding scale .. it could be that the screw has come off the mechanism and the piece simply slides around .. this is not correct .. the indicator should be adjusted by turning the screw.



if you have a vaporstat .. i might recommend the 0-20oz+inches of water as a secondary scale http://www.gaugestore.com/prodinfo.asp?number=33015

FJL

v-stat

I have that gauge hooked up to a radiator. 



I misspoke (or miswrote, I should say) when I was describing my v-stat.  It does work by a screw, which I can turn to move the indicator up and down.  My v-stat is a 0-4 psi model, not the 0-16oz model.  Not sure why my contractor used this one instead of the 0-16oz.  Maybe he preferred the mercury model to the non-mercury?  I don't know.  Unfortunately, I didn't realize, at the time, the difference between the two models.  To "set" mine at 12 ounces, say, I have to move the indicator halfway between 0.5 and 1.0 psi.  Not very precise.



View it here in this link:  [url=http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/honeywell-vaporstat-looks-new#]http://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/honeywell-vaporstat-looks-new#

Big-Al_2

You know you're a steam junkie stuck to The Wall when:

-- you have a box of spare radiator vents in your basement left over from previous experiments.

-- you analyze each month's gas bill in terms of "degree days per therm."

-- your Saturday morning ritual includes testing your LWCO before breakfast, in your pajamas.

-- your steam main is like a deer.  Its "antler" grows each year.

-- you wonder if "just one more" main vent will still make a difference.

-- you peruse eBay every day looking for good deals on valves, vents, controls, or gages.

--  you lie in bed at night listening to radiator vents click open and closed . . . and try to figure out what room each of them is in.

-- if somebody asks what kind of heat you have, you rattle off the BTU rating and efficiency of your boiler, and the EDR of each radiator from memory.

-- you keep a spare radaitor in your garage, "just in case."

-- you keep your boiler shiny and dust free, just in case somebody wants to see it. 

-- even though you're not a pro, the local heating guy comes to you with questions.



Peace



Big "guilty on all counts" Al

jpf321

LOL

I see you added a couple more .. these are great .. keep 'em coming. 

jpf321

You know you're a steam junkie when....

.... visiting the Museum of Natural History with your kids and you stop to take pictures of the strange radiators gizmos .. http://picasaweb.google.com/jpf321/NaturalHistoryMuseumRadiators?authkey=Gv1sRgCPb2yrWSq_-XzwE#



Can someone explain what the big bell covered thing is on the right end?

Steamhead

It's probably

some sort of TRV or maybe an electric or pneumatically-controlled valve. Where is the museum located? 

jpf321

american museum of natural history

79th St & Central Park West, NYC, NY

Was founded in 1869.

http://www.ny.com/museums/american.museum.of.natural.history.html

TonyS

When you dedicate your life to this

http://www.rexresearch.com/schaeffe/schaeffer.htm   I wouldn't doubt a discovery like this would have you shot dead in a very short time. But for all you steamheads, here is a nice weekend project.