Cleaning pipes - Am I crazy?

ryanr256

I want to clean the insides of my pipes. Heres why:



I have replaced the same section of pipe twice in two years because of pinhole leaks. With the first one I thought poor casting, but when the replacement had the same issue I started looking further into the problem. That led me to this site and the "Steamy Deal" book set.



I've since learned that 1. the pipes need to be insulated, 2. we were running way too high pressure, 3. we've got broken rad vents and possibly a broken main vent, 4. our near boiler piping is all wrong, 5. the location of our main vents is wrong, 6. the tie in for the Hartford is too long (a 5 inch pipe instead of a close nipple). I also learned that water hammer is not normal for steam systems, unlike what some "professionals" told me.



Also, when I replaced the leaking pipe, and I kid you not, we drained about a gallon of really rusty water from that section of the piping.



The insulation is on order and should arrive soon. I am in the process of moving the main vents and hope to have that done by the end of this week. The near boiler piping will be a challenge because I need 2 1/2 inch pipe/fittings and none of the local suppliers are open on Saturday and I don't have any vacation left to do the job on a weekday.



At any rate, I'm reticent to wrap the pipes in insulation when I know there's all kinds of crud in the from years of neglect. Since I'm opening up the mains to move the vents and repipe I was thinking of doing something, anything, to clean the insides of the pipes.



I thought about doing something like running a garden hose in them to flush them or maybe attaching a rag to a fish tape or other sturdy, flexible wire and pulling it through the pipes to clean them.



I've attached some pics that highlight some of the existing issues.

Am I crazy?



-Bob

Steve_210

in my opinion

you need to start with no 4and you should really hire a pro for this

crash2009

Am I crazy?

Maybe a little too enthusiastic. 

I don't think a boiler re-pipe is a weekend DYS project.  Even if everything goes right, you dont have enough time.  Not to mention "there will be no heat until you are done"  I hired a professional who worked here for 2 days by himself and then he brought in 2 of his employees on the 3rd day to help him finish (5 man days).  Admittedly, mine needed more work than yours will.  I admire your intestinal fortitude but get some help lined up.  Its a half a day just to clean up the mess.  If you are going to do this yourself, plan to do in the spring, at least you won't need heat.  You don't even know if the existing boiler is worth all this work and expence.  You won't find out until you try to bust out the pipes going into it.  I will quote something I read here, that I believe to be true.  "pick the lowest hanging fruit first" 



Get that plugged return working.  Put the main vents on an antler.  Let the boiler cool completely, and flush the **** out of it.  Hell, just this will take you 2 days.  Don't go after the near boiler piping until spring. 

TomM

ur not crazy

clean em while you got em open.  you can buy a garden hose to NPT fitting at the big box and do it that way. 

-

Or if you're rich, you can redo all your wet returns in copper.  id think you'd have to insulate them though.

-

my plan is to hook up a DHW line and ball valve to the wet return farthest from the boiler.  then I can give the returns a little 'blast' every now and then, and/or use that as a boiler fill point.  If its hot water, i wouldnt have to worry too much about thermal shock.

-TomM

Jamie Hall

returns

may well need cleaning.  Probably do, if the water is slow coming back to the boiler.  In my humble opinion, though, steam lines almost never do.  The steam itself does a pretty good job of keeping the crud swept out of them, and they should never have water standing in them.



Insulating the steam mains is a good idea -- away from any boiler piping which you may need to redo.  Insulating returns... maybe.  Maybe not.  Again, only my opinion but it's probably not worth the effort and cash.



Fix the pressure.  That should take all of five minutes.



Fix the vents.  That's a little more ambitious, but can be done without that much hassle -- and can be done without shutting things down for more than an hour or two.



If you have water hammer, and you still have it after the above, find out why.  It might be really lousy near boiler piping.  On the other hand, it could just be some sags in steam mains, or radiators not draining, or... some causes are much easier to fix than others.



Fix the near boiler piping?  Now that's another thing altogether.  Depending on how much of a disaster it really is, that could easily take several man days or more, as noted, and unless you're really handy with the threader and all that, it is not a do it yourself job.  (that five inch pipe on the Hartford loop shouldn't cause a problem, unless there are much bigger problems.  Yes it should be a close nipple, but...)



Incidentally, decent pipe really shouldn't develop pinhole leaks in two years, whether it's copper or black iron.  Do you have a water quality problem?  Are you adding a lot of water to your boiler (and if so, why)?. 

ryanr256

Low Hanging Fruit

Thanks for the comments.



The pressure issue has been fixed. On the p-trol, I've set the differential wheel at 1 and set the cut out to be .5. I don't have a 0 - 3 gauge to verify the actual setting. Adding a more accurate gauge is in the work plan.



I've also adjusted the pitch of the mains to the extent that I could.



Those two things have pretty much eliminated the water hammer.



Last night I flushed the returns. They weren't plugged. I now know they are clean and aren't contributing to our problem. If I understand things correctly, the "A Dimension", which is the height of the dry return from the NWL of the boiler, should be 28 inches. Ours is 52 inches.



I will move the main vents back from the end of the main this weekend. I don't expect the insulation to be delivered before then and it needs to be done before I insulate anyway.



We will probably need to replace all of the radiator vents also. They continously vent even after they get hot.



The insulation is on order and should arrive soon. When it gets here, it will be the first priority.



The near boiler piping can be put off until Spring. It's been that way for 30 years so what's a few more months? I will continue to clean the boiler until the water stays clear.



When I read the information on the Wall and what's in the I&O manual for the boiler, I can see that whoever installed our boiler either couldn't read or didn't care. I'm an OCD kind guy and just knowing it's wrong drives me nuts. I want it to be right and if it's not I will make it that way.



No offense to anyone here, but the pros I asked about the water hammer told me "it's steam, they do that." and the pros we've had clean the boiler didn't say squat about the near boiler piping being wrong or the vents being in the wrong place at the end of the main run. Maybe I'm being too critical, but if it were me I would have said something about it to the homeowner. Maybe asked some questions at least.



As for the leaks, here's some history:



When we bought the house this run of pipe was copper. The run had a T for a radiator, then a 4 ft. piece of copper off the T. It T'd again for another radiator and had a 6 ft length of copper before it made a 90. All the Ts and 90s were black iron and no dielectric fittings were used and the galvanic corrosion was obvious. We had someone replace the copper with black iron and that was that.



The 6 foot section developed a pinhole leak. The hole was at the 8 to 9 o'clock position and not on the bottom of the pipe. I replaced that myself thinking it was a bad casting. Then, and this is what started my odyssey into steam heat, the replacement developed a leak earlier this Fall.



What I think, and it's all speculation, is that this section has always been a problem and the previous owners got tired of continually replacing the iron and substituted copper. Oh, and this is also where the most severe water hammer would take place. You could hear the water sloshing around in that section of pipe. There wasn't an obvious pitch problem but I added what I could by adjusting the pipe hangers on that section. Now there is no hammer and I don't hear any sloshing in the pipe.



Do we have water quality issues? Cincinnati is known for its hard water but it was only the one section of pipe that leaked and the rest of the piping looks to be original. We did replace another section because of exterior corrosion. The previous owner stored all kinds of volatile chemicals on a shelf under the pipes. When we got the house, they had been there for probably 20 years and the containers were rusted as was the overhead pipes. It was fun cleaning thatup. But that area is totally separate from where we had the leaks.



So, I'm working on getting things corrected and getting the system functioning optimally.



-Bob

Jamie Hall

Bravo!

Sounds like you are well on your way to a wonderful quiet efficient heating system!  Amazing what getting the pressure right, and getting the pitches right can do.



Your radiator vents sound like they've had it.  Not too surprising.  Fortunately, they are pretty inexpensive -- but do try to get good ones at a real heating or plumbing supply house (or on line).  The big box ones don't last all that well.



Water sloshing in the pipe rather explains the leak.  Again illustrating the importance of proper pitch!



No offence on the pros -- most of the pros on the Wall really are steam pros, at least on the Strictly Steam part (there are some real top notch folks on the rest of the boards, too -- but what really distinguishes them is that they all tend to know what they don't know, and stay away from it and refer you to someone who does!).  Professional heating folks from other disciplines, though, however good they may be in their own fields, who don't know steam really don't know steam.  And if you don't know what you don't know, it never even occurs to you to ask the right questions!

ryanr256

Progress

Well, the insulation arrived sooner than expected, which is good because the high on Friday is supposed to be 37.



That, and moving the main vents, will keep me occupied for the rest of the week and into the weekend.



I will discuss the importance of functioning radiator valves with my wife and maybe we can find room in the budget for them.



I will also do another cleaning of the boiler.  >:}



We are a long way from where we used to be but we still have a way to go. I am so thankful I found this site and for the many responses that have shown me how a steam system can operate.



Thank you to all and have a Happy Thanksgiving.



-Bob