Steam for an apartment building

soozn

I live in an old (100 year old) four story walk up apartment building in Brooklyn, w a less than year old new boiler. Our steam heat has suddenly become very difficult to regulate, with some apartments on the upper floors getting very poor heat. Only when the thermostat is boosted to around 72 does the heat come on in the upper story corner apartment. Yet at this point, the 3rd floor is blasted, with temps nearing 80 degrees. We have to open the windows wide, or shut off the radiator, or both. Obviously, this is inefficient at best.



Any ideas? Thanks, soozn



p.s. the guys who installed the boiler were terrible, so no, we can't call them back to examine the situation.

Charlie from wmass

Check the find a pro section

There are some good guys there.

nicholas bonham-carter

sudden turn for the worse

you certainly need a real pro, and you should have a copy of "the lost art of steam heating".

some things could have suddenly happened to make a sudden change for the worse:

1.the pressuretrol may have failed; or the pigtail could have plugged up, and is allowing your pressure to get too high. [get a good low-pressure gauge [gaugestore.com 0-3 psi] and have the pro put it on the same pigtail as the pressuretrol, while keeping the useless 0-30 psi gauge as it is required by code. this will tell you exactly what your pressure is on an ongoing basis. if you would like to be more comfortable, and save some fuel money, get a 0-16 ounce vaporstat.

2. higher than normal pressure may have rendered your main air vents [not radiator vents] inoperative. you need plenty of venting on the main lines as you have such tall risers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3. your thermostat may have lost it's anticipation, causing short-cycling, thus favoring one floor over another. you may have risers which feed the top floor first, and then the 3rd, and on down.

look under the "find a contractor" here, and make sure that you are definite about having steam. contrary to popular belief, plumbers are not necessarily steam experts. "steam heating isn't rocket science--it's a lot harder" [thanks tim].--nbc

jpf321

one pipe or two ..

i'm happy to come over and give a non-pro albeit passionate-hobbyist opinion ..



if it's 2-pipe, chances are the traps on the 3rd floor need replacement .. likely you are sending steam up the return side to the 4th floor, closing that working 4th floor trap and keeping the 4th floor rad from venting.



in two-pipe .. the hot apartment is the one with the broken trap, and they are also the tenants that won't let you in ... sometimes the best way to get in is to crank it up to 90degF for a couple days .. then knock on their door :-)



you may well have other issues too .. i'd be happy to drop over for some poking around .. i've currently been helping out on a 200 unit 2-pipe Heat timer building here in Queens, they have over 600 convectors/rads .. we are finally getting the building managed, controlled and efficient.