Thought I knew what I was doing.

CIECO1

<span style="font-size:12pt">I could use some advice on a change we did in my son’s house that did not work out the way we expected. A few years ago we installed 5 zones of 300’ of ½ “ pex  the manifold had 1 spare zone and has been working very well. Last summer we enclosed a small porch about 10 X 15 and installed ½” pex under the floor boards adjusted all the zones for ¾ GPM every thing works well but the porch is cold it’s all windows on the north side of the house and was expected, so I came up with a way that I thought would work around the problem and it didn’t work. With out drawing a sketch I will try to describe the set up that we  have and the way I modified it. </span>

<span style="font-size:12pt">Out of the top of a 5 section Weil Mclain Boiler (old 1970 unit) through a 1 ¼ “ flow valve and is broken down to 3 zones. 1 ¾” hot water heater circulator on the feed side, 2 ¾” 2</span><span>nd</span><span style="font-size:12pt"> floor 3 ton AH circulator on return and then the radiant system.</span>

<span style="font-size:12pt">The radiant system has a Cash 1” temp control valve connected to the boiler feed and the return then goes to the circulator and then to a caleffi manifold. All works well then I installed a 1” tee after the circulator and connected the bull of the tee to the porch zone added a 1” zone valve after the tee Installed a thermostat  in the porch and used that to control the circulator so when the porch is cold only the porch zone will heat and connected the zone valve to the house thermostat and the end switch turns on the  circulator. It looked good to me, when the house calls for heat the zone valve opens and all the zones heat and work well. But when the porch calls for heat the circulator comes on and the water circulates but does not get past 90deg. Can’t figure out why any advice would be appreciated.</span>

Zman

Drawing?

I am not sure I am following the description.

Do you have opposing circulators without check valves?

A drawing would help.

Carl

Steamfitter66

Great picture of the radiant

now could we have a pic of the near boiler piping and the model # of your mixing valve?

Have you left it on for a couple of days to see what will happen?

Have you done heat load calculations? They are needed to properly design said systems.

Dave H_2

Heat Loss, Heat Loss, Heat Loss......

I am assuming that the thermostat is located in the original radiant room.



So when that thermostat gets satisfied, it shuts down the system.



The heat loss for the porch area is much higher and therfore needs a higher flow rate. So balancing the manifold based upon all having the same flow is causing the porch to be colder.

You can add a zone by adding actuators to the manifold and a thermostat in the porch



Dave H

hot_rod

the load on the porch

could be over-powering the system. Keep an eye on the return temperature to the boiler under that load. If it is a typical non condensing boiler you want that return above 140F within 15 minutes, in my opinion.



If that porch load is that large, so will be the fuel bills

CIECO2

Up date

As far as not having enough heat in the porch that goes without saying, I will probably add some baseboard next summer. But my question is still why doesn’t that zone by its self heat up to the 140* that it does when the zone valve opens? I am talking about the feed temp not the return. I was never much of a draftsman so I hope you can understand my drawing. I will also try to find some pictures of the rest of the installation. If I dont respond quickly to your post its because I am running out of e mail addresses because mine never work twice?

BenWoj

Log In Problem

I found that the first time you log in, you have to hit the "forgot password" button and reset it.  Works after that every time. 

lza

Working backwards

Do you have a separate temp gage on your porch loop?  Is that how you determined that you are only getting 90 deg F water in your porch loop?



If that is the case, I would work backwards.  Shut down the house t-stat, the AHU, the hot water tank, and then crank up the porch t-stat.  Is the aquastat getting a signal to fire up the boiler?  Is the Armstrong circ running, is the zone valve to the Supply Manifold closed?  Are all the valves that need to be open, open? 



Lastly, I would be concerned about heat migration from the Porch Zone at the Return Manifold to the other House Zones.   But maybe you have that covered. 

Weezbo

any chance the bugga boo ,

is at the mixer ?



Weezbo.

CIECO1

Still looking

Ok I think I have my account set up that I can sign on with no problems, thanks for the advice.

Yes I do have a separate gauge and it does read 90*. I have cranked up the porch loop made shure the zone valve was closed and still get no heat. I disconnect the return from the manifold; get a good flow over a gal a min and the loop heats up. First I thought full of air but when I went back a few days later same thing. Tried it again with the same result. Now with the zone valve closed I don’t see how I could be getting any reverse flow but that is why I am looking for help.

Unknown

piping

Piping not right at the mixing valve.. suppose u have too high of water temps going in there, where's the cool water coming from to reduce the temps to get mixing valve open more?? Needs pri/sec pipng for correct heat tranfer.. like I did for 5 difference temps zone off of one boiler.

CIECO1

Follow the flow

Na the mixing valve is set up right the only problem is the porch zone.

Zman

Ghosting

Do the other circs in the system have check valves?

It seems the problem only occurs during low flows. It could be that at high flows, enough water goes through the boiler but at low flows it is ghosting through other zones.

Closing the isolation valves on the other zones will test the theory.

Just a thought.

Carl

CIECO1

Another Thought

From what I remember the other circs were off but I will valve them off and see what happens. I am wondering if I am really getting any flow. when I opened up the return I had a good flow but there is no way the water is flowing if its not geting hot. But what is the story with 6 zones on it works well. and with only 1 zone I get no were, what do you think is different with just 1 loop open. Head to high, past the curve. Now when I open the return I am down 12 psi and I get a good flow but it gets hot with 6 zones. I am lost, maybe I should add a nother circ and get rid of the zone valve? 

Zman

Flow

If you have effectively eliminated the possibility that the heat line is airlocked or kinked and the loop size is within the range of the circulator, I think the water must not be making it through the boiler.

Best of luck,

Carl

Weezbo

i am thick headed , so ,..

hook a washingmachine hose to the supply header and one end to the return and crank it on for like 3 mins .. if the same thing is happeningto its ahead of the circ if it gets hotter than blazes as you turn up the temp on your mixer it means that there is a problem

1. loops not looping

2. return temp water not doing anything to the mix ,

3. if the temp drops instead of increasing you have the thing not seeing anywhere for the cold return to go so it will start out with some heat and just roll round and round the small loop gradually cooling off what little heat by conduction existed beyond the mix..



you have a piece of Hepex in the act ok so add blue food dye to some water in that supply side headder with it valved off from flow back at the circ..





and valved off on the return to the boiler



and valved off at the return to the mix.



in about three mins of your experiment the water should be rolling thru the hepex and back.. with or without the washing machine hose in place because all it will do is allow some higher water temp to bypass into the return ...





when you see blue on the supply side at the riser on the stone wall you have there call it good.

and fire the thing back up.

if blue water doesnt come back the circ is not doing the job.

lza

6 zones?

CIECO,



I am not following on some of the details.  When you say with "6 zones on it works well," are you saying that with the House stat calling for heat and the Porch stat calling for heat, all the house loops AND the porch loop heat up well?  I must have misunderstood that in your first post.  I got the impression that the porch loop NEVER heated up past 90 deg.



Also, you said, "I disconnect the return from the manifold; get a good flow over a gal a min and the loop heats up."  You disconnected the porch loop from the manifold and capped it?  Or you disconnected the 1" copper from the manifold?  From your drawing you show that you moved the porch loop from the manifold to upstream of the manifold.  I know the Caleffi manifolds have flowmeters on the supply manifolds, and it sounds like you added a flow meter along with a temp gage on the new porch loop.

CIECO1

Still stumped

            If you look at the drawing what I did was cut a tee into the line after the circ. And then after the tee I installed a zone valve. So what should end up happening is when the porch stat calls for heat the zone valve is closed but the circ comes on and I should have a flow threw the porch loop. When the house calls for heat the zone valve opens and the end switch turns on the circ and all 6 zones heat. You know I talked about adding more heat in the porch but it lags only a few degs behind the house I think if I can get this working the porch will be nice and warm.

 

Thanks for all the advice. After Christmas I will get over to the kids house I think I should cut a flow meter in to the loop and see when I loose it and why. 

                                                

                                                                                    Happy Holidays

Weezbo

you have circulation with the boiler valved off ?

and the flow is going thru the headder after testing that with the food colouring dye ?



it must be that the mixing valve is set at 90 then if 90 is all that is comming out of it



thats simple enough .



you said it is only going in at 90 .... " but the porch is cold " take the screw out of the cap and set it at 120 .. if it does not come out within 20 up or down of 120 the thing is defunked.

Tom_133

Ceico

Just a shot in the dark... Have you made sure the porch return is turned on all the way at the caleffi header? I am sure you have but that's the only thing I can see that would stop it from doing what you want unless the pump isn't coming on when you want it to. Make sure that return cap is unscrewed all the way (I think thats how it goes?)

Paul Pollets

Porch requirements

Porches always have a heat loss 2-4x greater than any other room. Does the application use transfer plates? Is there R30 insulation under the application? I'd say you will need supplemental heat, even if you're using plates and have adequate insulation under the loops. Do a heat loss and confirm the requirements!