Water hammer

hi

Hi, I have a one pipe steam system that was banging away and spraying water through the vents etc. and after reading dans books i fixed the pitch of the pips sized the header right and it's all working fine, well almost no more water spraying but every so often when the system shuts off about a min later I hear a few bangs, it sounds like its in the wet return, any idea what can cause this banging?

Fred

Is that wet return a horizontal and is it above the Normal water level?

hi

It's horizontal and it's on the floor the only part that comes up is the Hartford loop.

Fred

Is the Hartford loop above the normal water level of the boiler?

KC_Jones

Also does it have a close nipple at it's connection to the tee?

hi

It's at the hight that the Manuel specifies, the only thing that I could think of is that the water level has bean jumping around when the boiler is working, could that have to do with it?

KC_Jones

How much is the water level jumping around? Anything more than 1/2-3/4" is an indication you need to do some skimming to get oils out.

Fred

Yes, it sounds like you need to skim the boiler to get the oils out of it, possibly as a result of fixing the header, etc.That should stabalize the water in the boiler.

Jamie Hall

This can also be from thermal expansion (well, in this case, thermal contraction!), particularly if it just a couple of bangs.

hi

Thanks for all your comments, I'll try skimming and see if that helps.