Water loop

happydave

I want to convert a slow heating radiator in a sunroom to hot water. Piping off the bottom as we normally do, aquastat, bypass, etc. My question is has anyone piped the last few feet(5') in pex? Room is on a slab with the floor up on 6" joists that I could snake up thru with pex but not sure with copper. Thinking with bypass to temper it and quality pex and not insulating I should be okay. Thoughts?

Jamie Hall

Uh... what is supplying heat to that radiator now? If it is hot water already, a separate loop may help. If it's steam... not so much. In fact, changing to hot water may well make it a good deal worse. If it's steam, let's figure out why it is slow heating, and fix that instead.

happydave

Jamie, it's a far radiator off in a sunroom. Warms up only when heat is cranked. Good vent rite #11. Just heats up last, not useful. Used as a office music room. Gets closed off if not heated. Dave

BobC

Are all the other radiators using ventrite #11's?

If all the other radiators are heating fine there must be something wrong with the piping to this one radiator or it just needs a faster air vent on it.

Bob

Jamie Hall

I second Bob's remark -- and if this is steam, with a vent, you're going to be much much better of trying to find out why the steam is slow to that one radiator. Check all your pipe pitches. Check pipe diameters vs. EDR. Make sure your vents are balanced. Enough main venting?

To sort of add to my initial remark, keep in mind if you were to consider going to hot water that with steam your are looking at 240 BTU from each square foot of EDR. With hot water? 170 if you are lucky. Big difference...

happydave

All first and second floor vents are # 1 vent rites adjusted down. Radiator is pitched, piping is pitched. 8 by 10 room

BobC

I jut checked the tables and the ventrite #11 is a pretty slow vent, 0.06cfm at 1oz. IF the pipe pitch looks good and the radiator itself has proper pitch, I would try a more aggressive vent. To save time one with multiple orifices (Maid O Mist 5L) might be appropriate. The radiator should be pitched so water can drain back out to the steam supply valve.

http://www.amazon.com/Maid-Steam-Angle-Radiator-Valve/dp/B003DV3AGE/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1445942570&sr=8-2&keywords=maid+o+mist+5l

I'd start with the #5 (0.1 cfm) or #6 (0.15 cfm) orifice and see if that makes any difference.

Bob

j a_2

All good stuff above....also try this, because what you say tells us something is amiss...but first, was this one of the original radiators? Make sure the valve supplying the radiator is full open....may need to disconnect union and look see...couple options at this point, close valve run system, carefully open it and see if steam is coming,or reconnect it and run system with no vent on that radiator,and see what happens.....or shut down a couple of other radiators ans see what happens....How is the near boiler piping, boiler is sized correctly, correct, main vents installed in proper location and working....did you actually put a level on the pipe to c if it was pitched...Post a couple of pics...

happydave

Couple of year old boiler, done to spec. I did it myself. Soup to nuts right. Customer wanted a separate zone for a little music room. Didn't have funds to do the conversion.