New "Smith 8-HE boiler" that has an "internal flow control in 2.5 gpm tankless"

Liwymoi818

Totally at my wits end!

This new system with 2.5 gpm tankless (has internal flow control) installed 4/26/16 replaced formerly new 5.0 gpm system of 18 years that had no flow restrictors, even though we have 110 psi from main.

Former 5.0 gpm tankless boiler provided VERY hot water, so much so that after drawing a bath in former large jacuzzi and then small bathtub, we always had to add cold water before daring to submerge self.
Showers were always super hot, with constant pounding water coming out our shower head set to massage mode.
We could do 4 20 minute showers back-to-back with no absence in hot water, and never had any fluctuations in temperatures.

Now we now longer have a pounding massage shower (it's been reduced to a shower of medium pressure).
Showering now requires many tweakings of the setting as the water temperature constantly fluxuates from hot to warm to cool to hot etc.
In drawing a bath, minute 4-8 the water is barely warm. After 20 minutes to fill small tub (we just replaced large jacuzzi tub a year ago) the water is only near hot for 5 minutes. When adding more water, the water comes out barely warm for 5 minutes and then gets gradually hotter.
However if a 2nd bath is drawn after crappy 1st one, the water temperature is much warmer & 2nd bath far warmer.

Never is the starting temperature of the boiler consistent: it reads anywhere from 210 to 180o's.
The temperature on system always reads about 15 o's less than the gauge on boiler.

The only fixes by installer is to raise upper & lower limits 1) 154 & 164o's 2) 164 & 175o's and 3) today's change to 174 & 185 o's - to no avail in creating a hot warm bath or alleviating temperature fluctuations.

Further company insists the lack of "pressure" of massage shower head, that's been reduced to a medium shower with no pounding water, is NOT due to the 2.5 gpm tankless that has internal flow control. Yet we immediately noticed the change after installation & contacted installer that same evening to report it to them.

Worse, they insist I must add a flow restrictor to the main - but we can barely tolerate the lack of shower water pressure as it is.

Any suggestions please?

kcopp

So you had an older Smith Series 8 and you got a completely new boiler....the New Series 8 HE unit?
That new boiler is in actuality a Peerless Wb/wbv .
Smith as a company has pretty much been eliminated on the residential side....just a shell now.

http://www.peerlessboilers.com/Products/ResidentialBoilers/SeriesWBVWV/tabid/118/Default.aspx

http://www.peerlessboilers.com/Products/ResidentialBoilers/SeriesWBVWV/tabid/118/Default.aspx

There are also new controls on this boiler that may need to be adjusted. 5 gpm on a tankless is a lot. What was the btu output on the old boiler vs the new one? Is this steam or hot water?
110 psi is also much too high water pressure. Max allowed by code is 75 psi.

Firecontrol933

I guess I'm a little confused. You replaced what you knew had a 5 gpm capacity with one that only has 2.5 gpm capacity? Who made the decision to downsize the capacity by half? And I'm assuming the one making that decision had full knowledge of how many fixtures, what kind of fixtures and how you use them, but yet still installed something that has half the capacity...... ?

To stick with what you have I would (from here) only see possibly two alternatives and that is to install a secondary tank of sufficient size that the new tankless can feed into via a circulator, but with it's own cold water feed. That would get you more volume of hot water available, more consistency of temp and "might" solve your problems. Or, you could replace the new boiler with one of the same capacity as the old one.

Liwymoi818

Thank you Kcoop for the hyperlinks and I'm working on getting the btu info on the systems. My former new boiler, installed 1998 after a complete loss house fire, was not a Smith but I cannot recall what it was - will get this info later today.

Thank you Firecontrol for your response & advice.
The biggest problem with this situation is that I was never told the new system was only 2.5 gpm.
I should mention installation company didn't know that this tankless also has an internal flow control, as they initially installed an external restrictor when the couldn't achieve hot water on day 1 of install.
The rep payee for this system was BCAC, as income wise I qualify for Fuel Assistance (I have a connective tissue disease & hence suffer frequent unexpected dislocations of major bones disallowing me to work full time).
3 bids were submitted with lowest bidder winning contract approved by rep payee - who cares very little that water temps fluxuates constantly during showers and more so when drawing baths. They didn't have a problem with the fact I was having to add 4 pans of boiling water to take my hot nightly baths either.

At this point install company, after 5 visits in which 3 times they adjusted the upper & lower limits 3 times, has offered only the following:
1) I must add a reducer to main to reduce psi to 80psi - which if I do, there will be far less output of water (according to my plumber client. In 22 years I've never had a plumber at my house btw nor had to replace any fixtures even with the 110 psi)
2) the reason the bath gets cold in 5 minutes is that I have a metal tub. Of course this is the same bathtub the old boiler filled with extremely hot water and never cooled down to warm in 20 minutes (and yes, tub setting behind handle unit is at max setting)
3) fluxuations in water temperature is normal, including the solid 4 minutes the bath water comes out barely warm (of which I have videos of showing how the reading on unit fluxuates from whatever high range it reads at start (210-180o's ) to as low as 148o's, irregardless of what the lower limit is set at.

Thank you all again for your comments!

Liwymoi818

Formerly new boiler installed 1998 - Utica 5gpm
New boiler installed 4/27/16 - 8HE Smith 2.5 gpm with tankless that has internal flow control

Liwymoi818

Maybe this helps better explain my issue:
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