Circulator Pump leaking

jjustinia11

HVACNUT said:

I believe you said your not even using the coil. You have a seperate water heater. So yeah, close the ball valves and leave the coil drain open.

Yup. I was thinking that but did not know if the coil would still be heated empty and that would cause a problem. It probably has its own thermostat, but I have not taken the time to learn where they are. I am trying to leave everything as it was so I dont throw off any pressure setting. Nervous about messing something up and cause a problem, ala exploding coil being heated with no water in it. Was gonna pass the water through it and get the little boost in temp as it enter the heater, so the heater has less work. Does that make sense or should I just by pass the coil and maybe figure out how to turn off that thermostat (if that even exists)...

jjustinia11

Well here it is up and running. been on for 10 minutes on medium and all seems fine. boiler up to temp and pressure increasing. Gonna turn it off as it is not cold, but I know it is working. Thanks for the advice and help.

See that I added a drain at the exit of the coil in case I need to close that loop and drain it and leave it open to avoid any pressure. Now I have the water going through the loop-it comes out nice and hot and that seems to me a better situation having hot water going into the hot water heater. less energy for it to heat water.

HVACNUT

That turned out really nice.
You can even back flush the coil and get rid of the sediment.
Close the cold below the mixing valve.
Open the mixing valve. Open the drain on the cold side and catch the muck.

Question. Your new circ is wired into the high limit aquastat. I can't see where the thermostat wires are going. To the thermostat controlling the new circ? If so, how does the burner fire with a heat call from the other zones?

jjustinia11

Thanks!

Good idea about the flushing.

Here is a better pic of the wiring. The thermostat wire goes to the "aquastat" not the pump (look close and you will see it attached to the BX cable). Not sure of terminology and operation. I just matched what was there before. The other pump has its own thermostat wire from another thermostat for the basement.

I also removed the power to the bleu circ pump as the copper dead ends and it seems wasteful and leading to unneeded pressure on the pipes. Was that a good thing to do?

Larry Weingarten

Hello, One thing... that aquastat box seems to be dripped on by the valve above it. Any way to prevent wetting the box? Electricity under a drippy fitting bothers me for some reason

Yours, Larry

Alan Welch

Removing the other end of the wire coming from the relay to the circulator is more important.looks like it is just laying on the floor.

jjustinia11

Larry Weingarten said:

Hello, One thing... that aquastat box seems to be dripped on by the valve above it. Any way to prevent wetting the box? Electricity under a drippy fitting bothers me for some reason

Yours, Larry

Alan Welch said:

Removing the other end of the wire coming from the relay to the circulator is more important.looks like it is just laying on the floor.

Hey,
There is no leak on the aquastat, that is old staining from way back the old 90 that was above it had deteriorated and had a pinhole leak. part of the reason I redid the copper, I never mentioned that but its all new now and no drips. Everything is perfectly dry.

Yes I have the BX just hanging there. I capped each wire and then wrapped them separately with electrical tape on it. I will put it somewhere soon, just waiting for replies on the disconnection and I am testing the system. I can therefore easily put it back if needed. Not worried about the electricity. I am pretty confident on that area. I will probably just take the wire out once I am certain I am not gonna use that pump. Again, it is capped and taped, there is no danger and I won't leave it there for long.

HVACNUT

@jjustinia11. The new circ is wired into the aquastat.
The blue circ is disconnected.
There's a third switching relay I assume is connected. How does that zone bring on the burner on a heat call? Or it doesn't. The burner will cycle on the low limit?
Wanna do some more work?
Get a 2 zone, zone control board and bring the circs into that. Since your no longer using the coil, you can turn the low side in the aquastat all the way down, saving some gas $$. Or whatever the Canadian equivalent to $$ is.

jjustinia11

HVACNUT said:

@jjustinia11. The new circ is wired into the aquastat.

The blue circ is disconnected.

There's a third switching relay I assume is connected. How does that zone bring on the burner on a heat call? Or it doesn't. The burner will cycle on the low limit?

Wanna do some more work?

Get a 2 zone, zone control board and bring the circs into that. Since your no longer using the coil, you can turn the low side in the aquastat all the way down, saving some gas $$. Or whatever the Canadian equivalent to $$ is.

I like what you're saying and would like to do that, but don't fully understand. I generally get those things tell the circ to turn on and off but not much more than that. there are a lot of wires on my boiler I have not spent the time thinking about what they do, just that it has been working. would love to improve it but need to understand more. I will take a better pic and try to map out where the thermo wires are going.

jjustinia11

I hate to bother everyone again. the boiler is not firing. I have everything on, I set the thermostat to 80 (just to get the boiler started), the circulator pump is running, I filled the boiler to a pressure of 10PSI but the boiler won't fire. The pilot light is on. When I turn my basement thermostat on the boiler fires, so I got the temp up to 180. But then I turn that stat off and I am trying to only run the main zone and again the circ is running nicely, but the boiler is not firing. I suspect it is the setting of this aquastat, which appears to be set to zero. I don't know what the numbers under it are (the 5 to 45 ones). I am reluctant to change anything here until I understand to avoid danger. Please advise.

As you know I took the power out of the other circ, but did not touch anything else. your advice would be appreciated. Its getting cold!



PS. should I make a new thread? I put this here because you all know what my system is.