TRV HELP! They don't fit

diesels12

Ugh, bought over 40 TRV's as part of my heating upgrade and all fit pretty much like this. I know I am not the first guy to update 100 year old radiator valves so there must be a way. This even has my 20 year experience European plumber stumped. Valve on left is balancing valve and the right is Tunstall trv. Both are off, not due to the manufacturer, just bad luck. We tried pulling up riser, no play. Our supplier was at a loss too. I felt physically ill when I saw this, someone must have an answer with all the wisdom on this forum.

kcopp

The make up dimension is different.
You are kind of stuck.
You could use a nipple coupling but then you will still need to raise the radiator up w/ blocks.

http://www.supplyhouse.com/Black-Fittings-173000

hot_rod

We used these nipple extenders in the fire sprinkler jobs when the sprinkler heads needed an exact dimension. Not sure what sizes the are available in.

Certainly a machine shop could build them if you don't have options to move the piping.

diesels12

Unfortunately we have both a vertical and horizontal difference, I will try nipple extenders though.

HVACNUT

The nipple extenders will get it ip, but not over
How much room is there between the main loop and the floor? You can notch the floor and do offsets down below.
Is the Europeans pipe threader metric?

EBEBRATT-Ed

Since you have 40 of these to do....I would probably return them and figure out something else.

But if you are stuck with the new valves there is only one way.

Your going to have to experiment with different size blocks until you get something that works.

Your going to have to raise the radiators....you may not like the looks, wood, channel iron, steel square tube experiment with wood first to find the size. Use male x female nipple extension or couplings and regular nipples.

To make up the length you may be able to use a nipple extension as well. There is likely some play in the piping.

The first one is going to be a tedious struggle to get it right......and you may not like the way it looks.

Scott.Malo

Hi Diesels12,
Scott here from Tunstall Corporation. Hold on if you can. I want to gather the team and see if there is an alternative solution to what has been suggested here before you proceed. Give me until noon today (10/27) to reply back at this thread. We appreciate your business and want to see if the magicians here have some recommendations. Stay tuned .

diesels12

I am pretty much committed to the TRV's at this point. As you can see by the pictures, we did some pretty extensive work on the whole system. Eliminated 8" piped gravity system feeding 15 risers and replaced with 15 circulator pumps and 3/4" pex and 2 -175k btu oil fired boilers with tekmar 374 ODR and tekmar 360 mixing valve. We tied the pex in at the base of the risers in the basement so risers feeding radiators are still iron pipe. My plan was to have a couple of t stats, 1 on 2nd floor to control 1/2 circulators another on 3rd flr for rest of circulators and put TRV's on rads in the other rooms that don't have t stats. The first floor will be controlled by hydronic heat from airhandlers and have their own t stats. House is 12,000 sq ft so definitely need to control rads. I guess I could also put a T stay on every circulator to control the rads on that loop but the problem with that is each riser controls rads on both 2nd and 3rd floor so I would be heating a room on 3rd floor I don't use to heat the room on 2nd floor I do use.
Anyway that's my story. It's frustrating to spend so much money and run into a snag like this at the end. It's getting cold here and worst case I fill system and when I find solution I can always drain each riser individually and install TRV's so rest of house is warm.

Scott.Malo

Diesels12 - It appears that you have been talking with a colleague of mine here, Woody Tunstall. Woody has extensive knowledge in these areas so I am going to defer back to him. I would continue the discussion with him if you still need assistance. Thanks!

nicholas bonham-carter

What balancing problems were you having-under, or over heating?
How is the boiler controlled?
Was it a gravity system before?—NBC

Grallert

I'd maybe lift up or replace with a longer nip the left side connection. and connect the TVR on the right to the top of the rad instead of the bottom. Than you would be able to offset that raiser maybe with a 45 and a st45. Just a thought.

diesels12

To answer NBC's questions, no problems balancing prior , just wanted to replace 100 year old valves that didn't work. They were actually air operated which is pretty cool, see pic.
Boiler controlled by tekmar 274 with ODR
Old system was gravity.

diesels12

Grallert that's an excellent suggestion tapping into top of rad. It would mean modifying my rad covers but its possible.

Thanks
John

diesels12

Grallert, how would you suggest taking 100 year old taps off top of rad? Heating them?

JUGHNE

Could the risers in the basement be pushed up, assuming you tied them to PEX?

TRV people may be able to come up with a longer spud to correct the length?

Grallert

diesels12 Usually it's not easy. In fact So rarely is it easy I would go right to the sawzall method. I cut the hex off exposing a hole that a blade will fit into and very carefully cut a pie slice out of the plug. with a cold chisel or punch I knock the rest out. If it's a really pretty plug you could try heat and or a penetrater and get the correct sized socket and breaker bar. If you cut it find blades that are made for cast or be prepared to go through a few of the bimetals. slow and steady. Good luck.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Follow up with Woody Tunstall would be the first thing to do. They were good enough to respond to this thread

diesels12

Talked to Woody on phone, very nice guy and helpful and waiting to hear what their suggestions for a fix are. The product is top of the line as is the service! One way or another I will get these to fit and will post it here. No way am I letting this beat me! I really respect the knowledge on this website and I know there is a solution.

diesels12

Well here is one solution, a little rube Goldberg like but it works. We were able to pull up the pipe in floor to raise it and the copper closes the gap in a roundabout way lol.

JUGHNE

With the swing joint stirrup you have there, you don't even have to pull up the pipe for the hand valve.
Did the pipe for the TRV pull up OK?

diesels12

Pipe for the trv pulled up, but not easily. The copper is expensive solution with the elbows but did it just for the 4 rads we opened. Was thinking of pex for the other 36, it's ugly but the rad covers will hide it. Of course open to other solutions. The good thing about my new system is, I put valves on each of the 15 risers so I can drain one riser and do rads on that riser and still have heat in the rest of house than move on to the others.

diesels12

Just curious, are these old air operated valves worth anything? I will have 40 of them and was going to throw them out but they look so cool I was thinking of donating to a heating museum lol. Seriously though if anyone needs them contact me.

JUGHNE

How about changing the angle valve for a straight ball valve.
Off the top of that and loop down into a street 90 type ell in the radiator. Even loop a little behind rad.
Or a street 90 on angle valve.
At that point maybe 1/2" pex would be adequate. (tighter radius)

Might work on either end
.......something I would want to cover up right away

EBEBRATT-Ed

Wow! Those old valves do belong in a museum!!

that's a good fix but propress is$$$$. You could do it in black pipe or you could sweat it. A lot less $$ in fittings but more labor.

MilanD

Wait, won't nipple extension on supply work to lift it up?
Then slide the rad over to supply side, and then insert extensions both on the return spud in the rad (or short nipple with a coupler), and the nipple extension on the return riser?

novajke

I'm not a plumber, but in researching the solution when I encountered the same problem with horizontal offset, I found the option of using eccentric reducer coupling with the smaller end on the existing pipe and a reducing nipple to get back to the valve diameter could work. In my application, my replacement radiator already was reduced, so I only used the eccentric reducer coupling and a short nipple. I would love to get my hands on one of those crazy air valves to explore it from a mechanical design perspective - where are you located?

Leon82

After you get the 2 90s on there can you use the soft copper tube to make the curve? You would have less solder joints.

Or a 90 on the valve and a 45 on the rad. Would make the second bend easier

Leon82

They have 180 degree refrigeration fittings too that would get you even closer.

They are street from what I have seen so it could slip into the slip of the male adapter on the vertical pipe

With a 45 on the rad you would only need a small bend

EBEBRATT-Ed

All good ideas. lots of options but unless we are there with a rullar and a level we are all guessing

JUGHNE

I believe he has radiator covers so any imaginative piping could be hidden. That is why I mentioned the floppy PEX connection.

diesels12

I can get the pipe to move up but not easy. That leaves the horizontal offset so I will attempt some other ideas besides propress which is way to much $$$. I had to do it for the 4 I opened just to get new system going though. As for propress, look at these T's, big $$$ here but fast and efficient.

Leon82

That's a lot of circulators

diesels12

As for location of air valves, about 20 minutes north of NYC. Come and get them but you have to cut them out and replace them with trv lol, you can have as many as you want.

diesels12

15 circulators , 13 for risers and 2 for hydronic hot air handlers,not to mention the pumps in the primary and secondary manifold. Check out the YouTube video. We ran into a problem this weekend when we started it up so made video to send to our tekmar rep. Hopefully it's solved tomorrow.
https://youtu.be/kl9FrhdswSs

Leon82

On the right there are 2 sets of close tees, is that the primary secondary merge? If I recall there is a minimum length of straight pipe called for. And it looks like there is an elbow very close to 3 of them.

Danny Scully

Can I use extension couplings and raise the radiator so it doesn’t look terrible? just kidding very cool valves.

Harvey Ramer

Can you upload the piping diagram?

diesels12

Don't have piping diagram because we changed it. I do have this new YouTube video showing all the piping and pumps etc. Took it just for you guys!
https://youtu.be/7VnP4BOWgZQ

EBEBRATT-Ed

God I hate propress.........but I should have bought stock in it!!

Harvey Ramer

The pump on the far right has to turn on whenever any of the 13 pumps on the header for the radiator risers turn on. This creates flow across the closely spaced tees where the take-offs to the three-way mixing valve are. The pump should be wired to the Tekmar 360 control on the System Pump outputs. It also must have the check valve installed.
What model pump is it? It has to create flow equal to the combined flow in the Rad header.

Danny Scully

Why on earth do you hate propress @EBEBRATT-Ed?