water coming out of my vents

pjnick

I have water coming out of my vents on my radiators and my boiler is getting up to about 8 lbs of pressure before it cuts out on the low water shut off the water all comes back and it continues to run like this the main is set at 1.5 and the diff is at .5 any suggestions and also any one know a good steam guy in the boston area thanks !

neilc

when was the pigtail cleaned or checked last ?

pjnick

cleaned the beginning of the season

Fred

It sounds like the Pressuretrol isn't working, probably waterlogged and it sounds like the boiler may be flooded. Is the sight glass full to the top? It can look like it is empty but be completely flooded. Do you have an auto water feeder on the boiler? If so, shut it off and drain the water back down to the normal water level. Have the Auto feeder checked for a valve failure. Does the boiler have a hot water coil in it to supply hot water for the house? It may have developed a leak and is feeding water into the boiler.If so, shut the supply off to that coil.

pjnick

no supply to the house and no the boiler isn't flooded I've watched the water disappear from the sight glass till the boiler shuts off on the low water shut off then all the water comes back its' about 3/4 full on the glass and no auto feed

Jamie Hall

Pressuretrol either defective or plugged.

There is a reason why good installs include two and sometimes three pressuretrols (or a vapourstat and two pressuretrols) all on separate pigtails...

nicholas bonham-carter

Are any of the horizontal returns close in height to the boiler waterline?
When pressure pushes some water out of the boiler into the returns, a horizontal pipe at the appropriate height can “hide” a considerable amount of water, which immediately comes back when the flame shuts down. This can subject the boiler to abnormal thermal stress, and should be corrected.
In my case, the dry returns dropped down in steps, (from a 1953 installation!), instead of dropping straight down to the wet returns, and caused the problems you are having. Repiping solved it perfectly.—NBC

neilc

pj
after the pressuretrol,
it's probably time to post some pics of boiler and piping above

pjnick

well the main horizontal return running back at an angle to the boiler is probably about 10 feet long and half of it is below the water level of the boiler I guess that would be the wet return ?

EBEBRATT-Ed

I would remove the pressure control and pigtail and clean and reinstall. Also your gage may be defective

Pressure control will work weather waterlogged or not in fact the pigtail makes a water seal so the pressure control always pushes against water

Fred

pjnick said:

well the main horizontal return running back at an angle to the boiler is probably about 10 feet long and half of it is below the water level of the boiler I guess that would be the wet return ?

A picture of that would be helpful. Does it run back towards the boiler as an extension of the Main and then drops vertically to below the boiler water line? Has the water leaving the boiler always been an issue? With a pressure of 8PSI, it is going to push water out of the boiler. As we have said earlier, the Pressuretrol isn't working properly.

pjnick

thanks everyone I will try to get pics posted but the return drops vertical then goes about 10 feet horizontal back to the boiler I guess that's the wet return half of that run is below the water level

neilc

we need a picture of that,
and of the piping leaving the boiler supplying the radiators, and connecting back to the 10 footer

pjnick

still trying to figure out how to post pics , but I changed the pressuretrol skimmed the boiler and now not getting water out of the vents every thing seems ok but the pressure is still getting up to about 4.5 psi before it cuts out but with this extreme cold the boiler is running a lot . what do u think ? and by the way thanks for all the help. Oh one other question I replaced the radiator vents that where spewing water but are those junk now or could they be used again.? Thanks again

Fred

Those vents may be OK when you get the Pressure down or they may be ruined from the high pressure. 4.5 PSI is way too high. Here is the procedure to re-calibrate the Pressuretrol. You need to add a 0-3 PSI gauge to your boiler to do the re-calibration. The 0-30 PSI gauge is just not accurate enough at low pressures:
Inside the Pressuretrol, right below the micro switch, there is a pivot arm. At the end of that arm you will see a screw pin that is activated by the diaphragm at the bottom of the Pressuretrol. If you look very carefully at that screw pin, you will see it actually has a tiny (I mean tiny) hex head on it. It takes a .050 hex wrench and you can turn it clockwise (Towards the bottom of the Pressuretrol to decrease the Cut-out pressure or counter clockwise to increase the cut-out pressure (which none of us want to do but who knows, your Pressuretrol may be really screwed up!). Turn the power to the unit off first. You may find the first attempt to turn that screw a little bit stubborn (relatively speaking) because it has some Locktite on it but it does turn. Don't turn too much, a tiny fraction of a turn goes a long way towards getting it adjusted where you want it (maybe 1/32 inch turn to start with) . You may need to play with it to get it exactly where you want cut out to be.

Jamie Hall

pjnick said:

thanks everyone I will try to get pics posted but the return drops vertical then goes about 10 feet horizontal back to the boiler I guess that's the wet return half of that run is below the water level

Somebody did you wrong. That pipe should be all below the water level -- full length. Most likely someone installed a new boiler and failed to match the water line of the new boiler to the old one.

That will have to be repiped to be correct.

Won't solve your pressure problems -- that's most likely the pressuretrol, as has been said.

I will add that when you get the pressure problems solved, you may find that some or all of your vents no longer work properly. If they really have been subject to 8 psi, they may well have been destroyed. On the other hand, you might get lucky...

pjnick

thanks