Two stage gas valve

gfrbrookline

@Fred, Yes that is what I meant, I listed 3.4 per section just in case I counted incorrectly.

gfrbrookline

@Fred you are also correct about the supply valve being on the same side as the vent, you can see the black knob and brass spindle. Looks very clean.

Fred

@gfrbrookline , I too noticed how clean it was under there!

gfrbrookline

@cynthia07104 Hold onto the D vent as once you have relocated the vent you may find the radiator is still slow you get steam. If you can access the riser below the radiator I would install the D on it to coax the steam towards the radiator faster but still be able to vent it slowly.

I will leave it to @Fred to determine if the EDR matches the room. I am going to guess it is on the small side.

Fred

The potential output of that Rad is about 15K BTU. I'd like to see how it does after the vent is properly positioned. It may be enough. If the room is still cold, a heat loss may need to be done on that room. I kinda suspect it may be enough . The cathedral ceiling and if the side walls and ceiling are insulated is the big question.

gfrbrookline

@cynthia07104 I just looked back at your original pictures, do you have insulation on any of the mains or returns? If not adding 1" fiberglass insulation will make a huge difference and will likely get steam to the cold radiator faster. The ROI is usually pretty fast as well. If you don't have a local supply store try www.buyinsulationproductstore.com , don't use the stuff from the orange or blue stores it's only 1/2".

Dave0176

@gfrbrookline I recommend against insulating anything, the boiler is waaaaay oversized and they need to almost waste heat. Steam getting to any radiator with that boiler won’t be a problem, it’s a matter of balancing.

gfrbrookline

@Dave0176 now that she has the 2 stage gas valve most of the oversized factor will be diminished. I am also oversized by about 50% purposely by my previous contractor because my boiler also heats 2 80 gal indirect DHW tanks and a hot water loop for the basement. My mains and returns are now insulated and we were able to overcome short cycling by massing out the main venting with a total of 7 big mouths and 3 G2's and choking the radiator venting way down. The heat is also now even throughout the system, granted much larger system than the one in question. Granted every system is different.

If I knew then what I know now I would have found a different contractor who better understood steam and found a different solution for the DHW.

cynthia07104

@Fred would it be better to move the black pipe to the other side of the radiator or to tap the other side of the radiator?? After reading the replies I checked all my radiators and I have two in which the air valve and the supply pipe are on the same side. One radiator has a screw where the air valve should be, the other doesn’t.

As far as insulation we have 1 1/2 inch spray foam and batting on all outside walls. Or at least that’s what we paid for..

cynthia07104

Both radiators with the supply pipe and the air valve on the same side.

gfrbrookline

It is much easier and cost effective to move the vent.

Fred

cynthia07104 said:

@Fred would it be better to move the black pipe to the other side of the radiator or to tap the other side of the radiator?? After reading the replies I checked all mybradiators and I have two in which the air valve and the supply pipe are on the same side. One radiator has a screw where the air valve should be, the other doesn’t.

It would be much easier to have the vent moved than to try to move the supply pipe. Moving the supply pipe may also case problems trying to get the pipes pitched properly. The location where the vent is on those two radiators can easily have a 1/8" plug installed and if the one radiator needs to be tapped for a vent, that's a simple task for a steam pro or plumber.

gfrbrookline

Also make sure to swap out that varivent with something much slower. The varivent will vent way to fast and add to your problems. Again I would recommend a Ventrite No. 1 so it can be dialed in.

cynthia07104

gfrbrookline said:

If I knew then what I know now I would have found a different contractor who better understood steam and found a different solution for the DHW.

If only we knew what we know now which is still peanuts we would be in a better situation

Being we are so oversized we are definitely going to be adding some radiators in the garage and in the basement as it can only help our situation.

Dave0176

gfrbrookline said:

@Dave0176 now that she has the 2 stage gas valve most of the oversized factor will be diminished. I am also oversized by about 50% purposely by my previous contractor because my boiler also heats 2 80 gal indirect DHW tanks and a hot water loop for the basement. My mains and returns are now insulated and we were able to overcome short cycling by massing out the main venting with a total of 7 big mouths and 3 G2's and choking the radiator venting way down. The heat is also now even throughout the system, granted much larger system than the one in question. Granted every system is different.

If I knew then what I know now I would have found a different contractor who better understood steam and found a different solution for the DHW.

When the boiler finally goes into low fire at 14 oz, they get about a 2-3 oz drop in pressure, then the pressure begins to rise once again, at about the 5 min mark since low fire kicked in pressure has risen to about 1.5 lbs, within another 10 mins the pressuretrol kicks the boiler off at 2.5 psi all in low fire, it will remain off until pressure goes down to about 3-4 psi and will restart in low fire, because the vaporstat high fire cutin is set lower. I tried to calibrate the pressuretrol but couldn’t get it to cutout below 2.5 psi and come back on again. I told them the pressuretrol is faulty and needs to be replaced, Honeywell’s QC is absolutely terrible. Even on the vaporstat the scale means nothing as I have to use my low pressure test rig to set these things up to get the cutout cutin where I want them and I couldn’t get it below 14 oz pressure. Unbelievable terrible QC for an expensive item.

gfrbrookline

I was lucky to find a NOS mercury switch and replaced my newer style switch. Agree the new ones are far less accurate and have read many threads about them needing to be re-calibrated out of the box.

gfrbrookline

@Dave0176 @cynthia07104 I saw in the beginning of the thread that @Dave0176 recommended replacing the main vents with big mouths, I don't recall if this happened. That will help with the short cycling, you may benefit from more than one on each of the mains. Vent them faster and you can reduce your total run time. But get a properly working vaporstat first.

I think part of your pressure issue my be related to radiator venting. I know you found two radiators that had the vents on the wrong side. What are you venting your radiators with? With sunrads I would use only Gorton #4's, Hoffman 40's or Ventrite No. 1's, maybe a Gorton #5 on a particularly large unit. Anything larger than that is going to cause the radiator to shut down before it is heated through and make the boiler build pressure prematurely. It look me a long time of trial and error with vents, and convincing my fellow condo owners that slowing down all of the radiators in the system would actually give us more even heat and lower our heating bill. All of the contractors we had in over 20 years just kept telling us to put faster vents on the cool units so at one point we had 10 Gorton D's, 10 Gorton C's, 5 Gorton 6's and 6 Gorton 5's, we were totally out of balance and the boiler cycled constantly. That's when I found this site and ordered Dan's books. Now the largest vent I have is one Gorton 6 on a 10 section 3 column radiator with an edr of 80 that is farthest from the boiler, most are Gorton 4's, Hoffman 40's and Ventrite No.1's in units that I know the owners won't mess with them. It made a huge difference in balance and eliminated the cycling.

You are in good hands with @Dave0176, I have read many of his posts and have learned much from them.

cynthia07104

@gfrbrookline we did change out the main vents to big mouths and have ordered the Burnham pressuretrol. We did have all the wrong vents on the second floor. 🤦🏻‍♀️ We had some Varivalves, D’s, and 6’s. I agree most contractors don’t have a Steam knowledge base. All the previous contractors that came in before @Dave0176 told us to put bigger and faster air vents. They also all said there was nothing wrong with our header... That speaks a lot about them... We are having the valves moved to the right side, changing the pressuretrol, and changing some valves again. I’ll post any updates as they occur.

gfrbrookline

Sounds like you are on the right track!

gfrbrookline

How did you make out?