A little steam knocking

jacobsond

I have a mechanical room that is knocking. Steam system. High pressure at 80 regulated down to a 8. I was in the room yesterday checking and greasing the bearings on a fresh air only AHU. I noticed quite a bit of knocking in the condensate line. 4 Hoffman traps in a little 6x6 area with an air operated condensate tank. Pipes insulated very good. Heat exchangers in the room converting the steam to a hot water heating system. 20 degrees outside so the load was low. I was in this room for several hours the other week repairing and aligning one of the hot water pumps. The load was high -10 at the time and there was no knocking. I didn't have time to do much troubleshooting. The fresh air blowing in from the little AHU was blowing right on 2 traps from one of the heat exchangers. Im the new guy,but still the guy that will be tasked to repair because honestly I know just about as much as the supervisor. This is a state college so you know.

JUGHNE

May traps passing steam into the condensate water?
Any steam coming out of the condensate tank vent?

jacobsond

Nothing out of the vent. The traps seemed ok with initial ultrasound test. I will have to get back for further testing. Maybe isolate what I can and get some temp readings and more ultrasound. I'm still in the learning stage and have learned more in my 1st winter heating season than the previous guy did in 2 yrs ( he has told me). He moved into the systems control(computer) while I took the systems mechanic. A good move for both of us.