Cutting Fuel Bills with Venting in Steam Heating Systems

HeatingHelp

Cutting Fuel Bills with Venting in Steam Heating Systems

In this excerpt from his Dead Men’s Steam School seminar, Dan Holohan shares his knowledge about venting steam heating systems. He talks about air vents and proper placement, master venting and how it can cut fuel bills, balancing steam systems using a venting capacity chart, and more.

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johnlobb

Brilliant, Dan! I love your explanation! Thanks again for your unique ability to make the foggy obvious. Since my Son bought a place with a large steam boiler, we're going to sleuth out the venting problems...

DanHolohan

Thanks for watching, @johnlobb. Erin has other good stuff up on the Heating Help YouTube channel. Did you subscribe to it?

Steamhead

If you look at our Find a Contractor ad, you'll see a shining example of what Master Venting can do:

https://heatinghelp.com/find-a-contractor/detail/all-steamed-up-inc

And here is a more-detailed discussion of the job. The pictures in our Find a Contractor ad once appeared here also, but have gotten lost over time:

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/105596/all-steamed-up-inc-s-first-big-job-el-gordo-steamhead

Mad Dog_2

Proper main .venting can cut fuel usage DRASTICALLY....Commercial buildings can save 10s of thousands in some cases...Low hanging fruit!   Mad Dog 🐕 

trivetman

So without proper venting the steam doesn’t distribute efficiently and quickly to radiators. I get that.

Because it doesn’t distribute efficiently, the boiler runs for longer, using more fuel. Where does the extra heat from all that fuel end up? Does it just heat the space immediately around the boiler as it isnt absorbed by the distribution system? Does it go up the chimney with the exhaust at a higher rate?

Mad Dog_2

Pretty much...Yes.  The on/off...on/off (stop and go traffic on the L.I.E.) i.e., short cycling wastes tons of fuel and takes hours to heat the building properly.  That extra heat gets off the train 🚆 where you don't want it.  Mad Dog 🐕 

Steamhead

The other factor is, without main vents the boiler has to build more pressure to make the steam push the air out, since there is not nearly as much vent opening. This compresses the steam and makes it take up less space, so the boiler has to generate even more steam to fill the system- and uses a lot more fuel to do so.

pugman2

The last radiator on the first floor 2" main, pushes water out the radiator air vent. There is a wet return line under the floor in the basement, as well as a main vent. One the first heat of the day, the boiler is set to turn the heat from 65* overnight, to 70* daytime. A half inch of water will be pushed out the radiator air vent into a 12 OZ can. Once the heat is running during the day there isn't any problems. We have tried everything !

neilc

during that 1st recovery run, what pressure does the boiler get up to?

have you serviced the pigtail lately?

can we see a general picture at the boiler?