The case of the boiler room flood alarm, this weeks case

RayWohlfarth

I was asked to be part of a roundtable discussion about boiler combustion and was with some of the smartest people in the industry. One such person was a maintenance tech for a medical clinic in Alaska. He told me a story about how a pipe froze and flooded the equipment in the boiler room. It was not discovered until the next morning. After everything was repaired or replaced, his boss asked him to come up with a way to alert the staff if it ever flooded again. The only challenge was they had no money for the alarm. The tech had to use whatever was in his shop. His solution was simple and brilliant. What would you do?
As usual, I will post the video Friday and won't give you any clues.
Ray

clammy

A simple wi if or audible moisture detector, I have customer who’s basement always gets water just about every time it rains and they have a few of them through out the basement and at different levels so they know when there just a bit and when there’s a real issue . I have suggested using the likes of a hi water alarm so they know when the sump pump has failed being the last event was due to float hanging up ,it’s a real mess . I have in the past for a few very concerned home owners so I installed a simple 24 volt powered wet switch and a inexpensive door bell alarm piped safety discharges to a pan and of course to a sump pit ,condensate pump or indirect waste line and had my wet switch in the pan was pretty cheap as things go and worked out great for boiler and water heaters on second floor great to limit any damage . A good idea for elderly who don’t venture too often to the basement due to limited mobility . Great subject never discussed to often till always after the fact . Thanks Ray
Peace and good luck clammy

GGross

Some copper wire, a power source, and a less-than-$1 little piezo buzzer, which could probably have been scavenged from a control of some sort in the techs shop.

retiredguy

Attach 2 wires in close proximity to each other, to a thin board or a non conductive material. Power one of the wires and run the other wire to a light bulb, cheap alarm, whistle or any cheap device that will make noise or light and then to the neutral. Any time there is water, current will flow through the water to the alarm device and alert the owners. To make it a little safer, you could use a 24 volt transformer instead of a 120 volt supply..

CLamb

A weight sitting on a support of sugar or salt on the floor attached to a toggle switch for an alarm. Another option is a support of sugar or salt for a shelf holding many nipples which would then crash to the floor creating a loud noise.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Seems to me that by the time a moisture alarm trips your already flooded.

If the pipe froze a temperature alarm would be the best solution

RayWohlfarth

Well you are close but what the tech did was to use some old components from the scavenged items including a roller switch for the dishwasher. He mounted switch on the floor and wired it to a flashing light outside and an audible alarm in the hall. This is the part that made me smile. He stack Alka Seltzer tablets under the roller switch. If the tablets get wet, they fizzle away and drop, sounding the alarm. I thought it was clever. Here is the link to this weeks video. https://youtube.com/watch?v=VuzXvoZFAZ4

My other video is how the ASME CSD1 code is a win win for both the boiler owner and the boiler service company. Did you know that the code requires regular boiler maintenance? https://youtube.com/watch?v=eGYHEY8mDek

WPL

I would probably build something overly complex: a microcontroller-based conductivity sensor, and while I'm at it, might as well add temperature monitoring and logging, recording of burner running hours, etc. The "whatever he has in his shop" wouldn't be an impediment, since I'm an electrical engineer at an industrial controls company, and I've got an electronics shop...

RayWohlfarth

@wpl love that idea