Weil-McLain Ultra Series 4 Model 299 Heating Problem

attilio

I had a Weil-McLain Ultra Series 4 Model 299 installed last year but this winter is so far colder than last year and we're having problems with it. The heat does come up however towards the end of the loop, the last few rooms are always cold. Barely any heat comes up.

The plumber told me to increase the temperature of the boiler, so I changed Priority 2 Min Temp to 140, however that hasn't solved the problem. I'm concerned about raising it too much because I don't know if it will damage the system.

The water travels through 200+ feet of 1 inch pipe. The kitchen (which is about half way) has two toe kicks. By the time it reaches one of the bedrooms there's barely any heat coming out of the the baseboards.

Any thoughts as to what could be going on? Is it simply that the water is cooling off too much? Or maybe the boiler doesn't run long enough for the hot water to reach the end of the loop?

Thanks for any help you can provide. If you need any additional info I'll do my best to provide it.

HVACNUT

What's the max temperature for that setting?

Is outdoor reset being used?

There's also minimum and maximum firing rates in the settings.

Everything heated well with the old system?

attilio

Max is 180

I see Max OD Reset at 70 and Min OD Reset at 0

The house is a new construction. Last year it seemingly worked well however it was a warmer winter. We were getting "Supply greater than return by 58F" and the plumber that installed it tried fixing it but then winter ended and we couldn't test it anymore. This year the unit was getting the same error and a different plumber fixed that issue a few weeks ago.

HVACNUT

Were the toe kicks always there? They throw a lot of BTU's. 
While running that zone, get all info.
Boiler supply and return temperatures.
System supply and return temperatures.
Firing rate. 
Blower RPM.

attilio

Yes, the house is a new construction so they've been there from the beginning. Do you think they could be cooling off the water too much?

I'll grab that info as soon as I can and share it.

Jamie Hall

Do you know, or can you find out, if the various radiators and toe kicks and baseboards are run in series -- that is to say the outlet from one run to the next one and so and then finally back to the boiler? Or is each one piped individually off a main line, and then individually back to a return line? It makes a big difference in how well they will -- or won't -- work, and how to help the problem.

attilio

They are in series, so its one big 200+ foot loop.

HVACNUT

attilio said:

They are in series, so its one big 200+ foot loop.

Not good. The toe kicks are BTU robbers.

Jamie Hall

attilio said:

They are in series, so its one big 200+ foot loop.

There's your problem. And, unhappily, there's no easy way -- or even good way -- to fix it, unless the pipes between pieces of radiation are exposed and there is a basement or crawl space where you can break the loop and make it two or more parallel loops.

attilio

Thanks all. Yeah there's a basement, so parallel loops can easily be done by a plumber.

I'm going to try changing the toe kicks to their lower setting and see if that helps. If not, I may have to get the parallel loops done.

KC_Jones

So a brand new house with what appears to be an improperly designed system and a boiler that’s probably massively oversized. For the sizing, out of curiosity, how many square feet is the house?

The installing contractor should be resolving all of this on their dime honestly, it’s their fault it doesn’t work.

As a homeowner situations like this make me sad.

attilio

The plumber was incompetent and the contractor is no longer using him. Unfortunately he had to work on our house. Apparently he used the same plumber on another construction which had a crawl space. Rather than laying the pipe before the modular house was dropped, he came after and cut up the floor. I bet you can imagine how happy everyone was.

The main level is 2000 sqft. Once we finish the upstairs it'll be about another 1000 sqft. We can optionally finish the basement as well, which we have no plans of doing anytime soon lol. In total the house can potentially have about 5000 sqft of living area.

KC_Jones

That boiler, on modern, tight construction, could happily heat 10,000+ sq ft., probably close to 15k. It’s comically oversized, so add that to the list of incompetency.

So sad.

tim smith

What type of radiation is throughout house. Are you radiant floor in most and just happen to be convectors in kitchen or????. How many zones, What is design temp in for the majority of radiation? Agree on the way oversize for 3000 sft of new construction.

attilio

Convectors everywhere, only one zone for now. Eventually two zones when we finish the upstairs.