San Francisco steam help

lupusyonderboy

Hey folks, I live in a 7 unit building in San Francisco with a steam radiator system. Can anyone recommend a trusted local steam specialist(s) who might be able to help diagnose and treat our system? There are several radiators venting a large amount of vapor late in the cycle after a recent boiler issue.

I'm willing to get in there myself, but am a bit intimidated about the complexity of the system due to the size of the building and overall lack of maintenance. I've used wood blocks to fix the pitch of the problematic radiators but the problem persists after a small improvement. I also ordered new Gorton vents for those radiators. But I can't help thinking this is only treating symptoms. Anyways, I found this forum and have been reading up. I also bought "We Got Steam Heat" and just started it.

Here is a bit of background:

There are 15 radiators across 6 units; one unit has been replaced with electric wall heaters. The radiators are single pipe.

The radiator system has largely "worked" for as long as I can remember (20+ years), though without maintenance . A few weeks ago, there was an issue with the boiler that caused the sight glass to break. I am unsure as to the root cause. We had a plumber out who replaced the sightglass, but since then we have at least 3 radiators in different units that are hissing and venting a large amount of steam vapor later in the cycle. They all have Hoffman vents, though I'm not sure when they were installed. At least 20 years ago.


Some pictures:







Vent type that is hissing and venting steam; look like Hoffman 40?:



Older vent types that are not venting steam:



Video of the sight glass while boiler is on, approx 3 hours after firing up:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cqHI1OIByNdB3E5YY4-5HaaCqpnS9Agx/view?usp=sharing

bburd

It looks like your steam pressure is set too high. Please take a close-up photo of the two gray boxes that say "pressuretrol" on top of the boiler. Those vents are supposed to operate at three psi or less.

Mad Dog_2

I didn't even know they needed heat in Sunny California!   Is this one of those Grand Dames.  Victorians? Mad Dog 🐕 

lupusyonderboy

bburd said:

It looks like your steam pressure is set too high. Please take a close-up photo of the two gray boxes that say "pressuretrol" on top of the boiler. Those vents are supposed to operate at three psi or less.

Here we are:

Mad Dog_2 said:

I didn't even know they needed heat in Sunny California!   Is this one of those Grand Dames.  Victorians? Mad Dog 🐕 

Can you believe it? We sit around in our shorts and flip flops with the radiators running! Kidding of course. It's nothing like the Northeast but SF does get to the 40s overnight a few months of the year. Building is from the early 20th century

Larry Weingarten

Hi, @Alan (California Radiant) Forbes is probably a good one to contact here.

Yours, Larry

109A_5

Hello @lupusyonderboy,

I would have liked to know what actually broke the sight glass, pressure, vacuum, external destructive force ?

Anyway, have the pigtails been cleaned out lately ? If the pigtails are plugged up the pressure sensing devices are not aware of the actual boiler pressure.

Steamhead

Larry Weingarten said:

Hi, @Alan (California Radiant) Forbes is probably a good one to contact here.

Yours, Larry

This.

neilc

well there's another new way of not piping a header correctly

EBEBRATT-Ed

@neilc

with the condition of that poor Smith boiler and the amount they run it I doubt it's worth fixing until the boiler fails. Imagine that boiler all the way from Westfield, MA. But your right.

It just proves that California schools are no better than anywhere else. The installers out there can't read either.

bburd

So the smaller pressuretrol is the operating control and set to the correct level, though a clogged pigtail may make it incapable of functioning. The differential wheel inside the cover should be set to 1.

The other pressuretrol is a safety high limit and is also set appropriately.