Steam boiler leaving water on the floor from relief valave

tsgrau

I have a steam boiler for my home heating, And it has been running fine up till now. A couple of days ago I noticed some water on the floor near the pressure relief pipe, at least that's what I think it is. And now it's been doing it everyday. And I'm not sure why. Any thoughts on troubleshooting? My heat seems to be working fine so I get plenty of heat when it runs.

tsgrau

Here are some pictures of my system....

You can see water in the pan that I put underneath the pipe, but it's overflowing onto my floor still.

I also took a picture of my programmable water feeder and I have no idea what this code means l o c. When I looked at it yesterday it said it had 108 in it I have no idea what those mean.

tsgrau

Now that O look at it closer, it is not yhe pressure relief valve that I thought it was.  That pipe comes out the top of the boiler. 

This is a water feed loop, so I'm not sure what this pipe system is for. Maybe, to prevent over filling?  

Jamie Hall

Well... you may have two problems, not one. That brass thing which has the pipe attached to it which is leaking is a backflow preventer, and evidently it has a leakage problem -- and the drip is telling you that. It may be rebuildable. It may need to be replaced.

However, the water level in the boiler is low -- note where it is in the sight glass in relationship to the mark on the boiler. The "LOC" code in the feeder indicates that the feeder has tried to add water, but hasn't been able to keep up with the demand from the boiler. It may just be that one leak mentioned above, but there may be other leaks -- steam or condensate -- from the boiler or from the piping.

You need to follow up on that. Your boiler should not need more than a gallon of water per week -- in fact, it should need a lot less than that. So the water is going somewhere it shouldn't/

tsgrau

Thanks Jamie.  You were right.  I called the company that installed it thanks to their giant sticker on the boiler, and he found that the pipe after the back flow valve was clogged with dirt, so the water was mostly going on my floor and not enough of it was getting into the boiler.  He showed me how to flush it and its back up running.  He also stated that i should only need a gallon or two a year because the boiler only holds about 2.5 gallons anyway.

Jamie Hall

Thank you, @tsgrau , for replying -- so often people don't. Keep a casual eye on the boiler water level and that counter. That blockage may have been the whole problem!

Danny Scully

There appears to be a lot of black iron/steel piping prior to the backflow. @tsgrau, I would call the installer back to make sure your domestic water is properly protected. I could be wrong, as pictures are deceiving, but better safe…

EBEBRATT-Ed

The backflow preventer needs to be installed on the inlet side of the water feeder not on the outlet side as it now is.