Trane direct return trap

Onepipe

All,

First I would like to apologize for yet another inquiry on the Trane direct return trap but I have a question of operation. I have scoured the books and web and have read everything that I can find on the unit and think I have a pretty good understanding of whats going on in there. I posted a pic of a system that I am working on and it has a damaged fitting on the top of the trap that is leaking steam and causing excess feed water so my options are to remove the unit entirely or pull off what looks to be a union style nut off the top of the trap and try and repair/custom make a new spud to repair the unit. so here is my question:

Q1: I understand how the pump works for condensate but with the feed line for the direct return trap coming off the top of my dry return that would mean for the trap to ever see condensate my system would need to back up so much that my dry return was flooded to that level? am I correct in that thinking? In my system the dry return runs the perimeter of the basement with good but minimal pitch so that would be ALOT of condensate and water hammer before that trap ever saw condensate.

Q2: As with any of the gravity return two pipe systems that I work on (vapor or not) (also no f&t trap at the end of main)

I have 48" for my "B" dimension which is well above the needed min of 30" per lb so if im backing up that far I really have something going wrong. The system is also operating on a vaporstat with 10oz cut out and im hoping to get that down to 8oz. Its a Trane vapor system with thermostats traps at each radiator.

Steamhead

If the Return Trap has been damaged, you can simply remove it and the two check valves, cap the lines at the steam main and dry return, and replace the Pressuretrol with a Vaporstat. Set the Vaporstat to cut out at 8 ounces or so.

The reason the Return Trap was there, is to force the condensate back to the boiler if the boiler pressure got high enough so it wouldn't return by gravity. They didn't have a way of keeping the pressure that low on a coal-fired boiler.