Radiators heating at different speeds

Frankfog2

Howdy friends 🤠

I recently moved into a new house which also has steam heat, but i’m encountering something i didn’t with my old house. Two radiators seem slower to heat across then the rest of them in my house. For context i have 2 radiators on the second floor that have Maid o Mist C vents, those heat FIRST. I have 4 “normal” radiators on the first floor, all with maid o mist 4 vents. I then have a baby radiator on the first floor on a maid o mist 4, hence why i say “normal” because it’s very small. That one heats fast

The radiators i’m having issues with is the 2nd and 3rd radiators off the main. One of them is in the kitchen right on top of the boiler, the 2nd one is in the room with the thermostat.

Down in the basement i have 1 gorton number 1 and 1 maid o mist D. The main measures about 25 feet and 1-1/2 to maybe 2 inch diameter.

Pressure trol is set at 1.5-1.7 main and 0.5 diff

I was thinking about putting a maid o mist 5 on these two radiators, but since they’re pretty close to the boiler i think it’s not ideal, but i’m also inexperienced.

Thank you in advance

Big Ed_4

It may be balanced leave it alone , Heats upstairs first sounds good to me .. I am thinking someone already did the work … With out getting into it , I would recommend leaving it alone and come back January …..

delcrossv

Usually, if you want some rads to heat faster you slow the fastest ones down. But give it some time, comfort is more important than absolute speed.

bburd

The issue is not whether the radiators heat at different rates, but whether the temperature in the house is balanced overall. You won't be able to tell until it gets colder. Best not to mess with it until you're sure you need to.

dabrakeman

Sounds like you have adequate main venting, pressuretrol set correctly and good slow vents on all the radiators so good starting point. As others have said how is the "comfort" balance throughout the house so far. If that is good so far then so far so good… I have some radiators slower than others but it works for the comfort balane I am looking for. I don't know where you are at and whether you have had any cold weather yet but here where I am it is 32F and snowing this morning so we are getting there…😉

Only thing that seems odd to me is why the radiator in your kitchen which probably has one of the shortest takeoffs from the main is slow to get steam. Do you notice any puffing or panting from the vent? Any water hammers going on? What size is the radiator and what is the inlet pipe size?

Frankfog2

https://forum.heatinghelp.com/discussion/comment/1821461#Comment_1821461

sorry for getting back to you late. the vent was stuck and wasn’t letting air out. i boiled it in vinegar for 15 minutes and then water 2x 15 minutes each. big pieces of rust and crud came out. i let it dry and put it on and now its heating.

Lance

I balance the system mains to fill equally, to the radiators equally, but all is not equal. SO I balance the air vents to balance the radiator to the heat load of the room. Since I cannot guarantee simultaneous delivery on startup, or correct sizing of radiation, or the even heat loss rate per room, I control the venting which fine tunes the flow and fills the emitter. If the radiator is sized for the heat loss all is good. But 9 times out of 10, the farthest radiator should vent the quickest and since the closest radiator to the flow is always first, I have have two options. Remove the unneeded radiator or slow the air out to delay the vent rate. Another key point in balancing is to make sure the thermostat is located in the average or slightly cooler area so the there will be steam for that lonely radiator that is struggling to heat the room with the window open. No lie; a church I serviced, repaired, with potentiometer t-stat control for each zone, complained that the 2nd floor was not heating as it should. Upon arrival the boiler room is toasty and all is doing well. Looking into the 2nd floor I found many windows broken letting the heat out into the frigid air. Sometimes its not the system.