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Air in hot water baseboard, boiler piping seems incorrect?

wdr
wdr Member Posts: 4
in Radiant Heating

Hello, moved into a new place recently owned by family, it has hot water baseboard and can hear a lot of air in the system. I was initially thinking it could just be purged but looks like it may not be that simple?

There appear to be two zones with two sections of baseboard on each zone. I do not see any bleeders on any of the baseboard sections them selves (also each is connected to pex from the floor with sharkbite 90s, seems not ideal?)

I don’t see an air separator installed anywhere in the boiler piping, looking through the boiler manual and reading elsewhere seems there definitely should be one. Otherwise the piping looks roughly as described in the manual diagrams?

adding pictures of the circulator, boiler name plate, and piping.

my main questions are is the piping correct ish except for the lack of air separator, anything else particularly incorrect?

And I assume no use trying to flush the air out through the hose bib hidden behind the circulator on the inlet pipe to boiler as without an air separator will just keep gathering air?

If the piping is particularly bad I have no problem cutting it all out and re sweating it all, I just am an electrician by trade and not so familiar with hydronic system proper practice.

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Thanks for any thoughts

Comments

  • GroundUp
    GroundUp Member Posts: 2,172

    There should probably be an air sep in there but if you were to close both of the larger valves above the boiler with the orange handles, then open the fast fill as well as the boiler drains on the other line below the zone valves, you could very possibly get a good portion of the air purged out. If that doesn't do the trick, maybe add a couple bleeders at the high points and cut in a vertical air separator (Caleffi and Spirotherm both make one) down at the boiler.

  • wdr
    wdr Member Posts: 4

    gotcha, I’ll give that a try and see how it does getting the air out. Thanks!

  • wdr
    wdr Member Posts: 4
    edited December 2024

    just flushed a bunch of water through and definitely got some air out. Seems to have quieted down so will see how long it stays that way

    Well, the gurgling and trickling has stopped but now getting some of the water hammer type banging. So I assume still air in the system, guessing more in the boiler now.

  • wdr
    wdr Member Posts: 4

    Well it’s been a few days and the air is already back. So obviously there’s a leak somewhere. I’m guessing it’s the shark bite fittings on every baseboard, 8 total?

    So I’m thinking either way that needs to be fixed? And I don’t know if barrier pex tubing was used either. It’s pex going into the floor so my best guess is it’s pex from where the boiler pipes into the ceiling until the radiators

  • EBEBRATT-Ed
    EBEBRATT-Ed Member Posts: 16,807

    Before you do anything valve off and remove the expansion tank. The tank has a bladder in it with air on one side and water on the other. When removed from the boiler the tank should have 12-15 psi of air pressure on it. You cannot have it connected to the boiler when checking the air pressure.

    If the tank has lost, it's air pressure I would replace it. The expansion tank acts as a "cushion" to absorb pressure from heated water and push water back into the system the water cools.

    The expansion tank can cause all kinds of issues including air issues.

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