Residential Hydronic Heating System Testing

Mdonner

All,

Looking for some recommendations on the following items to purchase:

Combustion / O2 analyzer, don't need a printer, would like to be <$1,000.00

Propylene glycol test strips or meter, I do have a Refractometer

Boiler condensate test strips (to measure after the neutralization kit)

All these items are for my home hydronic heating system

Thank You.

hot_rod

I prefer the refractometer to the color strips, maybe it is my old man eyesight issue :)

Any ph strip will test the condensate. Again a ph meter is easier to use for me. However you do need to check and calibrate ph meters from time to time. The usually come with the calibration packages.

If you use glycol buy a good brand with a good inhibitor package. Mix at just what you need, don't go overboard on %. For small systems I prefer pre-mix as it is blended with DI water. Bad water when blending can ruin new glycol. The manufacturers tell you the water spec for blending.

Dow has an excellent glycol engineering manual, should be online. Use the Dowfrost (pg) version. Dowtherm is eg.

For systems filled with plain water I prefer to use a hydronic treatment, Rhomar and Fernox are brands I have used.

Fernox makes it easy with the test kit included in their small residential packages.

Plenty of boiler water test kits online, price depends on how much info you are trying to get from the water.

For plain water fill, ph, hardness, TDS are the numbers to know. If you are in road salt area, a chloride test is good to have, if you live in road salt areas. High chlorides are tough on stainless boilers and indirects.

As for combustion, pay attention to what it takes and $$ to recalibrate them yearly. If you use it a lot it is a drag to send it in for a month or more for recalibration.

pecmsg

combustion Analyzer

Have you been trained