ok..new rule if you don't know say so,its ok

David Sutton

ok i'm sure you have all run into this one, mr home owner calls jo-jo's heat repair, tells him steam rads aint heatin up jo shows up looks around for a while tell mr home owner that the water level is to low and you need all new air vents, at 30.00bucks a pop, he leaves and says as hes walking out the door the rads will heat up soon good bye, next day same thing happens jo-jo's heatin shows up tell the man of the house all the heatin things hes learn along the way and then hits him for 2-$70.00 return vents and walks out the door . things dont change much for mr. home owner so hes ripped and calls another heatin expert, who comes in, ask for a drink while he serches out the cause of mr.home owners trubbles, says that the vents aint no good and got to have new ones, mr home man tells him about the last guy who was there and what he had done. sooooo, the new guy says..... well the pipes on the rads are all blocked up and need to be replaced , so mister mad home owner says good by to the 2nd guy and calls in mr. 3rd. heating man, he looks around and tells mr.h.o. that the boilers not capable of making steam any more and tells him hes got to buy a hole new boiler. (wow )... Now hes got this friend who knows me and tell him he will have me stop bye and take a look at his system, begrugingly he says ok.. i walk in the door to this man who looks like hes seeing another boob walk in, i'm thinking oh boy this going to be good one, i walk over to the boiler, this guys watching me like a guard dog from the goolage prison camp.so hes starts telling me all the things the other gentlemen have done, then hes starts telling me how the system has been working, and what it was like before the trubble started, so i listen to him for about 30 mins. then he lets me look around . its a two pipe steam sys. with heat convectors , they are only heating half way, and they take for ever to heat up. the up stairs never get hot so i keep looking and listenning he then tells me that there is white smoke comming out the chimney in the mornning when he gets home, to told this to heating guy # 4 who was there two days before me , #4 told him that the boiler was not fired hot enuff so he put in a hotter nozzle to stop the condensation in the boiler, ( ahhhh you now know huh !! )so after he tell me this i rased the water level in the boiler and started it and up low and behold the boiler is leaking right above the water line and all his steam presure was going right up the chimney instead of going up the pipes, i was there a total of about 45 mins and i never brought a tool into the house, all i did was listen to him. i'm not the best heating guy in the biz. but i do listen to you guys . just thought you would like this story

Steamhead

I know the feeling, David

recently had a similar experience on a Trane 2-pipe orifice vapor system with convectors. We were the fifth contractor he called, and we were also the last one. This one didn't have a leaky boiler- the system venting was all wrong. You don't put vents on Vapor radiators (or convectors).

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Steamhead

Right way

big vent on the main and one on the return. These are Gorton #2 main vents. No vents on the convectors.



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Steamhead

Owner was so happy

he had us heat his addition with Orifice Vapor. We used Slant/Fin Multi-Pak-80 fin-tube baseboard with the H-6 steel elements.

The same thing can happen to you. Go for it!

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kevin

So David...

What was his reaction? Did you get the job? Does he trust you now?kpc

David Sutton

Yup, got it

Nice pics , yes i got the job, this is a great idea for heating the room, will this work on a conventional steam , or would you recomend using cast iron bb instead, thanks for the surport. David

Steamhead

Fin-tube vs. Cast-Iron

Which type to use depends on what is already there. You want to match the thermal storage characteristics as closely as you can. In this case, the original Trane convectors were fin-tube so we used fin-tube baseboard.

You will have to open each of your convectors (which is a good idea anyway to see if any are leaking) and see what's inside. If they're cast-iron, then cast-iron baseboard as made by Burnham or Slant/Fin would be a good match. Note that some early CIBB did not have air passages along the back and outlets at the top for convection, but I believe all current models do. Check to be sure.

If you find fin-tube convectors, then use fin-tube baseboard made for steam, as shown above. The Slant/Fin Multi-Pak-80 with the 1-1/4" steel elements is the only one I know of- there may be others but the Slant/Fin is a good product.

Either baseboard will work fine on a 2-pipe steam or Vapor system. First do a heat-loss to see how much you need. If your system has traps or water seals, simply pitch the element down and put a trap on the end. If it has orifices, add about 20% to the calculated heat load to size your baseboard. Then size the orifice to the calculated heat load and provide a suitable pipe union in the supply line to mount the orifice in. This will keep steam from reaching the dry return.

If you can, we'd like to see some pictures of this old beauty!

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David Sutton

fin tube

the olc convectors are fin tube, but its not a vapor system, the man would like to put on a new room about 400 sq. ft. and wanted to know if he could do it, of couse i said yes since your getting a nnew boiler anyway, i will gets some shots of the convectors and post it, thank you for your help. David Sutton

Steamhead

Vapor or not? Check operating pressure

Many of these 2-pipe-steam-convector systems were actually Vapor- the piping was sized so as to permit operation on a couple ounces of pressure, and top out at 8 ounces or so.

Here's a Webster Vapor convector I ran into. You can see the shutoff valve on the bottom right and the trap on the bottom left, and the pitch of the fin-tube element. This system had the usual Return Trap and Air Eliminator Trap in the boiler room.

If you don't see the classic Vapor equipment in the boiler room, you might still have a Vapor system that was stripped of all its goodies during a boiler replacement. Fortunately, all you need is good vents and trap elements and a Vaporstat that can't be set higher than 1 PSIG to make such a system run well.

BTW- where is this system located?

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David Sutton

Enfield Ct.....

the boiler is 4 sec crane sunnyday, it looks from the piping thats its the original boiler for the house, then convectors are both comming out bottom of the fintubesat each end then go's thru the floor surply is 1" return looks 1/2" only unions between the rads and the surply and return pipes, i'll try to get there soon to snap some shots, at the boiler there ie no indication of this running as a vapor sys.... thank you David Sutton

David Sutton

yes i did get it..

the man was very happy that we figured it out. he then ask me if i could walk on water too, so i dumped some water from the l.w.c.o. on the floor and stepped on it lol thanks David

Unknown

inside the supply unions,

Are there orifices inside the unions? Are there seals or traps on the outlets?

Something is there somewhere, to keep steam from the returns. I agree with Steamhead, it likely is a vapor system.

Noel

David Sutton

going back this weekend...

going to take a deeper look at this system . i did not see any traps any where traced all the pipes juet surply and returns ?????

Steamhead

If there are no traps

it is likely an orifice system. You may find that the orifices are in the unions, or they may be cast integral to the convector elements. Trane used the latter configuration in a lot of their steam convectors, even the fin-tube ones.

But I've seen convector traps installed in the basement, on the way to the dry return. Be sure to check that area.

Try to find out all you can about the system, including who made the convectors. This way you can properly size the boiler.

Can't wait to see your pictures!

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