New to Steam: Newbie Questions

Bryan_8

Hi,

I am new to steam heating by virtue of where I live, and have a few questions about its operation and also energy efficiency.

Background:

I recently moved to a new apartment in eastern Massachusetts and this is my first heating season. I know nothing about steam heat, but am learning quite a bit from this website :) The apartment is the second floor (about 1500 sq ft) of a two family house. It is heated by a one pipe steam system. The house was built in the early 1920s, and I assume the steam distribution plumbing is original. The system is probably pretty typical but I'll describe it.

The boiler is brand new; this is its first season too. It is a natural gas unit, Burnham INDEPENDENCE, that replaced an oil fired unit. (I found a city permit for one of the old oil tanks dated in the mid 1950s; I assume coal was used prior to that, but who knows?).

From the boiler, a two inch pipe (more or less) departs the top of the boiler, runs about 25 feet on the ceiling in the middle of the basement, turns left toward the outside wall, and makes a square loop back to the boiler. This main loop gradually slopes to let the water drain back to the boiler and branch lines connect to it. On the other side of the basement there is the same setup for the first floor apartment. There is no insulation on any of the pipes.

There are six radiators in the apartment: one each in both bedrooms, two larger ones for the dining rm and living rm, a small one in the bath, and another at the bottom of the front stairs.

When we first fired up the boiler a few weeks ago, I noticed that all of the radiators got hot except the living rm and dining rm radiators. For some reason (without any changes) these radiators eventually started working fine on their own. Naturally I had told the landlord the main room radiators weren't getting hot after a few days, and then when he sent out a plumber they worked fine. Just like your car always works fine when you bring it to a mechanic.

The bedroom radiators, especially in my bedroom, make loud hissing/squealing noises at the vent. There will be a bang at the vent, followed by hissing, and then another bang. This repeats while the boiler runs. This is annoying because the loud hissing/squealing keeps me awake. There was an oily smell coming out of the vents the first week or so, but fortunately this appears to be improving. Perhaps it was due to the new installation?

Also, the basement gets very warm (sauna like), due to the uninsulated main steam lines. I told the landlord about this, and he said that he had to remove asbestos :(. I requested that they be insulated with suitable materials. Since I pay the energy bills, he has no incentive to do so. He wasn't about to run off to the Home Depot to buy insulation at the end of the conversation, but I think I convinced him that it is important to do. How much energy is this heat loss costing me? Judging by the temp. of the basement when the boiler is on, I'd guess quite a bit. Still it would be nice to have some facts to help convince my landlord in case he doesn't insulate it. With a house with old windows and probably minimum insulation in the walls/ceiling, I don't want to waste any more energy.

Some clown also painted the bathroom radiator and one of the bedrooms in the distant past. So when it gets hot, we get to smell the paint fumes. :(

The air vents also have a dial to adjust them. I don't care to run the radiator at the bottom of the stairs, so would like to crank that one down. Unfortunately the dial on that radiator is missing. (Strangely the feed valve handle on that one is missing too). But maybe I can adjust the air vent with pliars.

Is there anything that can be done with the air vents in the bedrooms to reduce that hissing/squealing sound? The larger radiators in the main rooms don't do that. I hate to ask his plumber to come back out, is there anything that I can do?
As far as I can tell, there are no main steam vents, which I read here can help cause the hissing problem. But why does the hissing start and stop so suddenly? I would expect it to be more or less constant until the radiator is full of steam. I realize that the air has to come out, but can this be improved?

Thanks!