No pressure, very little heat

Dennis5

Hopefully some of you experts can help me.

I have small one pipe,1 zone hydronic system in my basement. It worked fine recently with 7-8 pounds of pressure. It uses a hot water tank as the bolier, small Amrtol air tank, pump turns and sounds fine, pressure reducing valve says, set 15, range 10-35.

My mistake was opening the water drain on the water tank thinking of removing some calcium, which also released my 7- 8 pounds of pressure.

Any suggestions from you folks,

Thanks,

Dennis

jaybee

little pressure , no heat

Well im not a expert just a begginner but im gonig to take a stab at this one. For one thing it seems as though your water feeder is not working properly because if it was it would automactically repalce the water that you drained out.Secoundly, anytime you introduce new water in the system u are introduceing oxygen in.And third, you could manually fill the water back in the system by lifting the lever on the automatic feed until you pressure is at 12lbs. hope this helps!!!!

Ken D.

No Heat

You probably drained off all the pressure and introduced air into the system. Bleed or purge the air from the system and reset pressure to 12 psi. The automatic feed valve is either turned off or defective and should be replaced

Dennis5

No pressure, very little heat

Thks guys,


I'don't have an automatic feed on this system, only one line coming with a pressure reducing valve. The only place to test is the tire type valve on top of the small tank. Is this where I need 12 lbs?

How do I turn on the automatic feed valve? There is a bolt and nut on top of the valve, which way do I turn it and how many turns?

Tks again guys.

Matt Undy

That schrader valve on the tank is to pressurize the diaphgram on the expansion tank, not to test the pressure of the system. The pressure reducing valve is the automatic feeder. If the pressure in the system gets below its diphgram's sepoint it feeds more water to bring the pressure up to what it is set to reduce pressure to. Try lifting its handle, perhaps its stuck (and perhaps it will then stick open or leak then your pressure reliefe will blow, it may blow anyway if that expansion tank doesn't have the right charge. Open the relief valve and let it close too to make sure it is still working.) Check to make sure there are nos hand valves in the feed line that have been closed.

Matt

Unknown

The pressure reducing valve

is an automatic feed , of sorts . It should keep the system fill to where you set it at , usually 12 psi when cold . With the shutoff valve open on this line , it should fill to the set point . The tire type valve is to check or add pressure to the expansion tank , not to add pressure to the system . There should be a working gage on the boiler to check the pressure . I would start by changing the pressure reducer and the boiler gage , if it's not working , and take it from there .

Dennis5

no pressure

Tks Matt,I have a simple air pressure tank, no diaphgram.
There is also a small petcock valve at the end of the system for bleeding or expansion purposes I think.

Ron Jr, I think it's not filling the system with the Watts pressure reducing valve. The gauge on the boiler line shows 0 lbs. The pressure reducing valve has an adjusting bolt and nut, is it safe to make adustment at this spot? Maybe the valve shuts off the water supply if there is not pressure in the system.

Why would the pressure reducing valve or the gauge quit working after simple draining about a gallon of water from the system?

Unknown

It happens alot

when we drain a system down for some reason or other , and the pressure reducer will not fill the boiler . Most of the time the reducer is filled with crud . You can adjust the fill pressure by twisting in the nut on top , but if the valve is mucked up inside it might not keep the pressure where you want it for long . The next question is did anyone adjust that nut before ? I would take a look at the inlet of the reducer first to see if it's full of crud . There should be a union right there . If it looks bad , just replace the reducer , cheap insurance for keeping the boiler running with water .

jaybee

Your pressure reducing valve is not working or it is shut off somewhere on the line if its not feeding the boiler . if not working install a new one or pull the lever and fast fill it to your boiler gauge read 12psi.

Dennis5

No pressure

Tks Ron Jr.

Seems the problem is the pressure reducer valve. I think it needs replacing, if I turn the nut fully open or closed it keeps filling the system, lucky there is a manual shut off valve. Since my system has been used only with 7-8 lbs in the past, I'm concerned that operating it at 12lbs pressure, maybe some of the old solder joints on the copper pipe will not hold. Is there any problem with running at a lower pressure?

jon_6

pressure va;lve

you should really have the boiler checked for proper safety operations and don't run the unit if their is no pressure. you could back fill the boiler bye the boiler drain at the bottom with a double female washing machine hose hooked to a water sorce.