Welcome! Here are the website rules, as well as some tips for using this forum.
Need to contact us? Visit https://heatinghelp.com/contact-us/.
Click here to Find a Contractor in your area.
Steam and Hot Water
Christian Egli_2
Member Posts: 812
Here is one problem with steam: you need a low water cut off. Curious to hear me complain about steam? Grief? .... grrrrr. Let me explain...
The dinner plan today was for us to enjoy a nice beef roast. It had been gently cooking in its own steam securely enclosed within my pressure cooker. Swiftly and efficiently. We were all salivating at the prospect of opening the lid to a savory roast with the delicious little onions and the subtle taste of the little carrots.
Well, we had none of it.
Too little an addition of initial make-up water had been made, and the low water cut out operator (that's me) never reacted. The cute little carrots turned into a calcined black mass thickly crusted on the bottom of the pressure vessel. A frightening sight, but there was hope, the chunk of beef looked OK. It was surprisingly not burned, the vegetables gave their life to save the cow. Martha Stewart would say: it's a good thing.
After a little scraping, the meat really came out tasting quite good, without even being dried out like meat comes out from being roasted in a dry oven. For me, this was quite a discovery. I call it: - le pressure barbecue, hon hon hon, and since there was no sauce to be had, we made delicious sandwiches.
What does it prove? Well, that you can't go wrong with steam. Would you cook your meat drowning in hot water? Noodles, yes, but not beef. Like everything else, there is the best method for each situation.
What's home heating all about? Well, it's about frying the environment in order to make it palatable for our taste. It's about cooking it to the ideal internal temperature of, say, 65F.
So, what's your environment like in Montana? Tough to cook? Noodle like? Beef like?
Note how Seattle climate is very similar to European climate, that is, mild, wet, predictable and very slow to change. Ideal for radiant hot water, it too, is slow to change and the great risk of overheating the home is rare, even with simple controls.
In Southern Florida, like Southern California, by contrast, it never really gets cold. Objects, floors and walls never drop stone cold, you only get an occasional chill at worst. What makes sense here is the hot air furnace, it rids you of the chilly night air, and if you wait for the sun (which always comes out) it gets hot, guaranteed.
See where I'm going?
From the Midwest on to the East Coast, our weather is much more entertaining. You rarely have to wait more than half a day to observe what would resemble a seasonal change. This environment here is one tough cookie, if you want to get a good handle on it you need blitz-heat. Lots of heat that can attack the cold and also quickly retreat from the warming weather front on the touch of the thermostat.
Blitz-heat,
what does that spell? S - T - E - A - M, and boy is it effective. Effective also means efficient because (like with forced air) you can easily avoid most of the overheating you suffer from with hot water systems that don't at least rely on outdoor reset. Overheating is one heck of big source of inefficiencies.
We also know from cooking roasts in the convection oven that they easily dry out. It's the same for us, we dry out in air heated homes where the air is necessarily heated way beyond the temperature of the objects and walls. It only works if you can baste yourself in the humidity of the South. Florida may have the edge on the radiant sun but it's the hot water and steam systems that have the edge on radiance.
Hot floors, large surface, low temperature; steam radiators, small surface, high heat; same amount of radiation to provide heat that mostly touches only the objects. Both waste little heat on making the air uncomfortably hot and dry.
Plus, when you consider that most home heat is lost through air gaps that leak all around the doors and windows and up through the whole house attic fan, there really is a big argument in favor of radiant heat. It seems to me steam heat combines all the advantages of both hot water and forced hot air without picking up either of their problems. Sounds great, no?
It's like barbecuing your roast beef in the pressure cooker.
OK, there are a few disadvantages to pressure cookers and steam heat too. They both require more knowledge, more skill and more attention. They are plainly more intimidating, but I think the efforts to overcome those difficulties is well worth it and the payoff is always an efficient system that provides exceptional results without complex gadgetry required.
It isn't fair to compare numbers on old and loosely insulated home with steam heat to modern homes with modern insulation and modern heating systems. The few people who have modern homes with modern steam have nothing to envy from anyone. It always amazes me how a fifty to a hundred year old investment in steam heat will still provide heat (maybe not at top efficiencies anymore because of poor maintenance, but it is still heat while other systems would have croaked long ago).
Dead serious stuff: I was once handed a copy of Cook's Illustrated where Chris Kimball went on to figure out how to cook the best cow. After cooking dozens of them and sticking them with temperature probes everywhere, he figured the best pot roast had to be treated at a meat temperature of 210F. Steam temperature! Eureka! This also busted his preconceived notion of a 165F level. We were not talking about grilled steak.
Unless, maybe, there is such a thing as: "le steak vapeur". Think of this at lunch tomorrow.
Christian
The dinner plan today was for us to enjoy a nice beef roast. It had been gently cooking in its own steam securely enclosed within my pressure cooker. Swiftly and efficiently. We were all salivating at the prospect of opening the lid to a savory roast with the delicious little onions and the subtle taste of the little carrots.
Well, we had none of it.
Too little an addition of initial make-up water had been made, and the low water cut out operator (that's me) never reacted. The cute little carrots turned into a calcined black mass thickly crusted on the bottom of the pressure vessel. A frightening sight, but there was hope, the chunk of beef looked OK. It was surprisingly not burned, the vegetables gave their life to save the cow. Martha Stewart would say: it's a good thing.
After a little scraping, the meat really came out tasting quite good, without even being dried out like meat comes out from being roasted in a dry oven. For me, this was quite a discovery. I call it: - le pressure barbecue, hon hon hon, and since there was no sauce to be had, we made delicious sandwiches.
What does it prove? Well, that you can't go wrong with steam. Would you cook your meat drowning in hot water? Noodles, yes, but not beef. Like everything else, there is the best method for each situation.
What's home heating all about? Well, it's about frying the environment in order to make it palatable for our taste. It's about cooking it to the ideal internal temperature of, say, 65F.
So, what's your environment like in Montana? Tough to cook? Noodle like? Beef like?
Note how Seattle climate is very similar to European climate, that is, mild, wet, predictable and very slow to change. Ideal for radiant hot water, it too, is slow to change and the great risk of overheating the home is rare, even with simple controls.
In Southern Florida, like Southern California, by contrast, it never really gets cold. Objects, floors and walls never drop stone cold, you only get an occasional chill at worst. What makes sense here is the hot air furnace, it rids you of the chilly night air, and if you wait for the sun (which always comes out) it gets hot, guaranteed.
See where I'm going?
From the Midwest on to the East Coast, our weather is much more entertaining. You rarely have to wait more than half a day to observe what would resemble a seasonal change. This environment here is one tough cookie, if you want to get a good handle on it you need blitz-heat. Lots of heat that can attack the cold and also quickly retreat from the warming weather front on the touch of the thermostat.
Blitz-heat,
what does that spell? S - T - E - A - M, and boy is it effective. Effective also means efficient because (like with forced air) you can easily avoid most of the overheating you suffer from with hot water systems that don't at least rely on outdoor reset. Overheating is one heck of big source of inefficiencies.
We also know from cooking roasts in the convection oven that they easily dry out. It's the same for us, we dry out in air heated homes where the air is necessarily heated way beyond the temperature of the objects and walls. It only works if you can baste yourself in the humidity of the South. Florida may have the edge on the radiant sun but it's the hot water and steam systems that have the edge on radiance.
Hot floors, large surface, low temperature; steam radiators, small surface, high heat; same amount of radiation to provide heat that mostly touches only the objects. Both waste little heat on making the air uncomfortably hot and dry.
Plus, when you consider that most home heat is lost through air gaps that leak all around the doors and windows and up through the whole house attic fan, there really is a big argument in favor of radiant heat. It seems to me steam heat combines all the advantages of both hot water and forced hot air without picking up either of their problems. Sounds great, no?
It's like barbecuing your roast beef in the pressure cooker.
OK, there are a few disadvantages to pressure cookers and steam heat too. They both require more knowledge, more skill and more attention. They are plainly more intimidating, but I think the efforts to overcome those difficulties is well worth it and the payoff is always an efficient system that provides exceptional results without complex gadgetry required.
It isn't fair to compare numbers on old and loosely insulated home with steam heat to modern homes with modern insulation and modern heating systems. The few people who have modern homes with modern steam have nothing to envy from anyone. It always amazes me how a fifty to a hundred year old investment in steam heat will still provide heat (maybe not at top efficiencies anymore because of poor maintenance, but it is still heat while other systems would have croaked long ago).
Dead serious stuff: I was once handed a copy of Cook's Illustrated where Chris Kimball went on to figure out how to cook the best cow. After cooking dozens of them and sticking them with temperature probes everywhere, he figured the best pot roast had to be treated at a meat temperature of 210F. Steam temperature! Eureka! This also busted his preconceived notion of a 165F level. We were not talking about grilled steak.
Unless, maybe, there is such a thing as: "le steak vapeur". Think of this at lunch tomorrow.
Christian
0
Comments
-
This may have been asked before, but
I have a question regarding the question of steam compared to hot water. Is steam not inherently at least slightly less efficient, at least in residential applications? I am not necessarily talking about boiler efficiency. Im talking more about zoning ability, constant circulation, and the ability to warm the heat emitter only to the temperature required to match the load. I may be showing my ignorance regarding steam as we do not have much residential steam in Western Montana, and my experience with steam is very limited. I have read The Lost Art, which seems to explain the basics well. I am not talking about conversions either. I am just wondering theoretically to satisfy my own curiosity, and I know this is the place to ask.
-Andrew0 -
I may take a lot of grief for this....
but in general terms hot water has the edge on efficiency. Largely this is because water can be varied in temperature with the outdoor temperature. (If this statement were not true, outdoor reset would be a questionable strategy. It is done because it saves money and provides more comfort).
Steam comes in one basic intensity in low pressure systems. Both work well and steam is not nearly as problematic is most people believe, when properly done. But with water you do not have to boil the water into a gas. Steam heats without use of a pump so that goes in it's plus column. Steam can heat more quickly but has a cyclical aspect to it's control.
I have had houses with both and the hot water systems cost less to operate out of the box and even less when fine-tuned. That's my experience. Others have their opinions as I am sure you will see
0 -
The biggest advantage of steam
is the danger of freezing up in a power failure is almost eliminated. The radiators and most of the pipes drain dry when the system shuts down. We've all seen hot-water systems that froze up- they're often a total loss.
The other side of the boiling vs. just heating the water debate is, there is much less water in a steam system to begin with. So there's less water to be heated.
A steam system can be built in a small to medium sized house with just four moving parts. I have yet to see a hot-water system that can match this.
To Learn More About This Professional, Click Here to Visit Their Ad in "Find A Professional"0 -
Excellent points, well-taken
Steamhead. Also the standing pilot, heat in a power outage feature is hard to beat.0 -
The Only...
... thing that really gets to me in the "steam vs hot water" debate, is the scenario of somebody who doesn't understand steam just blindly ripping it out, or advising somebody to do so. A lot of steam systems get replaced that could have been inexpensively made to work both properly & economically.0 -
Amen, Tony.
Pass the wrench.
The old concept that when a practitioner sees the "old way" of doing things (Steam System, Slate Roof, Terrazzo, you name it) and says, "It cannot be fixed", what I hear correctly is him saying "I cannot fix it/deal with it".
Brad0 -
All to much of that goes on every day
0 -
The voice of experience ... from
the School of Unplanned Happenings
Been there ..... Done that!
That was a good read Christian.0 -
Glad you enjoyed my beef
Learning is always fun.0
This discussion has been closed.
Categories
- All Categories
- 86.3K THE MAIN WALL
- 3.1K A-C, Heat Pumps & Refrigeration
- 53 Biomass
- 422 Carbon Monoxide Awareness
- 90 Chimneys & Flues
- 2K Domestic Hot Water
- 5.4K Gas Heating
- 100 Geothermal
- 156 Indoor-Air Quality
- 3.4K Oil Heating
- 63 Pipe Deterioration
- 916 Plumbing
- 6K Radiant Heating
- 381 Solar
- 14.9K Strictly Steam
- 3.3K Thermostats and Controls
- 54 Water Quality
- 41 Industry Classes
- 47 Job Opportunities
- 17 Recall Announcements