Hot water and blood

Steamhead (in transit)

that Viessman makes a nice boiler, that when properly installed will work well. But they're not the only game in town. Personally I like to paraphrase the Hair Cuttery ad: "A good boiler is a good boiler". What counts most is the installation.

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Frank_33

Hot water and blood

I am replacing a steam system in an old city rowhouse with hot water.

Radiation will be a mixture of converted flat top steam radiators, European designer radiators, baseboard and radiant.

One no-brainer for radiant is a new concrete floor on a 650SF section of the basement.

My wife refuses to consider radiant except in the new master bath because she has poor circulation and her ankles tend to swell up. For instance, the heat from the computer under her desk, causes her problems. She believes that any heat from the floor will also affect her.

I have found on the internet only a French study that determined that radiant heat causes no circulatory problems long-term. That does not address my wife's concerns.

I did read somewhere that normal skin temperature is 84 degrees and radiant heat should never exceed 85 degrees "because it might damage the wood floor." Perhaps it is also a question of not being warmer than skin temperature?

In any case, and this may be a long shot, does anyone know anything (short of a spousal valve replacement) about this intersection of physics and anatomy?

Weezbo

sorta...

might go long though.
I have studied accupuncture for decades,health is an important issue with me. as we become older we are suseptable to various influences that "speak" directly to us as individuals. wind,heat, cold,moisture tweak the individuals health differently.i may for example be able to stand out in pouring down rain with wind gusts to 60 degrees in high heat and weather it, someone else may catch a cold and be bed ridden from (uncomfortable to them) a mild breeze and high humidity...many people feel a storm comming in thier Bones...this isnt superstion nor is it a joke to them they indeed feel real pain involved within what may seem wonderfully comfortable atmosphere to me. this is due to the "electrical" equilibrium of the individual. i am going to let it rest right there, as i dont want to rewite the book on the indian and oriental medical practices of the past few thousand years.

Larry (from OSHA)

Frank

Check out this website called healthy heating. Lots of info and perhaps some facts that might bolster your argument.

http://healthyheating.com/

Good luck on your project.

Larry (from OSHA)

ps. I'm just a homeowner. Maybe some of the pros here will have some other good advice for you.

Ken_8

Hey Frank!

Nice to see you here.

Knowing your place as well as I do I would urge you to stay with the basic plan, that being, radiant in the master bath only - and any form of hot water heating in the rest.

There is one idea that you may not have considered, that being ceiling (rather than floor) radiant. Assuming a great deal of demo work is in your ultimate plans now (at least since we worked together on this stuff), it is an extremely viable solution many of us fail to see on the radar and has a few advantages over floor radiant. Among them, sheet rock can take higher temperatures than wood. Since radiant does not heat the air, there is 100% radiant output from the ceiling and no furniture on the ceiling to block the radiation - making it extremely even heating, the water temps can be higher because there will be no bare feet being over-heated by a warmer floor, and it allows your wife's feet and legs to be minimally affected by the floor radiant dynamics.

Home run?

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hr

It may not

be necessary to run the floor (surface) temperature up to that 84-85° temperature range. Have a radiant contractor do a heat loss and design to get the info.

I believe Stephen and Monica Irgens of STEP Warmfloor have some info or studies from Europe on the subject you mention. www.warmfloor.com Also try the RPA for info www.radiantpanelassociation.org.

Panel radiators could be another option, or the ceilings as Ken mentioned.

hot rod

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Steamhead

If your wife doesn't want radiant

why not just keep the steam and fix whatever is wrong with it?

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Frank_33

Thanks for your posts

Wife seems to be right.

All I was able to learn on the hydronic sites was that a radiantly cooled floor cooler than 65F might cause leg cramps.

However, a medical site says: Avoid sources of heat: baths, saunas, floor heating, prolonged exposure to the sun.
http://www.medivein.com/siteuk/advice/adandpre.html

Varicose veins are common, so this may not be an income-enhancing piece of information for the subfloor radiant industry. (But see Ken's suggestion.)

Weezbo
I tend to agree with you about electricity, but sometimes varicose veins are just varicose veins.

Ken
Hi! Great suggestion. I thought about this for other rooms, but not for basement. Guess that's what makes you a consumate pro.

Home run? You mean back to manifold?

Steamhead,
We love steam, but

1. The relatively new boiler was designed by WM not to take a coil retrofit to reduce the cost by $75.

2. It was so vastly oversized 5 years ago that it will never run efficiently.

3. At least one half of the steam radiation is now missing.

4. A major steam line in the basement would have to be rerouted.

5. Lining the masonry chimney for a steam boiler might cost $3,000 more (NYC prices) than for a 3" liner for a Vitodens.

So we really are doing a new system, and no one does a new steam system.

6. My entire family (and other parties unnamed) will throttle the two of us if I change my mind on this again. But Ken knows my setup, maybe he agrees with you?

Steamhead (in transit)

Ken does steam

so do Mad Dog, Dan Foley, Noel, myself and others. I'd look into using a direct-vent setup that would bypass the chimney and eliminate the need for a liner, a flat-plate heat exchanger to feed whatever radiant you decide to use, and an indirect for your hot faucet water. And moving a steam line can be done if you know what you're doing- ask me how I know that.

You may find it costs less to do it this way than to buy a new Vie$$man and line the chimney. Regardless of cost, it would probably be less disruptive to the house.

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Frank_33

Direct vent is not so easy in a NYC brick row house if you want the boiler in the basement. You can only vent out the back wall. My basement goes back 40' from the current boiler room. And while I have gas and water lines there, the direct venting would be a little funky. And there would be that nasty and expensive near boiler piping. And then the boiler's output would travel an extra 40' to the distribution system which would cause an efficiency loss and a longer wait for HW at the faucet. It doesn't seem worth it to save less than a grand.

While the steam boiler is doable, it has these downsides:
More expensive chimney liner ($3,000). --
Expense of moving steam pipe. --
Expense of heat exchanger. --
A hybrid system has to be more complicated in which more can go wrong. --
Sizing -there is only 178SF of steam radiation left (42k BTU) --
The wretched sizing question of whether a hydonic takeoff from a steam boiler is additive or subtractive --
I believe the steam boiler will also be less efficient.

The downside of the HW boiler is:

Running some pex to the upper floors and putting new thermostatic valves in the steam radiators.

Advantages of the new HW system:

The Viessman should be very efficient (burner modulation, outdoor reset, condensing) and quiet --I can throw out some humongous pipes in the basment I am renovating. --I have a lot of flexibility in radiation choices and can even make changes or additions later --and the Viessman comes with factory designed controls, so that's one less source of error for the people who install and maintain the unit.

I also like gadgets and expect the shiny German boiler to be a conversation piece for years to come .

The only thing I don't like about the Viessmans is that not everyone can service them.

I am seriously thinking of making the new minisplits on the top floor be heat pumps as well, just for backup!

Ken_8

I don't know who

sold you on the Viessmann, but it is hardly the only boiler with high efficiency. Further, it adds huge costs for efficiency matched by others. One brand in particular is made in America, is stainless steel and many places are stocking repair parts because many are generic.

We can talk about it all when you get final drawings of the ultimate room and detail drwaings.

I would envision a combination of runtal type rads, floor radiant, and ceiling radiant - combined. The boiler would be ideal for making domestic hot water via indirect stainless water heater, driven by a 92+% efficient water heater.

I'd be honored to look at the prints and come up with some options as soon as you get to that point.

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Frank_33

Only The Wall and other forums, clearly there is love...

joel: Well Viessmann makes the best indirect...

mark: viessmann seams to do a lot more for the contractor in service and training wise.

ALH: I think the Vitodens boilers are a good value. There is a lot of versatility in the controls. The heat exchanger and burner are second to none. It's the best modulating, condensing boiler on the market.

heatboy: If you buy a Vitodens........you buy the 300 indirect. No option. I sell the Vitodens as a system. Since the Vitodens is the best boiler we have available to us, it makes little sense to "cheapen" the project by substituting a sub-standard indirect. Domestic hot water makes up 30% +- of energy consumption. The Crown, while being a wonderful budget tank, is not really compatible with the performance you can achieve with a Vitodens. I love the Vitodens and I am pretty sure there is nothing else like it.

ALH: I wouldn't mind seeing a Vitocell 300 in every home. I certainly won't argue that the Vitocell 300 is a superior tank.

Mad Dog: I like that approach too

S. Milne: The Viessmann tank is a superior product.

Gary Wallace: BTW, I sold my first V 300 today:-) Wish I could sell them on every Vitodens job I do

Bob Knebel: No doubt the Viessmann tank is the king of heat exchanger surface area and low pressure drop

Cosmo: would personally go with the Low Loss Header, you don't necessarily have to use Viessmann's, (although it is Awesome)

Steve K. Happiness is a Vitodens 200

John Jr: All my customers love them can't belive the gas bill's they get. Even the one's that go with propane!

Cosmo_3

Here here Steamhead

You couldn't be more right. We all know that the boiler is only a part of a system. I have seen very economical boilers installed in well though out systems that work well, save energy and burn clean.

I have also had to help a builder I do some work for by coming to the aid of a competing contractor who underbid me big time on this builder's heating system a few months ago and now the zones don't work as intended, the blue boiler soots up all over (direct vent) the new stucco, an expensive 2107 control installed but not used (oh look at that honeywell aquastat).

The installation quality IS more important than the equipment brand. However if we can assume the design and install quality is the same, I would much rather have Viessmann products as long as the $$ are there. Viessmann itself manufactures EVERYTHING they sell, and WILL always stand behind their products. Accross the entire product line everything Viessmann sells I think is just a notch over anything available to us here in the U.S. That does not mean that the other manufacturers produce junk, on the contrary I sell Crown, and have installed a lot of (oh no) Buderus, and many other brands have awsome products- HTP, Burnham, etc... I like to see the job, find out what kind of budget I have to work with, determine how the customer's lifestyle may affect the design, and then pick equipment brand.

But in the end, I have to be honest, every job I look at my first thought is how GREAT a Viessmann would look on this job!!!!!!

Cosmo Valavanis

Dependable P.H.C. Inc.

Cosmo_3

have heard this before

One of my elderly clients had this concern. She just moved into the home, and it had an older undersubfloor light gauge sheetmetal heat transfer plate/pex system installed in the kitchen, and bathroom areas. She has Vericose veins, and circulation problems in her feet and one of her friends told her that she should get rid of the floor heat ond install electric baseboard (ahhhh). She called me, and when sat down for some tea and her awsome home-made biscuits and when she explained this to me I didn't know what to say so I said I would look into it.

What I saw was a typical econo aproach to the radiant temp control- manual 3way temper valve. So I told her that the system was installed okay, but I could make the radiant floor temps even, and only as warm as needed to heat the floor per outside temperature at that given time. She said okay, and I installed a simplet injection loop w/ a Wirsbo promix outside reset control w/ a floor sensor, and kept the radiant panel pump on constant.

The good news is she called me after the heating season was over this year (although right now it is pretty cool outside) just to say that she did notice that the rooms w/ radiant were more evenly heated thoughout the day, and her circulation problems were not worse when her bare feet were on the floor w/ radaint heat compared to other rooms.

Not saying that this may not be an issue, but I think that by keeping the btu's per sq ft needed down, and using reset w/ constant circ we can limit the actual surface floor temp as much as possible and still keep the room comfy.

Of course, I think using the walls for radiant is another option over using the ceiling.


Cosmo Valavanis

Dependable P.H.C. Inc.