Removing Condensate Pump from steam system and making it gravity

Geoff Lincoln

I have a oil fired steam two pipe system. The motor for my condensate pump stopped and my heating contractor decided to convert my system to gravity flow for the condensate return lines. At first there was no check valve and the feed water filled the boiler and condensate lines making it cold at one end of the house. A check valve was installed and condensate lines and boiler were flushed out. I now get heat at this end of the house but it takes forever. The contractor says that the steam will have to push out any water left in the lines. I never had this problem when I had the condensate pump. Thanks in advance for any HELP!!

Ken_40

Two things:

Remove the check valve.

Lower the steam pressure to under one pound. If you do not have a vaporstat (but rather a 0-10 p.s.i. pressuretrol), you need to change it.

The system will sing and dance with the correct steam pressure!

Geoff Lincoln

Ken, I do have a Pressuretrol but the steam pressure is under 1 psi. The pressuretrol unit in the past would get a signal from the condensate pump but since it is disconected the only signal it gets is low boiler water level.

Geoff

Ken_40

I'm confused...

"Pressuretrols" are incapable of operating at under one pound. The lowest "sensitive" setting is around (underline around) one and a half pounds max. And, that's after tweaking the hell out of one, maybe even bending the trigger tab a bit, to close the "break" gap from the micro-switch a hair.

Also, unless you have a rather unusual setup, most boiler pressure gages are totally insensitive and innacurate at pressures below 3 pounds! Which explains why we always put a 0-30# gage for code purposes on all vapor steamers, but a 0-5 # in addition - so as to be able to adjust the on/off settings accurately, and in the range of 4 oz. to 16oz. pressure range your system was originally likely designed to function within!

How the pressuretrol would inter-act with a condensate pump is alien to anything I ever saw. The condensate pump should have its own float trigger, and when the level gets up, the float makes a switch that dumps the receiver contents back into the boiler. Now that the condensate pmp is gone...

More details please.

Geoff Lincoln

Ken, the feed water control valve was what would get a signal from the condensate pump not the pressuretrol unit. The only thing that the contractor did was remove the condensate pump and route the condensate pipes into the bottom of the boiler. The boiler runs and the water level drops and the feed valve feeds water controled by the low water sensor for the boiler. This water feed valve (bulbus cast iron unit)is mechanical and has a float in it.

Geoff

Ken_40

Got it.

If the LWCO is dual purpose, meaning turns off the boiler when the water gets real low, as well as has either an internal float, like a ballcock you see in older toilets, or a set of contacts that open a remote solenoid/water feeder, that's fine.

Since the float-cock, in the feed tank has been abandoned, feed-water has to be introduced somehow, the way you state is fine as well. I'm a tad confused as to how the thing worked with BOTH a a ball-cock in the condensate receiver, now removed, AND a combination LWCO/feeder worked before, but maybe I mis-read a detail or two?

Since the modsification is already done, what's the system acting like now?

BTW, I hope you're not confusuing a condensate pump and a boiler feed pump. They are similar in appearance, but wildly different in function.

Geoff Lincoln

Ken, what I am calling a condensate pump was attached to the condensate return lines and held about 1 gallon of water and the pump would kick on now and then and pump condensate into the boiler. The condensate pump had an electrical conection to the boiler level control valve. All that has been removed and the condensate pipes have been routed into the boiler using gravity. These lines have been cleaned out and I am getting condensate flow, but one side of the house takes a long time to heat up and condensate water comes out of the air vents and overflow. Less water now than before the lines were clean.

Geoff