temperature setting?

Joanna

I'm attaching a picture of what I have. The company calls it a "gas-fired water boiler," not a furnace. The directions say thermostat... but it could be an aquastat? If I turn the temperature up (provided I can figure that out), nothing's going to explode, right? I had a heating guy come over last year to fix/replace leaking bleeder valves, and he didn't say anything about the temperature. Oh well - what should it be set to?

Joanna

temperature setting?

Hello - Forgive me if I don't use the correct terminology...! I have cast-iron baseboard heaters that use hot water to heat the house (not very well, I might add). The furnace that heats the water was new when I bought the house (1.5 years ago). What should the temperature gauge be set at? It's been set at 80, but it can go past 200 degrees. I only noticed because I just had to re-light the pilot and the instructions say to "set thermostat to desired temperature." Maybe this was why my house was so cold last year? Thanks in advance...

Frenchie

aquastat?

You say thermostat. But since you said it goes to 200 degrees you must mean the aquastat on the boiler itself. For baseboards like that at 80 degrees I can't believe they would heat at all. A more normal setting would be 160-170 degrees.

Frenchie

Aquastat

Yes, that is indeed a hot water boiler. You have a thermostat on the wall of your house to control the temp. of your house. On the boiler there should be a thermostat to control the temp. of the water inside the boiler. This one on the boiler itself happens to be called an aquastat. If you had a guy out to do other work and you didn't complain about the house not heating well, he probably didn't even look at the aquastat setting. In a normal house with cast iron baseboard I would set the aquastat on the boiler at 165 degrees farenheit. No, the boiler won't explode because of that setting. I would not turn it above 200 for any reason. In fact if you turn it up to 165 and the house still doesn't heat, you should call someone in, because that would mean other problems. Houses with cast iron baseboard should heat well and be very comfortable! however if the water is only 80 degrees they won't work! Let us know how you make out....

tom_49

Joanna,

What you have there is a gas boiler. The temperature on the gauge should probably be reading around 160o- 170o.

I dont know if those aquastats even go down to 80o . Try this if you can. Nothing will explode . Take a cooking thermometer and wrap it around one of the copper pipes coming of the top ( or side ) of the boiler with tape ( watch out! it may be hot), turn the thermostat on the wall up as high as it will go.

Then watch the boiler in operation, you should see the gas burning. Make notes of the temperatures on the cooking thermometer. The gas should eventually shut off. At that point take another messurement of the temp. This temp. is the actual high limit temp. of the boiler.

After you have done this let us know what temp. it shut off at.

Darren_10

I second

Jasons opinion He's right on track. Your house will never be the same. (COLD) good luck! Darren

MIRZA

ZONE VALVE

Hello:
I have hot water gas boiler one year old with the base board heating and I have two zone valves control the whole hous for some reason one of the zone has no heat at all even when set the thermostate in that zone to 75-80 F and the room temperature at that time is about 67f. Thanks for help

Joanna

Thanks everyone... I adjusted the temperature to 165 once I found the adjustor. It was actually set at about 140. Since I just relit the pilot 2 nights ago, how long should it take the system to reheat? I also drained the system of the water last week (really gunky after sitting there all year)- does the system automatically refill?

(thank you for your patience - I think I've read every "home help" book out there, and no one answers the "single girl, first home" questions like you guys.)

jackie_2

register heating - no idea!!! Help

I live in a house built in 1870 I moved in around February last year. I do not have a clue how the registers work. All I know is that it is heated by natural gas. My bill for one month was 553.37 yes very exspensive. I would like to know if I am doing something wrong or not doing something at all. Help

Frenchie

Water fill

Oh boy, You might have a problem. Turn off the boiler right away if you aren't sure that it is full of water!!!! I didn't even consider the fact that the boiler may be empty. That's the problem of not being there in person to see the equipment. I'm not sure why you drained it, that's normally not a good idea. Usually, and I repeat USUALLY the system will refill itself with water through the auto feeder, and you would need to bleed the air out of the system before starting it up. The danger here is that you may have a fill valve shut off, and the boiler is still empty after you drained it. you ABSOLUTELY DO NOT want to run a boiler that is empty. This is dangerous, and will ruin the boiler. After starting a boiler that is full and running properly you would feel heat in the house within a half hour or less. Also NEVER attempt to put water in a boiler that was just heated empty. This could literally make it explode!!!!

Joanna

Water fill

Ummm... thanks. I drained it because that's what the heating guy did last year. Uh oh. So I just turned off the pilot to be safe. I bled the valves throughout the house and water came out. The psi on the gauge is about 10. I read the whole manual and I still don't know if it automatically refills or not.

brucewo1b

Jackie

first repost as a new topic but we need to know if its a steam system, hot water system, or forces hot air system. take pictures of the boiler/furnace and near boiler piping so we can identify if you can not.

brucewo1b

Mirza

I would call back the installer and have him look at it, it may be air bound or a bad zone valve and have them go through it with you, or someone put a nial through a thermostat wire while hanging a picture or mirror.

Frenchie

OK Joanna

OK Sounds like you are OK. You scared me for a minute. Now you can understand why people are leery of giving advice in a forum such as this! If the worse case was true, you could have been hurt. So, if you have water coming out at the bleeders, and the pressure guage reads 10 psi, your system is full and it is safe. It must be auto-filling. Some installers shut off a valve on the auto fill after they fill the system, so that next time any water is let out it won't fill up again. Not a good idea in my opinion, but some people do it. Since you have water go ahead and relight the pilot light. Then make sure you turn the gas valve to the "ON" position once the pilot is going. if you leave it on pilot setting, the main burner won't fire up. once you turn the gas valve to "ON" with the pilot already lit you should hear the main burner fire up. a sound like WHOOSH, or a slight rumble type noise. now, since you have your aquastat set at 165 degrees, you should feel the baseboards get nice and toasty in 20 min. or so. Let us know!! Oh, the reason you don't want to drain and refill your system, unless it was apart for repair, is that every time you put new water in you are adding oxygen with the water. Over time this will rot out the boiler. Now that you know it is full, just leave it full forever.

Joanna

It WORKS

The system refilled, we relit the pilot and fired it up. It turned on - after adjusting my new digital thermostat to the highest temperature. I have an Ivy League degree... doesn't mean you are smart, take it from me. Thanks again. Hope I at least entertained you.

Frenchie

Good deal

Glad it works! As a preventive suggestion- set the digital thermostat to 3 cycles per hour. This is best for hot water heat. They usually come set to 6 CPH, which is for forced air heat. 3 CPH will give you better comfort and efficiency. Good luck!