More on 2 Pipe Steam

DennisK

Do all 2 pipe steam/vapor systems have an F&T trap. I have something where the returns come into the wet return, which I've learned is a Float trap/Air eliminator, but can't find a F&T trap anywhere.

One other thing. If I replace the boiler, and they put in two end of main vents, does that replace the Float Trap/Air Eliminator. I'm trying to take Dan's advice of "don't remove anything from a steam system unless you're absolutely sure what it does"?

Steamhead (in transit)

No they don't

It depends on how the system was designed and installed. Many systems used some sort of water-seal piping arrangement to separate the drips from the steam mains and the dry returns.

The FT/AE is essentially a main vent for the dry return. No need to remove it if it works, although I'd remove the vacuum check from the top if there is one. If more capacity is needed you could add main vents to the dry return.

Also check to see how the steam mains are vented. Instead of main vents, you may find pipes crossing over from the steam mains to the dry returns with radiator traps in them. These route the air from the steam mains to the dry returns where it leaved via the FT/AE. The traps close once steam hits them.

Have you located any names on the FT/AE or related components, to help us identify your system?

DennisK

The boiler is an HB Smith. I really love old stuff, and if I were more creative, I would use it as a lawn ornament or something. There are two mains coming off it, but as far as I can tell, there is no connection between the mains and the returns (I hope that I'm using the right terminology), and no main vents. I don't see how the air gets out, and it would explain why one half of the house stays cold. There are two fittings adjacent to each other, one on the main, one on the return, pointing upward, that look as if they were capped for a long time, but they are pretty close to he boiler (?a long lost radiator). The original radiators have steam traps, which havent been serviced since McKinley was President, and some "plumber" (I think Dan calls them knuckleheads), attached some copper tubing to the steam system and put in copper slant fin...no steam traps there. The returns come back to a Webster Modulation Vent trap. The body is marked 1tm1a and the middle part is marked 1tm2. Until fairly recently, I had stem coming out of a radiator air vent that someone had put in an orifice at the top of the trap, that has subsequently been replaced by a Gorton Valve (I know there shouldn't be steam in the return anyway, I have to have the traps put in or replaced).
The amazing thing to me is that the system works at all. I have no doubt that if I replace this boiler with someone who doesnt know what he is doing, I will likely be in for alot of trouble.

What I really would like to do is the following:

1. Change to natural gas- I know that it may be more expensive, but I live in the city and need the room in the basement that the oil tank occupies. Oil also smells (especially when its being burned in something that looks like Fulton played with it as lad)
2. Repair all of the steam traps
3. Figure out how to vent this thing properly (and get it done)
4. Take a hot water loop off the boiler, and run a hot water zone to the copper/slant fin etc. areas.

What do you think?

Steamhead (in transit)

Webster Modulation System

is what you have. I've worked on more than a few and they always impress me. BTW, I've seen some Webster Modulation installations that did use F&T traps, but these jobs did not have wet returns, so the F&T drained the condensate from the steam mains into the dry returns as well as vented air from them.

Is there someplace you can move the oil tank to, like under a porch or similar? This is a popular tank location in the Baltimore area but since it gets a bit colder in Beantown I'd check to see if tanks located there have had fuel-flow problems. Also, a modern, properly functioning oil-fired boiler WILL NOT smell the house up. An older one shouldn't either. Ask me how I know that. Hint: The Lovely Naoko has a very good sense of smell, and she hasn't complained about it....

If you get an oil-fired boiler, and the price of oil rises way beyond gas and stays that way, you can use a conversion burner to fire that boiler with gas. Then if the balance tilts the other way you can re-install the oil burner. This "future-proofing" can come in handy. But you can't change a gas boiler to oil, so you'd be stuck if gas stays higher than oil.

Since the copper baseboard has way different thermal behavior than your cast-iron radiators, I'd change back to a radiator with a trap. Problem solved without going to the trouble of tying a hot-water loop into the system.

Fixing the traps is a no-brainer, just have your contractor get the proper replacement elements from Tunstall or Barnes & Jones.

Venting your system is pretty easy. I'm sure you have crossover pipes with traps in them, routing air from the steam main into the dry return and closing when the steam hits the traps.

BTW, if you're the same guy who had Ed Wallace look at your system, if you hire him you can be sure the job will be done right. He knows his Webster.