Floor heating not working, any ideas?
Hi all,
I recently moved in this apartment, built in 2013, which has floor heating.
When I first visited the apartment (a month before moving in) the heating seemed to work fine (it was actually so warm I was sweating inside).
After I moved in, I noticed the heating is not working well at all. Specifically:
- The main living area (~45sqm) is controlled by a master thermostat, and despite the temp I set, I get max 21c,
- Same living area seems to have uneven warm areas on the floor,
- Two bedrooms are controlled by a different thermostat system, which only open the valves on the return pipes (so they seem tied to the overall temp set by the master thermostat in the living area)
- Master bedroom floor is cold, despite the thermostat being cranked to the max,
- Smaller bedroom floor is lukewarm, despite the thermostat being cranked to the max.
Called the landlord's contractor for looking into it, but all they said was that the system is supposed to be working, and that it just takes time for it to warm up.
After 3 days of thermostats set to max, nothing has really changed.
Here is the setup:
From left to right, the return pipes are:
- Cold-ish (Living room 1)
- Lukewarm (Living room 2)
- Cold (???)
- Cold (Bedroom 2 — I suspect Master Bedroom)
- Cold-ish (Bedroom 1 — I suspect Second Bedroom)
- Lukewarm (Bathroom)
The pipes here seem to be numbered as such:
- Supply heat
- Supply cooling
- Return heat
- Return cooling
I have no idea what's the possible issue - any guess?
I mentioned the possibility of some air in the pipes to the contractor, but he said it's not possible since it's a closed loop.
Also worth mentioning: previous tenant told me they never really turned on the heating in the bedrooms in 6 years, so I can't tell if it has ever worked or not.
Any lead is really appreciated, yours truly here is not faring well with the cold and humid Netherland winter.
Cheers!
Comments
-
Contractor has a point: there shouldn't be air in the system. That, sadly, doesn't mean there isn't.
Ideally you or your plumber would be able to find a way to isolate each loop and purge it — at least 20 litres per minute flow — until no bubbles were seen in the outflow. Not sure if I see a way to do that…
Br. Jamie, osb
Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England1 -
feel the floor tubes with your hand,
are they hot? warm? cool? cold?
same up top at the feed and return,
hot? warm? cool? cold?
known to beat dead horses0 -
Supply tubes are all warm (~30-40c as expected).
Return tubes I specified in the post, I'll write them here again:
- Cool (Living room 1)
- Lukewarm (Living room 2)
- Cold (???)
- Cold (Bedroom 2 — I suspect Master Bedroom)
- Cool (Bedroom 1 — I suspect Second Bedroom)
- Lukewarm (Bathroom)
0 -
You mean it's not possible to do the purging on this setup?
0 -
A better picture of the piping is needed. I'll bet there are purge ports on an engineered product like that.
In this pic, only one zone valve is open. They are open when you see the blue ring around the top.
The ones with the fluted tops are themostatic valves, not powered valves.
So assure they all open to get flow before you try purging.
Bob "hot rod" Rohr
trainer for Caleffi NA
Living the hydronic dream0 -
Fair, here is a wider picture of the piping:
These seems to be the purge ports on the pipes to me, or am I wrong?
Also there are these valves in the system, which I think are to empty it?
As for the two insulated pipes being closed, those are for the cooling as far as I understand - here cooled water is provided during summer, and hot water during winter. That's why they're closed - but fair point to keep that in mind for bleeding/purging.
Honestly I would rather leave this to the contractor since I'm renting and don't want to be personally liable for any damages. Just was wondering if the issue may indeed be air in the system, or something else to consider.
1 -
Looks like there is a TRV in series with the heat feed. Is there a remote bulb it is reading and what is it set to? Does that Alpha pump show you flow rate by chance?
Most likely you are not getting enough flow. Some zones valves need to go through a calibration procedure to set them, not familiar with the ones on your setup.
0
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