Correct system, plumbing errors

magewick · May 10

My vapor vacuum system was recently inspected. I was told following the boiler should not be located on the floor, but on a raised platform. The pipe ping is a mess and should be corrected. Please advise

Jamie Hall · May 10

Can't really see the piping — too close — so I'll not comment on that (although I do wonder if there is any header at all…)..

Keep the vapourstat, whatever else you do. That's the most reliable pressure control you could possibly have.

Now. Did anyone tell you why the boiler shouldn't be on the floor? There are basically two reasons. First, in at least some jurisdictions code requires boilers or any gas fired appliance to be raised for protection. That's one thing. Another is that the water line of the boiler is, in some installations, important relative to the rest of the piping to get reliable quiet operation. Can't tell.

EBEBRATT-Ed · May 10

And who is telling you you have these issues?? Need pictures from 8-10 feet away

Mad Dog_2 · May 10

Exactly.....mad Dog

magewick · May 10

distance from boiler water level to header is 4ft.

mattmia2 · May 10

the near boiler piping is very wrong. it could work ok if the water quality in the boiler is good or it might work very poorly. does it heat quietly and quickly? did you just buy this house?

from what i see here the boiler water line doesn't need to be higher unless there are low return connections we aren't seeing.

pecmsg · May 10

how long has that been like that?

Jamie Hall · May 10

Well, the near boiler piping is quite wrong. However before you become too concerned, reember that steam can be oddly forging at times, and if you are not having problems with banging or other evils of the sort you can probably leave it.

And unless there are some other pipes out in the woods I can't see, there is not heating reason to raise the boiler. That does not mean, however, that there might not be a code requirement to do so to protect it from flooding.

EBEBRATT-Ed · May 11

With those tees in the main with plugs I wonder if the counterflow drips were removed?

mattmia2 · May 11

probably drips and a second riser from the old boiler. the old boiler probably had a much bigger steam chest and would work without much of a header.

magewick · May 11

the original boiler had two risers. The coal fuel was converted to use fuel oil. Eventually, the old system was replaced with a weil mcclain boiler - however only one riser was installed instead of two risers. The plumbers could not loosen one of the boiler plugs. Should my system have two risers?

mattmia2 · May 11

It should have a header at the boiler. It may or may not require 2 risers to the header, the boiler manual will tell you the number and size of the near boiler piping. The mains should each individually connect to the header that currently doesn't exist.

the header should have connections in the order of: risers from the boiler, risers to the mains, connection to the equalizer.

if it is counterflow(the mains slope toward the boiler and condensate drains toward the boiler vs parallel flow where the mains slope away from the boiler and there are returns at the far ends of the mains) the mains should have drips that separately connect to the return below the water line.

Correct system, plumbing errors

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