Steam extremely loud and vibrating throughout the house
I moved into my Brooklyn house a year and a half ago. We have steam radiators. The boiler is in the left side of the basement. We are in middle of our second winter here and whenever the heat goes on it always makes loud banging sounds throughout the house. There also is a cauldron boiling sound that we always hear in the middle of the house mainly on the second floor when the heat is on. The left bedroom (2 floors directly above the boiler) gets overly hot to the point that it’s unbearable without the bedroom door open when the heat is pumping. In contrast, the right bedroom doesn’t get hot enough. The middle bedroom gets hot and that is the noisiest room. The floor in the middle bedroom also slightly sags. The dining room which is directly beneath that middle BR also has a couple of line shapes across the ceiling which are soft to touch (possibly indicating some water damage at some point?) but no moisture was detected there when we checked it a few weeks ago. Just this past Thursday night, we heard an unusually loud banging/thumping sound reverberating throughout the house coming from the middle BR. Although the steam is always particularly noisy in that room, this time it was much louder, it had a thumping sound and sent vibrations throughout the house. It sounded like something might break or explode so we shut the heat switch off on our thermostat. We were away Friday night and Saturday and returned Saturday night. We left the heat on 65 before leaving but upon returning, the temperature in the house was 58 and the heat wasn’t going. I saw that the pilot light was out on the boiler. We called a boiler guy that night who replaced the thermocoupler. The heat then worked nicely for around 3 hours until that loud vibrating thumping that we first heard on Thursday night began again. We never touched the vents in the radiators in the house. Does anyone know what the problem may be?
Comments
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You have condensation stuck somewhere where it should not be stuck. A radiator or pipe has settled to a point that causes the water from the condensing steam to be trapped and as that water builds up and overflows a drop of water and that drop of water hits a hot steam pipe that drop of water can flash into steam causing a hammering sound. That is only one possibility. There are several reasons for a hammer sound like that. A good steam fitter can find that problem and solve it for you. Where are you located, city zip code (not your exact address). There is a link at the top that says "Find A Contractor"
Edward Young Retired
After you make that expensive repair and you still have the same problem, What will you check next?
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There are a lot of hack contractors. In your area I would try @Mad Dog_2 or @JohnNY you can PM them on this site. They are both steam experts.
There may be others on this site as well
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The OP said Brooklyn — which translates for me at least as @JohnNY or @Mad Dog_2 or just possibly @EzzyT … although the last is over in New Jersey. Couple of other guys I can't remember just at the moment (sorry guys!).
Click on the names up there to send them a PM and they will get back to you.
Br. Jamie, osb
Building superintendent/caretaker, 7200 sq. ft. historic house museum with dependencies in New England2
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