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Major radiator stumper

Daniel_3
Daniel_3 Member Posts: 543
I've been through this before many months back. I had a 5 section, 5 column, 38" tall Corto. It took a while to heat up as every other radiator in the house would be charged before so. At the end of the cycle the radiator would finally take on steam BUT only at the air vent and below and only at the last section. The section at the angle valve would get hot but barely on the outside columns. Eventually through mere convection and higher pressure with no place for the steam to go it would take care of a little more of the radiator's sections. I changed the radiator out just two months ago with a 7 section, 3 column, 38" plain Peerless as well as one in the adjacent room with the same dimensions.

Believe it or not this new rad does the same thing as the Corto so I know it's not the radiator being plugged up. After some inspection I counted my runs and found 7 on one main and 7 on the other but I have 15 for my connected load.

Before I moved in the PO's had renovated a small room into a bathroom (across the wall from the room with the trouble) which most likely did not have a radiator in it. They added A&R radiantrim as a 5 foot section along the baseboard. All the walls were taken down in this room but the plaster in the trouble room is untouched on all the walls. The run for the trouble rad looks to travel straight up through walls that still have the plaster intact. My though is that when they renovated this room and replaced the walls with sheet rock below in the front foyer they somehow tee'd of the trouble run to connect the baseboard. This baseboard has no problem getting hot. I use heat-timers on all the rads. At full steam some of these vents bubble a bit probably due to condensate that is inside the vent and beginning to steam.

I can't for the life of me figure out what's going on. Why would only parts of the radiator heat up? There seems to be no rhyme or reason. Being one pipe steam this baffles me. The radiator has proper pitch, a new angle valve, and no hammer. I was thinking of trying the "all out" according to "It's all in the venting" by adding another vent onto that radiator but I don't believe this will work.
Steam gurus, whaddya think?

Comments

  • ER
    ER Member Posts: 27
    vent too fast

    maybe the venting is too fast and the steam pushes straight across the rad to the vent without rising up and pushing the air out of the columns. The columns remain filled with air having no place to go. Never seen it only read about it on this site. So this is only my diy 2 cents.

    Eric
  • Daniel_3
    Daniel_3 Member Posts: 543


    If that was the case the vent and angle valve would be hot to the touch before other rads in the house but this rad is the very last to receive steam so the venting can't be fast enough. The vent setting is the same for the same exact rad in the room across the hall which heats evenly. This issue seems to be related to the piping before the radiator. I've already tried setting the vent rate at the lowest setting.
  • Daniel_13
    Daniel_13 Member Posts: 2


    I'm thinking I may have a horizontal run issue since it can't be seen. It couldn't be at the basement level and wherever the connection to the baseborad is there isn't a problem. There's no hammer at all. I really don't want to tear up the floor. Ah man . . .
  • gerry gill
    gerry gill Member Posts: 3,078
    first try this.

    disconnect the trouble radiator and leave just an open valve there..obviously when you or if you get steam there you will have to shut the system back down and reconnect the radiator..what i want to know is can steam get thru the runout..also when you do this test close those heat timers down to only 1/4 open..do this test and report back.

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  • Daniel_3
    Daniel_3 Member Posts: 543


    I do get steam thru the run-out as it was flowing through the bottom of this rad and the one before it to close the heat-timer. It's really strange how the steam manifests itself in the radiator. I mean why could only parts of the rad steam up like this. I've never seen anything like it. I've seen steam in the first section only, the top corner near the supply, but never down through the bottom and to the vent. This vent was bubbling as if the condensate was boiling in there and the first section was hot but nothing else. The first time I steamed this rad up it did get hot all the way, a little slow, but all the way across, and condensate was pouring out the union so I replaced the union lug (since it wasn't the same brand as the current valve) with the lug of the same variety and that fixed the leak. the previous run was 1" but I used a bell reducer and up'd the valve to 1 1/4" as well as the same rad in the room across the way since the radiator has too much air volume for an 1" angle valve.

    I'll try another vent ( I have a jacobus, a dole 1A, a ventor, and vent-rite), disconnect the radiator, and open the angle. If this produces no problem then it must be the horizontal run(s). Over and out Sir!
  • Daniel_3
    Daniel_3 Member Posts: 543


    Well here's the fix. It gets hot all the way across and evenly to boot. It turns out that a 5foot section of radiantrim is tee'd off horizontally to the adjacent bathroom where it comes up into a 3/4" angle valve off copper. Adding these surfaces together I find that the EDR is more than the largest rad in the my house so I thought, hmmm, I remember reading that "It's all in the Venting!" in the Library and it spoke of adding venting to the larger rads if they have trouble heating up. This turned out to be the fix since the the combined radiantrim and peerless edr's are indeed one large rad essentially.
  • gerry gill
    gerry gill Member Posts: 3,078
    Good Job!!

    thats a gorgeous looking radiator..did you paint her up yourself?

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  • Daniel_16
    Daniel_16 Member Posts: 1


    Yes Sir!

    Hammered copper.
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