jpf321
Joined on November 20, 2009
Last Post on March 28, 2012
Recent Posts
still more info needed....
@ March 28, 2012 12:38 PM in water coming out of air valve
Pics of the rad including the inlet valve and piping.Inlet diameters in relation to rad size.
Rad pics will also help us understand the type of rad.
Relation of that rad to the boiler? 1st (closest rad)? Far rad?
Gortons/Maid-O's DO NOT seal on over-water like others do/can (Hoffmans, Doles, etc) .. only on temp
When you say the glass was all the way full .. was it full into the header? or was there still some room in the glass gauge?
Do you have a fancy auto-feed with a use-meter on it?
Do you have significantly slow returns? Slow returns will/may trigger a false low water condition.
You may want to look into a VXT Auto-feed with the use-o-meter and "feed delay" capablities. I believe the only options are a 24V or 120V VXT. http://www.hydrolevel.com/new/images/literature/sales_sheets/VXT_sales_sheet.pdf
If you're going to go with an Auto Feed, I think the VXT is the best case. I don't have auto myself .. but I did put one on my aunt's system. She can make a damn good Pecan Pie, but boiler care taking just isn't her thing
Understood...
@ March 27, 2012 8:39 PM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
I'll take it :-)thanks for clarifying. Makes sense.
But isn't that the point of
@ March 27, 2012 7:30 PM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
Hdd? To normalize different years and/or locations.. As you mentioned, the per hdd was nearly the same. Wouldn't one expect mine to be had I not run the hp's and etrvs? I went from 0.252 to 0.147 that's fairly significant i think.i didn't
@ March 27, 2012 5:16 PM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
want people to think that "oh you used much less oil .. but your electricity must be through the roof" .. that is why I added last year's electric in there, to show that it wasn't through the roof. I was providing last year as a baseline .. anything more than baseline should be loosely considered heat pump excess.yes, I do also make my DHW via boiler tankless coil .. but I did last year as well. so it should be a wash.
size and stuffing
@ March 27, 2012 12:03 AM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
my house is about 2400sq ft. double course brick built in 1920's. ThermoKing storms on single pane double hungs.some rooms were blown with cellulose last year. nothing was done this year. the beauty of the eTRV system is I can now see immediately which radiators are almost constantly getting cold fast .. and now I can target more insulation in those areas.
My kids' bathroom which has 2 cold walls is a repeat offender. My mother-in-law's room on 3rd floor (not brick walls (rather wood and stucco) and against unconditioned space on ceiling and side walls) is is also cooling more quickly than others.
There are some rooms that I have rarely ever caught in active "heating" mode and seem to be very well tempered.
jpf
Check out http://Degreedays.Net
@ March 26, 2012 8:27 PM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
Check out http://Degreedays.NetOr tell us your closest "weather representative" airport?
energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
@ March 26, 2012 4:39 PM in energy usage this winter .. (it is over now right??)
as some of you might recall .. this winter, I did things a bit differently .. I ran my heat-pumps during non-peak electric hours and my boiler during peak. as well, I had eTRVs installed on all rads and only heated the radiators that were below settemp. All temps were set at 70dF both years.I started record keeping this season around 10/22/2010 .. as of today, below is my oil consumption usage.
OIL: 10/22/2011 - 3/26/2012
USED: 469.557 gals @ ~$3.50/gal
HDD: 3134.7 (degreedays.net 65F daily, KLGA)
GAL/HDD: 0.149
COST: $1645
Electric: 10/21/2011 - 2/25/2012 (they read MARCH today I will update upon receipt of bill)
kWh: 5015
Cost: $829.17 ($0.16/kWhr)
COST OF eTRVs: $1200
TOTAL COST 2011/12: $3675
Previous year 11/1/2010-4/1/2011
USED: 1000 gals @ ~$3.35/gal
HDD: 3972 (degreedays.net 65F daily, KLGA)
GAL/HDD: 0.252
COST: $3350
Electric: 10/21/2010 - 3/25/2011
kWh: 3527
Cost: $754.96 ($0.21/kWhr)
TOTAL COST 2010/11: $4104
SAVINGS by running eTRVS + Heat Pumps: $429
And the wife-comfort-meter this year was no different than last.
So my eTRVs paid for themselves ($1200) and I saved about $200 (assuming March electric is about $200). The cost of oil went up but my consumption dropped by ~40% (gal/hdd). Electric cost me only about $100 more than I would have spent had I not run the pumps. Yes the winter was much more mild (3972 HDD (2010/11) vs. 3135 HDD (2011/12)) .. but I still feel that I did pretty well with the way I ran things. Next year, there won't be the $1200 investment in eTRVs.
I hope this is interesting to someone. I'd love to get other people to share their stories of consumption this year.
jpf
2 different issues ...
@ January 23, 2012 6:34 PM in snubbed by the snubber ...
the vacuum "problem" is not related to the inability for the vaporstat to reset the cut-out. i submit that the snubber may be the culprit here,and I was looking for anyone else with a snubber to chime in.the vacuum "problem" has been discussed here on the wall several times .. it is due to the contraction of the cooled air between the pigtail and the gauge (presuming the gauge is on the same pigtail). where, as the singular place in the vented system, vacuum is never broken, i was simply looking for a way to break that vacuum.
i have an independent 0-30 manual reset p-trol which is a safety control and NOT an operating control such as the vaporstat. they are out of different taps on the boiler and are on their own pigtails.
thanks ..
@ January 23, 2012 4:09 PM in snubbed by the snubber ...
I get it now ... thanks for the description ..I still think that a little Taco 417 valve might do the trick .. but again it may not since there is never really supposed to be water up that high .. or maybe there is at a few oz of pressure .. i've never been inside a pigtail. http://www.taco-hvac.com/uploads/FileLibrary/100-7.1.pdf
I'll get one tomorrow and test it out .. will report back
jpf
looked at
@ January 23, 2012 11:54 AM in snubbed by the snubber ...
a 288a todaY. I sucked and blew and couldn't figure out how it worked.i don't believe snubber defective. i think more likely, vaporstats are the culprit and perhaps they wear out or drift out of calibration enough to cause a problem at the very low pressures.
exactly...
@ January 23, 2012 11:48 AM in snubbed by the snubber ...
i just realized that insulating the pipes around the gauge area would help since the severe vacuum is caused by the cooling off as well. But i'd love to hash out an automatic way to break that vacuum as well.snubbed by the snubber ...
@ January 22, 2012 9:20 PM in snubbed by the snubber ...
On 2 different boilers where I have a snubber & vaporstat installed, I am suddenly having problems whereby the vaporstat is not "resetting" after pressure drop ... in actuality, the pressure is not dropping through the cut-in but being held slightly above it .. and thusly leading to a no-heat condition.Is any other snubber-lubber seeing this problem? I removed the snubber in one of the units and things seem to work much better now.
On a slightly different yet very similiar point, is there any way to allow complete/automatic vaccuum release in the vaporstat tree above the pigtail? I was thinking about a Taco 417 hydro air vent (coin valve) or something. Perhaps a small vaccuum breaker, which I can't seem to really source from anyone...
Do we know where you are?
@ January 15, 2012 10:56 PM in five cold radiators on three risers, I'm scratching my head
Where in the world is niftyc? I'd love to have a look if you are in NYC METRO.ahh. Champaign, IL.. Maybe you can get boilerpro over to you..
Did you look
@ January 15, 2012 4:49 PM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
@ the answer?ANSWERS.. If you are giving up
@ January 15, 2012 11:24 AM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
http://goo.gl/DNf43And
http://goo.gl/YkScy
congrats to ROD who sent me a private message with the correct answer after remembering our conversation/thread of 2yrs ago
Hmmmm..
@ January 15, 2012 11:18 AM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
Where would this thing be inserted in your mind?Yes
@ January 15, 2012 11:10 AM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
Yes.. 1st w mod.. 2nd "removed"JPGVideo freeware
@ January 14, 2012 10:48 AM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
JPGVideo is a little piece of freeware software that will take same-sized JPGs and make them into an AVI movie... http://download.cnet.com/JPGVideo/3640-2140_4-77457.htmlAs soon as I had all the pictures 200 for the 1st video and 300 for the 2nd .. it only took 3mins to make the video ..
well ...
@ January 14, 2012 10:46 AM in a puzzle for all you super-smart steamies
considering that not even Dan H. has a reference for the original article (neither date nor publication source) .. and the only google reference I can find for the author is in a Michigan Newspaper dated 1916 .. (not even sure this is the correct person) .. it's not something that comes up much I suppose ..however, I'm confident that the 1st video radiator is heating better than the 2nd. overall, it stayed hotter .. and heated more thoroughly more quickly 20mins vs. 30mins. from steam to initial inlet.
overall, the concept makes sense once you realize what's been done and what's going on ..
i'm on my way out the door now until tomorrow night without connectivity ... i'm glad some others know the answer and can manage the thread while I'm away ..
cast iron rads/baseboards
@ January 13, 2012 11:48 PM in radiators/baseboards
available at www.simplyplumbing.com (local to NYC) ...http://search.simplyplumbing.com/results.php?catalog=yhst-58098396986444&query=governale&submit=&list=
did something similar on ....
@ January 13, 2012 11:33 PM in Peerless 63-3L Install by All Steamed Up, Inc.
my aunt's boiler .. in fact I used the gauge tapping for my pressure-trol tree and the other tapping for my vaporstat tree ...
if you want to get steam to the far side of a water trap ...
@ January 13, 2012 11:13 PM in five cold radiators on three risers, I'm scratching my head
if you want to get steam to the far side of a water trap ... have a read of this recent thread ...http://www.heatinghelp.com/forum-thread/139100/stumped-and-need-your-help
In my case, I wanted the return water to get past the very deep trap .. but it works just the same to get the steam across .. of course, you'll need your pro to replace those elbows at the top of your U with t's.
