I have hot water heat/cast iron radiators.
Boiler is ancient converted coal burner I believe.
It has been acting up lately. In the past I have had problems loosing suction on the oil line and or crud sucked up when tank is low or when oil is delivered. Burner will cycle on and off, sometimes seconds apart.
Now, I’m not sure if these two problems are related or not. High limit is set at 180, low at 160. It seems that I remember the unit maintaining temp somewhere in that range. I came home yesterday after the boiler was serviced and the gauge read 120 and it took forever to get the house warm and the radiators never seemed to get as hot as they should. As I was standing in front of the boiler, it started doing that on of thing again.
Today when I got home, I checked the boiler and the temp read around 180. I kicked up the thermostat and the radiators began to warm right away, but then it still felt like it was taking forever to get the house warm. I checked the temp and it was below 140.
How much should I expect the boiler temp to drop once the circulator goes on? And, any other thoughts?
Is it reasonable or necessary to expect the tech to at least vacuum out the fire box?
Thanks,
Eric
Replies
How much should I expect the boiler temp to drop once the circulator goes on?
That's a hard question to answer. I have seen this problem many times on old boiler systems with a lot of water volume in the system.
We built an addition on a home last year and installed a Warmboard radiant floor in it. The home had a new, large gas boiler that fed a high volume radiator system just like yours. They kept the thermostats set low in most of the house, but wanted it warmer in the new addition.
When those other zones called for heat and dumped that large amount of cold water into the boiler, it would take hours to get the water temperature up high enough to make the Warmboard work properly.
The original system was coal fired and basically ran all the time, so there never was cold water in the system. Needless to say, they need to do some remodeling on the heating system.
Thanks, that did ocurr to me.
HeatingHelp.com (The Wall) is the site that will provide the information you need.
Thanks