Posted by Tony Conner on February 10, 2000 at 17:45:54:
In Reply to: escalated from merely annoying to emergency posted by david nadelson on February 10, 2000 at 16:30:37:
: Today was warm, the boiler had the day off. Now there's no heat at all, and it's gonna be 18 degrees tonight. Autofill red light steady on, pretty low water. Glass looks dirty, red stain about halfway across middle, white smudge above that, lots of droplets near top.
: Noticed that water supply enters at base of new part of return pipe (the rest of which is buried in the floor, by the way). There's a U-shape where the right side (toward return) is an inch or so lower than the left (toward boiler). Since the water supply is in this lower part I am now suspecting that cold water is entering the return before making it to the boiler itself. Seems to violate the Hartford loop.
The old buried wet return line is likely leaking, and most (if not all) of the condensate isn't making it back to the boiler. This is probably why the make-up feeder is so busy. If this is happening, it's not likely the fault of the guys who replaced the boiler. From they way you're describing the situation, this outfit sounds more like they do mostly hot water boilers, rather than steam. It's not just matter of screwing pipes together - lot's of guys can do that. If they haven't taken the time to do some reading about steam systems, they (and their customers) will have problems. Steam is very much a "bird of a different feather".