Thanks for all the input. All the tubing is finned except of course what's
in the basement. I'm calling the oil company and will have them come and
test circulator and review the system so that by next winter's major heating
need I will be OK and maybe get some benefit this season.


"Edwin Pawlowski" wrote in message
et...

"John F." wrote in message
...


Have been in the house only 2 years. I became vaguely aware of the heat
loss last heating season but can't say I was aware of the frequency of
boiler on/off situation. There are no walls left on which to put finned
sections.

In most cases, the baseboard enclosure runs the entire lingthof hte wall,
but it mayh only have a portion that is finned, the rest is copper tubing.
The amount of finned tubing is determined by the heat loss calculations
done for each room. You can do more fine tuning of the heat from rom to
room by closing the dampers on roms yo want cooler, thus allowing the
temperature of hte circulating water to remain a bit hotter as it travels
to the next room on the loop. In my case, some of the rooms have only 50%
of the sections finned, the rest plain tubing.


As I mentioned in one of my replies there is some 200 feet and
more of heat loop but only about 100 feet of that is actual heat fin.
The rest is insulated piping in the unheated basement. I wonder if this
length of run is too long or does it matter. I'm wondering if cutting
into the current run and adding another zone would solve the problem
assuming it's not a cirulator problem.

Splitting the run to two zones may help in some cases. The water is
giving heat to the tubing, that is giving heat to the fins, that are
giving heat to the air. As the water runs each foot, it is cooling down.
It just may not be hot enough by the time it gets to the last room.
Running a section of insulated tubing to the further zone will help as it
will be a shorter section.

If the boiler is cycling off and on, it has enough capacity to heat the
house. It is shutting off because it can make more heat than the rest of
the system can take away. Check to see how hot the return pipe is too.

If you are not getting enough heat in the house, the potential problems
a
Not enough finned sections of baseboard
Missing or insufficient insulation.
Poor or no circulation (some circulators have speed controls so check for
them)
Poor layout of the zones