You're not clear enough on the situation. If the boiler can make steam, that
part of the house should be warm. The heat exchanger has to tap the water
jacket of the boiler at a low point, so if there is sludge, it'll mess up
the circulator as the plumber said, also as others have said air in the line
will cause problems. Having wired a number of side arms off of steam
boilers, I'd have sooner replaced the steam side or installed two separate
boilers.
Do you have an actual heat exchanger or did he run this heat off a hot water
coil on the boiler? What makes your domestic hot water?


"mikeasmel" wrote in message
ps.com...
We are having problems with the heating system in our house -- it is
not heating the house adequately and hasn't done so since we moved in 3
months ago! The previous owners converted from an old oil system to gas
just before we bought the house and we now have steam in the old part
of the house and hydronic/baseboard in the newer part of the house, all
being run by one new gas boiler with a heat exchanger on it.

We asked the plumber to come over today and have a look at it since we
weren't getting enough heat. He said that there was sludge that had
built up in the steam system from the old pipes and that it had
destroyed one circulator. He claimed that he couldn't guarantee the
circulator since he was not responsible for the pipes that were in the
old part of the house that he had never worked on. I told him that that
was not acceptable since he had told me (before I bought the house,
when I asked him if it made sense to do more work and upgrade the
system further at that time, and he said absolutely not!) that it was
a brand new system which he was very proud of and which he told me
would be more than adequate
for our home. When I asked if he could prevent/limit this from
happening again (maybe flush the lines a few times?) he said that he
couldn't guarantee it and that he couldn't flush the lines in a steam
system (I don't understand that).

He left my house before I returned from work this evening and so I
didn't actually speak with him after he worked on the system today. He
did however mention to Jenny that we might have a more substantial
problem.

Right now, we have very little heat in many of the rooms/radiators in
the house and it is cold and I don't know why?

Any thoughts/comments/advice for me for when I speak with him
next/tomorrow?