I'm sorry for the long message. I really want to avoid having to bring
a 'pro' to check this out, so I want to exhaust my capabilities before
I have to shell out lots of cash:

The whole second floor of my house is frigid. I have a oil based boiler
(replaced new in late 2004), and the system is water based (hot water
flows into the radiators in the house). It has two zones, the first
floor and the second floor, controlled by separate thermostats.

Problems started a few weeks ago. Temperature was erratic upstairs.
Sometimes we'd set the thermostat to off and upstairs would be boiling.
Other times the thermostat would be high and heat would be
non-existant. Most of the time it worked fine. We still had the
thermostats from the older boiler (20 y/o at least) and after tinkering
w/ the temperature one day the front plate fell out (w/ the thermometer
coil) and heating stopped on the 2nd floor altoghether. I replaced the
thermostat w/ a nice new digital one (24V compatible w/ my unit), and
connected the R and W wires just as they were identified in the
original thermostat. Heat never came back to the 2nd floor.

The boiler is in the basement. (As my install guy explaned it) the
heating water coming out the front pipe, splitting into two, and one
going to the first floor zone, the other going to the second floor
zone. After the water makes it's way around, two pipes come back down
to the basement, each with a small pump. These pumps are hooked up to
the box that also connects the cables from the thermostats. The pipes
after the pumps join into one pipe and go back into the system. This is
the loop of warm water. Touching the pumps they are both running.

I noticed the back pipe coming down from the second floor was cold,
while the one coming down from the first floor was hot. I took this to
mean that the hot water wasn't making it's way around the system. I
'bled' the system to get rid of air in the 2nd floor zone (you could
feel air being forced out the pipes while it was being 'bled'). Now
both pipes are warm, which is good... but no heat upstairs yet!

Tracing the front pipe that pushes water from the boiler into the
upstairs rooms, I find that it starts off scolding hot, and the first
floor section is scolding hot all the way till the pipe leaves the
basement. Following the split for the second floor, it is hot
initially, but as I move farther away from the split it gets cold (even
before it leaves the basement).

What the heck could be going on? Could it be the thermostat causing
issues still? Tomorrow I'm going to pick up a voltage meter and make
sure the connections are good. Apart from that, what else could be
going wrong? I was quite surprised that the 2nd floor front pipes were
cold, given that the corresponding pipes at the end of the loop (w/ the
pumps) were warm. I made sure my installation guy explained everything
to me. Could I be misunderstanding how the system works? How could
there seemingly not be any hot water going up to the second floor, but
the pipe at the end of the loop is warm? Is the loop flowing the other
way instead (pumped up the back?)? The manual for the unit is useless.

Ok... that's about it. I'll be eternally greatful for whatever guidance
you can give me.

On 7 Jan 2005 21:58:00 -0800, "coldguy"
wrote:
snip

Ok, your boiler makes hot water. The lower floor loop works fine, but
the upper floor loop doesn't. Both circulators are running. (Are you
sure? Sometimes with vibration is it hard to tell. Turn off the lower
floor zone by turning that thermostat way down, and make sure the
other circulator is still running.) If it's not running, then you
have a problem with the thermostat, wiring , circulator, or control.


You are not circulating water in the upper floor loop; if you were,
you'd have heat.

The feed to the upper floor is hot for a while after it leaves the
boiler probably just from conduction.

Sound like the upper floor is air locked. When you bled the upper
floor, did you get out water, or just air? If just air, you may just
need to bleed it more. Make sure you bleed every radiator.

If you never get water out of the bleeds, then the static pressure of
your system isn't high enough to overcome gravity. Make sure the
make-up water valve is open.

If you don't know what or where that is, it is probably time to call
the pro.

HTH,

Paul


The boiler is in the basement. (As my install guy explaned it) the
heating water coming out the front pipe, splitting into two, and one
going to the first floor zone, the other going to the second floor
zone. After the water makes it's way around, two pipes come back down
to the basement, each with a small pump. These pumps are hooked up to
the box that also connects the cables from the thermostats. The pipes
after the pumps join into one pipe and go back into the system. This is
the loop of warm water. Touching the pumps they are both running.

I noticed the back pipe coming down from the second floor was cold,
while the one coming down from the first floor was hot. I took this to
mean that the hot water wasn't making it's way around the system. I
'bled' the system to get rid of air in the 2nd floor zone (you could
feel air being forced out the pipes while it was being 'bled'). Now
both pipes are warm, which is good... but no heat upstairs yet!

Tracing the front pipe that pushes water from the boiler into the
upstairs rooms, I find that it starts off scolding hot, and the first
floor section is scolding hot all the way till the pipe leaves the
basement. Following the split for the second floor, it is hot
initially, but as I move farther away from the split it gets cold (even
before it leaves the basement).

What the heck could be going on? Could it be the thermostat causing
issues still? Tomorrow I'm going to pick up a voltage meter and make
sure the connections are good. Apart from that, what else could be
going wrong? I was quite surprised that the 2nd floor front pipes were
cold, given that the corresponding pipes at the end of the loop (w/ the
pumps) were warm. I made sure my installation guy explained everything
to me. Could I be misunderstanding how the system works? How could
there seemingly not be any hot water going up to the second floor, but
the pipe at the end of the loop is warm? Is the loop flowing the other
way instead (pumped up the back?)? The manual for the unit is useless.

Ok... that's about it. I'll be eternally greatful for whatever guidance
you can give me.

I agree with Paul with something additional to add. You claim that when
the T-stat is off the 2nd floor would be boiling, and when you turn the
T-stat up, it's cold. All this started after you replaced the T-stat.
Could it be possible that you mis-wired the T-stat and that it is in
"cool" mode. Anotherwords you wired it up as an A/C thermostat so when
you turn down the T-stat, it would actually turn on your boiler instead
of turning it off, and vice-versa when you turned up the T-stat it
would turn off the boiler.
A good way to check is to remove the wires from the t-stat and short
them together. If you start to feel heat coming up to the second floor,
that means that everything is fine, you just have to wire the T-stat
correctly.

If you had heat on the second floor prior to replacing the thermostat,even
if it was erratic, you should first look at the new stat. Just turn it up
and down while someone is at the boiler. They should hear the relay click on
and off. If not,remove the stat and touch the R and W wires together and see
if that makes the relay. The erratic heat is probably a separate
problem,most likely caused by air in the line or an incorrectly adjusted
flow control, which prevents backfeeding from one loop to another
"Paul Franklin" wrote in message
news
On 7 Jan 2005 21:58:00 -0800, "coldguy"
wrote:
snip

Ok, your boiler makes hot water. The lower floor loop works fine, but
the upper floor loop doesn't. Both circulators are running. (Are you
sure? Sometimes with vibration is it hard to tell. Turn off the lower
floor zone by turning that thermostat way down, and make sure the
other circulator is still running.) If it's not running, then you
have a problem with the thermostat, wiring , circulator, or control.


You are not circulating water in the upper floor loop; if you were,
you'd have heat.

The feed to the upper floor is hot for a while after it leaves the
boiler probably just from conduction.

Sound like the upper floor is air locked. When you bled the upper
floor, did you get out water, or just air? If just air, you may just
need to bleed it more. Make sure you bleed every radiator.

If you never get water out of the bleeds, then the static pressure of
your system isn't high enough to overcome gravity. Make sure the
make-up water valve is open.

If you don't know what or where that is, it is probably time to call
the pro.

HTH,

Paul


The boiler is in the basement. (As my install guy explaned it) the
heating water coming out the front pipe, splitting into two, and one
going to the first floor zone, the other going to the second floor
zone. After the water makes it's way around, two pipes come back down
to the basement, each with a small pump. These pumps are hooked up to
the box that also connects the cables from the thermostats. The pipes
after the pumps join into one pipe and go back into the system. This is
the loop of warm water. Touching the pumps they are both running.

I noticed the back pipe coming down from the second floor was cold,
while the one coming down from the first floor was hot. I took this to
mean that the hot water wasn't making it's way around the system. I
'bled' the system to get rid of air in the 2nd floor zone (you could
feel air being forced out the pipes while it was being 'bled'). Now
both pipes are warm, which is good... but no heat upstairs yet!

Tracing the front pipe that pushes water from the boiler into the
upstairs rooms, I find that it starts off scolding hot, and the first
floor section is scolding hot all the way till the pipe leaves the
basement. Following the split for the second floor, it is hot
initially, but as I move farther away from the split it gets cold (even
before it leaves the basement).

What the heck could be going on? Could it be the thermostat causing
issues still? Tomorrow I'm going to pick up a voltage meter and make
sure the connections are good. Apart from that, what else could be
going wrong? I was quite surprised that the 2nd floor front pipes were
cold, given that the corresponding pipes at the end of the loop (w/ the
pumps) were warm. I made sure my installation guy explained everything
to me. Could I be misunderstanding how the system works? How could
there seemingly not be any hot water going up to the second floor, but
the pipe at the end of the loop is warm? Is the loop flowing the other
way instead (pumped up the back?)? The manual for the unit is useless.

Ok... that's about it. I'll be eternally greatful for whatever guidance
you can give me.

"Paul Franklin" wrote in message
If you don't know what or where that is, it is probably time to call
the pro.

HTH,

Paul


I agree with Paul's advice. I want to add one more thing. The boiler was
recently installed you say? I would think the installer would come back and
take care of any problems that may show up. Try the bleeding as that is
simple and free, but don't hesitate to ask the installer for help. He may
have bled the system originally, but it just needs more or some sort of
adjustment.

On 1/8/2005 12:58 AM US(ET), coldguy took fingers to keys, and typed the
following:

I'm sorry for the long message. I really want to avoid having to bring
a 'pro' to check this out, so I want to exhaust my capabilities before
I have to shell out lots of cash:

The whole second floor of my house is frigid. I have a oil based boiler
(replaced new in late 2004), and the system is water based (hot water
flows into the radiators in the house). It has two zones, the first
floor and the second floor, controlled by separate thermostats.

Problems started a few weeks ago. Temperature was erratic upstairs.
Sometimes we'd set the thermostat to off and upstairs would be boiling.
Other times the thermostat would be high and heat would be
non-existant. Most of the time it worked fine. We still had the
thermostats from the older boiler (20 y/o at least) and after tinkering
w/ the temperature one day the front plate fell out (w/ the thermometer
coil) and heating stopped on the 2nd floor altoghether. I replaced the
thermostat w/ a nice new digital one (24V compatible w/ my unit), and
connected the R and W wires just as they were identified in the
original thermostat. Heat never came back to the 2nd floor.

The boiler is in the basement. (As my install guy explaned it) the
heating water coming out the front pipe, splitting into two, and one
going to the first floor zone, the other going to the second floor
zone. After the water makes it's way around, two pipes come back down
to the basement, each with a small pump. These pumps are hooked up to
the box that also connects the cables from the thermostats. The pipes
after the pumps join into one pipe and go back into the system. This is
the loop of warm water. Touching the pumps they are both running.

I noticed the back pipe coming down from the second floor was cold,
while the one coming down from the first floor was hot. I took this to
mean that the hot water wasn't making it's way around the system. I
'bled' the system to get rid of air in the 2nd floor zone (you could
feel air being forced out the pipes while it was being 'bled'). Now
both pipes are warm, which is good... but no heat upstairs yet!

Tracing the front pipe that pushes water from the boiler into the
upstairs rooms, I find that it starts off scolding hot, and the first
floor section is scolding hot all the way till the pipe leaves the
basement. Following the split for the second floor, it is hot
initially, but as I move farther away from the split it gets cold (even
before it leaves the basement).

What the heck could be going on? Could it be the thermostat causing
issues still? Tomorrow I'm going to pick up a voltage meter and make
sure the connections are good. Apart from that, what else could be
going wrong? I was quite surprised that the 2nd floor front pipes were
cold, given that the corresponding pipes at the end of the loop (w/ the
pumps) were warm. I made sure my installation guy explained everything
to me. Could I be misunderstanding how the system works? How could
there seemingly not be any hot water going up to the second floor, but
the pipe at the end of the loop is warm? Is the loop flowing the other
way instead (pumped up the back?)? The manual for the unit is useless.

Ok... that's about it. I'll be eternally greatful for whatever guidance
you can give me.



I can't see it from here, but are there separate zone valves for the two
zones (floors)?
If so, the following pertains to my Honeywell zone valves, yours may be
different.
I have had to replace the whole zone valve in one case and in a couple
of other cases, just the electric motor because the motor's brass drive
gear had worn out. The zone valve is a square box mounted in the hot
water lines going to each zone (floor) and has wires going into it (in
my case, at least, 2 red and 2 yellow).
You may or may not have a manual lever on the bottom that can be set to
'auto' or 'open'. If you do have the lever, push it all the way to the
right and then pull it towards you a little to get it into the lock
notch to keep it open (look underneath to see how to lock it). If the
top floor then gets hot, you have found the problem.
The problem with the valve could be electrical or mechanical. If the
electric power is getting to the valve motor when the thermostat is
calling for heat, then it is probably mechanical.
If you feel adventurous, Turn off the boiler with the emergency switch,
and then pull the cover off the zone valve (it should just slide off
when you pull on it, in my case anyway)
Unhook the wires to the motor and remove the motor (just 2 screws in my
case). Observe the motor gear. If it has a worn groove around the
circumference, you probably only need to replace the motor. I don't know
if you can get just buy the motor, but I have bought the whole valve and
just used the motor from it. I have a couple of new motorless valves in
case the valve ever goes. It the gear looks intact, the whole zone valve
will probably have to be replaced (Plumber time!).
Put a new motor in the valve, wire it up, and see if that corrects the
problem. If it doesn't, call that Plumber.














--
Bill

Mikepier wrote:
I agree with Paul with something additional to add. You claim that
when
the T-stat is off the 2nd floor would be boiling, and when you turn
the
T-stat up, it's cold. All this started after you replaced the T-stat.
Could it be possible that you mis-wired the T-stat and that it is in
"cool" mode. Anotherwords you wired it up as an A/C thermostat so
when
you turn down the T-stat, it would actually turn on your boiler
instead
of turning it off, and vice-versa when you turned up the T-stat it
would turn off the boiler.
A good way to check is to remove the wires from the t-stat and short
them together. If you start to feel heat coming up to the second
floor,
that means that everything is fine, you just have to wire the T-stat
correctly.

Hey there, thanks for the advice, I will definitely try shorting the
cables together. Just to clarify, the thermostat that was behaving
badly was the old one, and I didn't want to imply that it always
behaved the opposite of what I set it to do. I was just trying to say
that sometimes the heat was as expected, other times it was very warm
or cold, irrespective of what we put the thermostat to.

Hi Paul,

When I bled the system a few days ago it was w/ the 'pro' that
installed the system. We did the whole thing at the boiler -- we closed
the lower zone so we didn't affect it, turned up the water preassure
and opened a faucet attached to zone 2 (which we hooked up temporarily
to a hose going outside). Water and air rushed out the faucet for a few
minutes (you could feel the pipe vibrating between air and water). We
did this until the flow felt totally smooth, meaning that now only
water was going through the loop. We closed the faucet and turned the
water preassure back to normal (and opened up zone 1). The cold pipe
downstairs started to get warm so he declared victory and left.

I will make a few more tests (wiring of the thermostat, look up more
info on the radiators themselves), and then admit defeat and call the
guy back in. I know he really should be the one doing all these things,
but I'm trying to be self sufficient.

People at work also mentioned I bleed the radiators.Is that any
different than bleeding the whole loop in one fell swoop? I guess I
assumed air would be pushed out of all the radiators when we did that.

Thanks a lot! (And everyone else that has responded, I'll take all your
advice)

coldguy wrote:
Mikepier wrote:
I agree with Paul with something additional to add. You claim that
when
the T-stat is off the 2nd floor would be boiling, and when you turn
the
T-stat up, it's cold. All this started after you replaced the
T-stat.
Could it be possible that you mis-wired the T-stat and that it is
in
"cool" mode. Anotherwords you wired it up as an A/C thermostat so
when
you turn down the T-stat, it would actually turn on your boiler
instead
of turning it off, and vice-versa when you turned up the T-stat it
would turn off the boiler.
A good way to check is to remove the wires from the t-stat and
short
them together. If you start to feel heat coming up to the second
floor,
that means that everything is fine, you just have to wire the
T-stat
correctly.

Hey there, thanks for the advice, I will definitely try shorting the
cables together. Just to clarify, the thermostat that was behaving
badly was the old one, and I didn't want to imply that it always
behaved the opposite of what I set it to do. I was just trying to say
that sometimes the heat was as expected, other times it was very warm
or cold, irrespective of what we put the thermostat to.

Oh, one last thing about the wiring. When I change the thermostat from
a very low target temperature to a high temperature, I can audibly hear
the boiler 'click' (and vice versa, when I go from up to down). Which
is why I was leaning away from the wiring being bad... it at least
sounded like the boiler was reacting to the request for more or less
heat. I'll still look into it more, though.

Update: The radiators in each room don't have any air valves on them.
So I can't bleed individual radiators. It looks like the approach the
guy took a few days ago is the only way to push the air out of the
system. I'm looking into the thermostats and if that doesn't lead to
anything I'm calling for help. Thanks again!!

As to bleeding radiators. Put a bucket or jar or something under the
bleeder. Leave it open until you get a solid stream of water coming out.

--

Christopher A. Young
This space intentionally left blank
www.lds.org
www.mormons.com


"Paul Franklin" wrote in message
news On 7 Jan 2005 21:58:00 -0800, "coldguy"
wrote:
snip

Ok, your boiler makes hot water. The lower floor loop works fine, but
the upper floor loop doesn't. Both circulators are running. (Are you
sure? Sometimes with vibration is it hard to tell. Turn off the lower
floor zone by turning that thermostat way down, and make sure the
other circulator is still running.) If it's not running, then you
have a problem with the thermostat, wiring , circulator, or control.


You are not circulating water in the upper floor loop; if you were,
you'd have heat.

The feed to the upper floor is hot for a while after it leaves the
boiler probably just from conduction.

Sound like the upper floor is air locked. When you bled the upper
floor, did you get out water, or just air? If just air, you may just
need to bleed it more. Make sure you bleed every radiator.

If you never get water out of the bleeds, then the static pressure of
your system isn't high enough to overcome gravity. Make sure the
make-up water valve is open.

If you don't know what or where that is, it is probably time to call
the pro.

HTH,

Paul

At this point, it sounds as if you have major problems with air in the
system. The solution is to replace the fill valve (pressure regulator) and
also the air eliminator. Your HVAC guy should be able to do this for you.

The fill valve regulates how much PSI is in the system, the air eliminator
traps and releases any air. Between the two of them (and then bleeding the
radiators again) that should make the system work a lot better for you.

--

Christopher A. Young
This space intentionally left blank
www.lds.org
www.mormons.com


"coldguy" wrote in message
ups.com...
Hi Paul,

When I bled the system a few days ago it was w/ the 'pro' that
installed the system. We did the whole thing at the boiler -- we closed
the lower zone so we didn't affect it, turned up the water preassure
and opened a faucet attached to zone 2 (which we hooked up temporarily
to a hose going outside). Water and air rushed out the faucet for a few
minutes (you could feel the pipe vibrating between air and water). We
did this until the flow felt totally smooth, meaning that now only
water was going through the loop. We closed the faucet and turned the
water preassure back to normal (and opened up zone 1). The cold pipe
downstairs started to get warm so he declared victory and left.

I will make a few more tests (wiring of the thermostat, look up more
info on the radiators themselves), and then admit defeat and call the
guy back in. I know he really should be the one doing all these things,
but I'm trying to be self sufficient.

People at work also mentioned I bleed the radiators.Is that any
different than bleeding the whole loop in one fell swoop? I guess I
assumed air would be pushed out of all the radiators when we did that.

Thanks a lot! (And everyone else that has responded, I'll take all your
advice)