No Heat in Living Room

I have a 1 bedroom apartment with hot water baseboard heat. There is 1 thermostat. My unit uses a Triangle Tube Prestige Solo 110 for heat and hot water. Preparing for winter this year I turned the thermostat up beyond ambient. I got heat from the baseboards in kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom. None in living room. This has happened before and the technician said he bled the system. What steps must I take to bleed this system? I am tired of paying someone over $100 to spend 15 minutes in my apartment.

 

W,
With the limited info given it's hard to instruct you on bleeding.

What piping design do you have for one. In a one floor apt. I'm guessing you have a loop system where water circulates from 1 baseboard to another and the back to the boiler.

If that were the case then if 1 room heated they would all heat. Since air in the system prevents the water from circulating. If you had enough air to prevent circ. then nothing would heat.

If your emitters are individually fed then it is possible for 1 emitter not to heat while the others are fine.

More info is needed on piping , pressure, location of the BB that is not heating in regards to where in line is it with the others, if it's being bled properly so fresh water which has air doesn't feed back in.

Pics would be very helpful if possible.

Hope this helps a little.

 

Perhaps I misspoke. The baseboard in the living room does heat up but only gets slightly warm. This has happened numerous times before and each time the tech comes in and fixes it in about 15 minutes. Each time he says he bled the system. This is expensive and I would much rather do this myself. I will try to take some pictures of the piping this weekend when a friend with a camera comes over. In the meantime could you tell me where what would function as a zone valve is in this system? It is a Prestige SOLO boiler so I assume that is made for 1 zone heating which is what I have. However I can't find anything that resembles a zone valve either on the external piping or inside the unit cabinet itself. How would I manually open the system so that it stays that way when I shut it off so that I can bleed it?

 

W,
On a single zone system there are no zone valves. They are not needed.

Zone valves are used to stop the unwanted flow of water when you have 2 or more zones so that when 1 zone calls only the section that is controlled by that stat and ZV are heated and not the whole entire house.

Would have to see pics of what you have to answer anything like that.

When he bleeds it do you watch him and is the living room the last baseboard to heat.

http://www.supplyhouse.com/ 86,000 BTU Output Prestige Solo 110 Condensing Gas Boiler w/ TriMax Control (NG)

If you go to this site and scroll down to the info section you can find all the info on your boiler.

If the whole thing doesn't come up just type your boiler in the search box.

 

Well I think I attached the pictures. We'll see. OK. If there isn't a zone valve what opens to route hot water through the pipes and baseboards when the thermostat calls for more heat? From what I have been able to find online that is what I need to keep open when I shut off the unit and open the black handle valve. I sent some pictures. I hope they help. I really want to do this before it starts getting really cold. I'll be waiting to hear back.

 

Are the bleed valves on the baseboard radiator pipes? You could open those valves yourself so you don't have to pay someone to come in to do it.

Sometimes only a small amount of air will come out each time. You need to repeat the bleed process every few days.

Be sure that the boiler pressure is in effect (say about 20 PSI) otherwise when you open the bleed valve, air will go in instead of come out.

If possible, gently lift up and prop up the end of the baseboard finned pipe where the bleed valve is located. Leave it that way.

Also worth trying, put blankets over part or all of the radiators in the warmer rooms to see if the colder rooms get warmer.

Allow a whole day with the heat turned on before concluding whether what you did worked or not.

 

No. there are no bleed valves on the baseboards. It was always purged from inside the utility closet.

 

W,
Although close ups are usually good I am having a little bit of a problem identifying your pipes.

The pipe with your Spirovent is your SUPPLY line going to your baseboards. You should only have that 1 pipe going to your 1st piece of BB and then it will feed the next and the next until it gets back to the boiler through the RETURN line with the BLACK drain valve.

You have a GREEN gate valve with a line going into the floor. I'm guessing the is your boiler drain.

Your YELLOW line is your gas supply.

There is another line with a yellow ball valve, above the black handle drain valve going into your boiler which I cannot identify. Where does that come from. I see your pump but cannot tell where that comes from either. I'm guessing it's on the return.

Wider angle pics would help a lot. Also all those red and blue lines. I'm guessing those are for domestic hot and cold water. Where do those copper pipes that they are connected to come from.

As far as your air problem goes I see something that I don't agree with, and that is how they are feeding your system, into your supply line after the SPIROVENT. All the air that comes with the fresh water is going right into your BB's without the benefit of going through the SV to remove the air.

To get to the SV the water has to circulate through your BB and come back through the return line, into your boiler and then it will go through the SV on the way back to the BB's.

You want the air to bleed before it gets to the BB's, not after.

It's not the end of the world but it makes bleeding the proper way imperative because of the set up you have you do not want any fresh water entering your system because it will go directly to your BB's without first going through your Spirovent.

The bottom line is if this isn't bled right you are always going to have this problem. If done right, unless the system is opened up for repairs you shouldn't have any more problems.

One final thought. Your relief valve should be vertical where your air vent is. You never mount your relief valve that way. I doubt very much if the schematic called for it that way. They are meant to be installed upright.

A little in depth but I hope this helps a little.

 

The yellow handle valve above the black handle one leads to the bottom of the boiler itself. It runs directly to another yellow handle ball valve that can be seen in the pictures just below the red (what I assume to be) pump with the Grundfos label. There is another yellow handle valve on the other side of that pump then directly to 'boiler supply' on top of the DHW unit. As for the red & blue lines they are all connected to copper pipes into and out of the DHW unit. I have attached some more pics. I really hope they help. The black wire that can be seen running through img63 goes to the bottom of DHW where it connects to a sensor. I agree that I absolutely want to do this correctly. I very much appreciate your time and effort helping me with this. Will be anxiously awaiting response. PS- Pretty much everything in this apartment was built, assembled, connected or mounted half-ass. I obviously had no hand in it.

 

W,
That Grundfos pump is for your indirect hot water heater. You should have another one for your heat.

Is it possible to get pics of the whole setup from a little farther away so I can see what is connected to what. I can see most of what I need to except the heating pump and what are you currently running for pressure.

I noticed you said apartment. Are you allowed to touch this system or is it the landlords responsibility.

For a 1 bedroom apartment you've got enough piping there to do a small town.

 

Actually it is not possible to get a view from further away. Everything is in a very small utility closet. The only other pump I find is inside the boiler cabinet. Also Grundfos. Pic attached. Yes it is a 1 bedroom apartment. I,ve got a kitchen sink (no disposal), a bathroom sink, and a tub/sower. That is it. As far as the landlord being responsible, they do not live in my state. They are not very responsive to any complaints. I just want to get my heat working properly again.

 

W,
OK, that is the pump I was looking for. That is the pump for your heat that circulates the water through the BB's and back to the boiler. Is it located on the supply line before the Spirovent or is it on the return line after the black drain valve that you use to bleed the system and what does your pressure on the gauge read.

It should read a minimum of 12-15 and could go as high as 20 PSI.

 

That pump is on a line running from the top side of the boiler down thru the cabinet into the spirovent. See pics. IMG 0072 is from the bottom of the pump out thru the cabinet to the Spirovent. IMG70 the top coming from the boiler. The analog pressure gauge on the cabinet reads 30psi. If I change the wall thermostat to call for heat it drops to 22psi. Thanks again for hanging in with me.

 

Back up and take wider-angle photos.

 

This is the best I can do. I took a pano view with iPhone that was a lot better but is way too big to upload to this site. This is all I've got for what it's worth.