Gravity cast iron radiator zone

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Jlinde37
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Post by Jlinde37 » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 7:26 pm

Hey guys. Week #1 burning coal has been a success with mediocre day temps here in WNY. I'm looking to add a few more btu to my upstairs great room and I've always wanted a cast iron radiator, partially for nostalgia, but mostly because my living room is short on hwbb.

The upstairs is all on 1 pumped zone and the largest room lacks in heat on coldest days overheating the other rooms. It is 1 series loop fed with 3/4" pex thru 20' of hwbb. This is fed from a primary/secondary piping system.

My question is could I add another "zone" by using closely spaced T's but not use a circulator? Thinking it would gravity flow to a decent sized cast iron radiator and use tsv on the rad? I would pipe it with 1" pex.

Or should I not bother piping a Gravity zone and just add it in series with my existing loop? Or should I parallel it with monoflo ts?

Kinda hoped a gravity would work for some heat for when the power goes out. I've yet to figure out how to set up a battery bank inverter backup with auto transfer. (that will be another post)

Sorry if this was long winded. Just trying to give as much info on my setup as possible.

Thanks, Josh

 
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Post by franco b » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 7:43 pm

Not quire sure of the setup, but using one tee on the feed and a momoflo tee on the return it would divert hot water to the radiator.

 
Jlinde37
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Post by Jlinde37 » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 8:08 pm

I'm saying closely spaced regular tees in my primary boiler loop to the cast iron rad. Would it still gost flow? I meant use mono t if I tapped off my secondary hwbb zone. Or should i just run it in series with existing hwbb. Maybe I'm not wording things properly


 
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Rob R.
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Post by Rob R. » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 8:11 pm

Put the great room on its own zone. You may not need additional radiation at all.

 
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Post by Jlinde37 » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 8:19 pm

Boiler loop run on circ that runs constantly. The Hwbb loop and radiant loops are pumped zones controlled with zone controller

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Jlinde37
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Post by Jlinde37 » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 8:22 pm

Rob R. wrote:
Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 8:11 pm
Put the great room on its own zone. You may not need additional radiation at all.
It's only has 8' hwbb radiation for a 24x14 room. Facing the west windy side of the home with 2 large 3x6' windows. It's open room with kitchen without alot of room for more baseboard.


 
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Post by Rob R. » Sat. Oct. 12, 2019 9:04 pm

Gotcha. In that case it does sound like you are under radiated. My great room is 16x24, and has 40' of baseboard...and that is still barely adequate when the wind is roaring.

I would still put that room on its own zone, but some cast iron radiators would probably give you the heat you are looking for.

Spend some time calculating the heat load of that room so you know how big the radiators need to be.

 
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Post by Jlinde37 » Sun. Oct. 13, 2019 10:01 pm

Rob, would It still ghost flow if i ran a set of closely spaced t's?

 
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Post by Scottscoaled » Mon. Oct. 14, 2019 4:42 am

You said your run was fed with pex. You could re-plumb the zone to put the radiator at the beginning of the run. That way the radiatior would "soak" up a bunch of heat before the rest of the hwbb's. It would also reduce the temperature of the water going to the hwbb's so the zone would take longer to satisfy.

 
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Post by Rob R. » Mon. Oct. 14, 2019 6:02 am

Jlinde37 wrote:
Sun. Oct. 13, 2019 10:01 pm
Rob, would It still ghost flow if i ran a set of closely spaced t's?
Maybe - depends how long the piping run is.

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