OWB zone valve possible problem with it

[LadyToysDream]

Hi

We put in our central boiler OWB this summer, and Sept 1st, we fired it up. It has been running all month. Heating the hot water, and then some heat for the house. No problems.
I noticed yesterday morning, that the inside furnace blower was running, and running for hours NON STOP.......
I got the hubby on the phone, and had to shut it down with the switch on the old furnace. Hubby let the fire go down / out in the outside boiler.
Finally got the guy on the phone who sold us the unit this morning.
I thought it might be the thermostat not working but it does turn the blower on and off when you turn the dial on the thermostat face.
He came to the conclusion it might be the zone valve not working.
When hubby gets home, he can move the switch on that valve, from auto to manual and see if that makes any difference.
The man told me all that would need replacing is the green top half of that valve. The rest would be able to stay in place.
Everything was fine till sometime yesterday. The thermostat was controling things.
It was put together by a man who does know plumbing and electric from working many years in the trade.

Question is..... has anyone had a zone valve problem of any kind ?

 

[pwl]

On my old system (indoor boiler along side fuel oil boiler) I had constant problems with zone valves. When I put the new CR 5648 a couple of years ago I took out the zone valves (4 of them) and put in circulating pumps. Problem solved. I have hot water base board heat in most of the house and one zone is radiant heat in the floor with pex.

 

[LadyToysDream]

Thanks for the response

Hubby moved the slider on the zone valve to manual and then back to auto.
Turned OWB back on, and now the thermostat is controlling things again. Maybe something got stuck in the zone valve. Anyways, all is well now. I guess these OWB systems just need a bit of tweaking now and then.

 

[MS-310]

Keep in mind you mite need to replace the top soon....It happens like this.

So I take it you have a down draft furnce?

 

[LadyToysDream]

Hi
Our original furance is propane, with the new heat exchanger under it, and then it pushes the heat down through duct work throughout the house. So I am assuming this is a down draft furnace ?
Our house is a 24 by 40 ft double wide with a addition of 12 by 24 ft.
So yes on original furnace that came with the house that we are keeping in place to use for a backup just in case.

Guess I better ask the dealer if he has those zone valves in stock....just in case we need one. I forgot yesterday to ask him if he called the manufacturer of them and what their response was.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Most zones valves are not rated for use on open systems anyway...separate circ's are better...especially in a primary/secondary piping scheme.

 

[LadyToysDream]

Things were working fine until this morning again.
The thermotstat at 65 degrees setting, won't shut it down. The blower keeps on running, and running and running.
Trying to get ahold of the dealer now.
We were over to their place the other day and thought we had a solution
to the problem. We thought.
Wondering if something in the zone valve is stuck.
I can get the slider bar to move from auto to manual and back again.
OWB seems to be making a lot of creosote also.

For right now, I am manual turning the blower switch on and off for
so many minutes at a time. Can't afford to ruin the blower on the propane furnace (downdraft)because the new furance does not want to co-operate.

And yes the plumbing was done by a person who knows what they are doing.

I'm getting more grumpy by the minute, and the poor cocker spaniels are looking at me and thinking......*why won't she shut the heat down?!*

Hubby is at work, aware of the problem, and I have his permission to do what I need to do, to get the problem resolved.



Okay, now it's trying to drive me nuts.....it just shut itself down all by itself.
And I was just able to turn it back on by using the thermostat.
I hope the dealer is having a good day......I'm going to make it interesting for him..............

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Sounds like a sticking fan relay to me...or an intermittent short.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Also...my setup similar to yours Lady...counterflow furnace, hydrocoil, Central OWB. I used a stand-alone t-stat, transformer, relay, to start/stop the fan/circ. pump. Things can get squirrely if you try to tie into existing control wiring, relays.

 

[LadyToysDream]

Hi

If it's a sticking fan relay, then is that on the original furnace or the new parts we installed on the old furnace ?

If a short, then I will need to get hubby or the guy who did the work, to check that area out for a possible short.

 

[LadyToysDream]

It's making me want to bang my head against the wall......
sheesh.....
try up a lot of money into a furnace and then have to chase bugs
in the system.
And I know the plumber electrician's work is right....guy did if for many years as a full time job.

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Not sure how your installer did it. The boiler will run your circulators continuously, as they should, and operate the damper door on the boiler if the water temp. gets below the setting on the display, ex: 180 degrees, minus 5-10 deg...(170). Then, the damper door opens, fire intensifies,heats water to setpoint (180) then closes door. If you have a separate zone valve or pump serving the hydrocoil on the furnace, then it is controlled by another relay...so the problem is there, rather than the OWB.

 

[LadyToysDream]

second picture

 

[ghitch75]

x2 on the stuck relay.....in the first pic the zone valve is open to the coil....the manually leveler is down push it up and it will stop the hot water from getting to the coil....and as far as your wiring did the guy put in a isolation relay?....do you have A/C?...second pic ..it you can't get the blower to stop with the T-stat flip the black switch on the right and that will kill the furnace blower till you can get someone out there to fix it....

 

[LadyToysDream]

Had to run a few errands at town, and now when I get back home, I turn the switch back on for the blower motor. Adjust the temperature, and let it run for awhile. Outside temp on furnace was 170.
Then I just use the thermostat to turn her down, and see if it will shut off on her own, and yes. Thank goodness.

Yes I put that maual lever on the zone valve back up into automatic position.

No on A/C.

Not sure if we have a isolation relay or not, but will ask.

Maybe I just need a lesson in how a OWB works......
in plain simple language please

I fiqure one puts in a OWB, then hooks up the pex pipe and electric, runs the water through a heat exchanger on the hot water heater, and then through the heat exchanger under the old furnace, using a zone valve and then the water returns to the OWB to be reheated and circulated again. Thermostat should control the heat.......

 

[LadyToysDream]

I am bringing this thread back up to explain what happened with this situation.
2 months of living in a sauna....heat and more heat.
Non stop blower unless manually shut it off ourselves for a few minutes at a time. Or if we let the fire go out in the OWB.

Dealer finally came beginning of this week, and replaced the zone valve. Said system, was hooked up okay. So it ran good that evening, and then the next morning, we were right back to square one. Then the furnace proceeded to run good for about 2 days, and then we went right back to the blower problem again.

The poop hit the fan yesterday about 1 o'clock when the blower would not turn back on. Hubby came home from work and agreed with me, we had a blower problem. I made 3 phone calls. One to find out what a blower motor was going to cost us. One to the dealer, and one to our friend who put it in.
While I was on the phone, hubby got the blower going again.
Friend got here just after 3 and used his electric equipment to fiqure out the problem. Part of the problem was the new thermostat, and the other problem was that we needed a switch put in. We had had 2 furnaces banging heads all this time. It was back feeding. So he did what he had to do yesterday, and furnace worked real good last night, and today.

So friend was just here today with the new switch, and problem solved we hope. If not, we buy about $ 50 more in parts for a more fancy switch type whatever he called it.

I hope I was technical enough with the explanation.
Electric is not one of my strong points .........

 

[mtfallsmikey]

Good to hear from you again, glad to see you get everything straightened out.

The best way (and easiest) to approach multiple furnaces, etc. is to use separate t-stats, relays, etc. Strange things happen when contol wiring gats crossd up.

:deadhorse:

 

[LadyToysDream]

Good to hear from you again, glad to see you get everything straightened out.

The best way (and easiest) to approach multiple furnaces, etc. is to use separate t-stats, relays, etc. Strange things happen when contol wiring gets crossd up.

Thanks
Well I always try to update a thread I have made when it comes to asking for some help / info.

Furnace seems to be behaving right now. Thank goodness. The sauna part was getting real old fast.
We are using less wood. I can go to town now and not worry I need to be home to babysit the furnace. That was getting old too.
Like I told the dealer. We had nothing to compare to really.
Our old wood furnace in the old farmhouse was different than this one, and we only had the one furnace. Not 2 banging heads like this time.

I can't fault our friend. This was his first OWB install. My hubby did quite a bit of the work also. I kept saying ....it's got to be something simple.

Wood is really nice heat ..... I'm happy....
And the hot water is a real nice bonus