Please note: I am not a licensed plumber or heating and cooling technician nor do I sell parts or service systems.

 

Background and definition:

So you move into a house that has baseboard radiators run along walls of each room and somewhere, probably on the first floor or basement, is a furnace. a whole lot of pipes, valves and drain faucets. Ok, you either have a steam system or a hydronic heating system. Difference? Steam is just that, water is heated until it is boiling and steam is routed through usually heavy, cast iron radiators. Hydronic is similar but the water in the system never reaches a boiling temperature. Ok, so you have a hydronic heating system. Do you have a user manual? Do you know how the hydronic heating system works and what may be required to maintain it? Chances are the answer is “no” to all the questions posed above. Personally, I think every house, home, ought to come with a user, owner’s manual that describes every system to include electrical, water and heating.

Now like most things, everyone tends just to use and go happily along until one day we flip the switch, turn the key or otherwise try to use something and it just does not work. In the case of a hydronic heating system, the 2 major problems you are probably going to face eventually is that the circulator pump will die or you hear gurgling sounds in the baseboard radiators when water flows through them. 

In my home, I have a 3 zone, multiple loops, hydronic heating system and believe it or not, it took me almost 10 years to master the damn thing. Well, I do not want you to have to endure hassling your system that long to fully understand and maintain it, so what follows is a description of my system and how I maintain it.