biggpicc

What's a fire pit? Does in run on natural gas & how do I build one? lol

Air is all it was. As of last night it was running at around 20lbs out and 16 back in! Thanks to you guys... Kurt, Mike & David. Thank you! What I did was add the air scoop on top of the expansion tank and got rid of the auto bleeder and went with a $6 manual bleeder. As the air enters the water heater you can easily hear it bubbling which alerts you to open the bleeder. That combined with a temporary modified version of Mikes suggestion of a mixing valve it bled in minutes. I ran a hose from the return line on the manifold to the pail of anti-freeze on the floor. This acted like a mixing valve and the system purged quickly. Shut ALL valves leading to the temporary sump pump "pushing" the system THEN quickly shut the pump off. Click to Enlarge 145.48 KB Click to Enlarge 29.39 KB

This is what I've got, Mike except mine is a 5 zone manifold. With its adjustment options available on both the top "feed" and bottom "return" valves I can open or close each zone to the desired amount of flow acting much like a zone valve. Unless I am mistaken, the picture in fig 4 on the page you sent me could be achieved by connecting a hose to the far right "drain/air bleeder" on the manifolds return and connecting it with a tee close to the feed line coming from the circ pump correct? John Click to Enlarge 50.64 KB

Kind of you to reply Chad / David. Thank you... I do have a $7 air vent above the expansion tank, Chad. Do you recommend I relocate the air vent and put it atop an air scoop (air purger same thing)? Do you think I need the pricey Auto Air Eliminator ($88) above the new air scoop or is my $7 device suffecient? I do have a fill valve, David. It's in the lever valve directly in front of the cir pump. I connected a hose to it and filled a bucket full of water/glycol anti-freeze mix, stuck that hose in the bucket as well as another hose in the same bucket connected to the other side of the circ pump. I closed the circ pump itself off and ran the fluid in a big loop watching all the air bubbles cione out as the fluid did ran around in circles in the closed system. I started at the last of the 5 zone valves and worked backward to the first closing each as I "thought" I got it bled. When finished I opened up the circ pump and closed off the hoses. That's where I'm at now & I'm anxious to get back at it and try both of your suggestions. I'm really hoping to get this going since I'm in WI and it's getting close to freezing at night. Thanks guys!

Please take a look at this picture and tell me what's wrong. This is a new (my first) radiant job. It's in my work shop and is made up with close to 700' of 1/2" PEX. The only 3/4" Pex is what you see in the picture. I filled the system using a 3/4hp sump pump and it filled and bled the air fine. I then tried to get the system moving with a 1/25 Grundofs circ pump and it did nothing... went out and got a 1/6th HP steibel Eltron (in picture) and that does nothing either! Even with the sump pump cranking 3/4hp during the fill the top gauge only showed 10lbs of pressure. The return gauge showed zero, however, it was moving at about 5 gal per min. Please someone tell me how I buggered this up. Click to Enlarge 36.56 KB