i_am_chris
02-01-2010, 07:03 PM
Hiya,
We have our radiant floor system running and are experiencing an unexpected issue.
At this point, we have only one of the three zones running, though the entire system has a blend of water & glycol antifreeze. Two of the zones are in buildings we aren't using yet. The third zone, which we are using, is in a building 500+ feet away and 130 feet downhill. We used vendor-supplied 7/8" pex for our radiant floor lines as well as domestic hot and cold water supply lines to this same building, with Viega 3/4" pex used to connect to non-vendor fittings.
We ran the domestic hot and radiant heat supply lines in one paired run, wrapping foam rubber insulation around both lines and surrounding these in "corex" drain pipe underground. This was to keep the two lines carrying heat as warm as possible. We have the radiant heat return line paired with the cold water supply line, again wrapped in one foam rubber insulation piece and in a shield of corex.
In this zone, we've found that the hot water/radiant heat supply lines are sagging, shrinking, or something. The building that houses our manifolds and pumps (we have no basement) is where we noticed the problem. The vendor pex pipes are slowly dropping through the floor. Weird thing is, at the Zone 3 building, the pipes aren't pushing out the other end of the corex - they come right up to the floor and turn to the various loops. So, its like they are shrinking, buckling, something!?!
We haven't found any leakage, the pressure is stable, the system works. Have you heard of anything like this? We have twice added additional sections of pipe in our utility buildling, because we don't want to try pulling the lines back up and risk somehow disconnecting the pipes underground, which would be a serious hassle to fix. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.
Can provide more info about the system, how we're running it, etc.
Chris
We have our radiant floor system running and are experiencing an unexpected issue.
At this point, we have only one of the three zones running, though the entire system has a blend of water & glycol antifreeze. Two of the zones are in buildings we aren't using yet. The third zone, which we are using, is in a building 500+ feet away and 130 feet downhill. We used vendor-supplied 7/8" pex for our radiant floor lines as well as domestic hot and cold water supply lines to this same building, with Viega 3/4" pex used to connect to non-vendor fittings.
We ran the domestic hot and radiant heat supply lines in one paired run, wrapping foam rubber insulation around both lines and surrounding these in "corex" drain pipe underground. This was to keep the two lines carrying heat as warm as possible. We have the radiant heat return line paired with the cold water supply line, again wrapped in one foam rubber insulation piece and in a shield of corex.
In this zone, we've found that the hot water/radiant heat supply lines are sagging, shrinking, or something. The building that houses our manifolds and pumps (we have no basement) is where we noticed the problem. The vendor pex pipes are slowly dropping through the floor. Weird thing is, at the Zone 3 building, the pipes aren't pushing out the other end of the corex - they come right up to the floor and turn to the various loops. So, its like they are shrinking, buckling, something!?!
We haven't found any leakage, the pressure is stable, the system works. Have you heard of anything like this? We have twice added additional sections of pipe in our utility buildling, because we don't want to try pulling the lines back up and risk somehow disconnecting the pipes underground, which would be a serious hassle to fix. Any ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.
Can provide more info about the system, how we're running it, etc.
Chris