Philip in Connecticut
Member
New Energy Kinetics EK-1 boiler/hot water heater installed in June. Up until a week or so ago, the system was called upon to provide domestic hot water only: all of our thermostats were turned to cooling mode. System ran fine, produced prodigious amounts of hot water, and was very quiet.
Heating season begins last week. We have thermostats in 3 heating zones calling for heat off and on to take the chill out of the early Fall mornings. We are now experiencing a phenomenon called kettling: sound of boiling water emanating from the boiler itself.
This sound is only heard when the oil burner is firing: once the demand for heat is satisfied, the burner shuts down and the noise immediately stops.
A few things to note:
-Its a 4 month old system
-It worked just fine until we started opening zone valves in the heating circuits.
-Noise starts about 30 seconds or so after burner firing begins.
-Water chemistry: we are on well water, although we don’t have a water softening system: never needed it. Out water test shows slighlty/moderately hard water. We do use a 1 micron whole house water filter.
The most popular answer I’ve encountered online in regard to this issue is: its scale buildup on the boiler wall. Not sure I am convinced that this is the culprit, given the system has only been in service for 4 months, and given that this problem did not exist prior to opening the heating circuit zone valves.
FWIW: I’ve never observed/heard the air vent bleeding any air from the system. There is just a single vent just above the main boiler return connection. I suspect air in the system may be a contributing factor but my contractor has dismissed this as a possible cause.
Contractor plans on doing an acid flush of boiler, per the manufacturer’s recommendation so we will be trying that next week. Given everything I’ve stated above, I have strong doubts that this cleaning will resole the problem.
Any thought on what could be happening and possible remedies?
Heating season begins last week. We have thermostats in 3 heating zones calling for heat off and on to take the chill out of the early Fall mornings. We are now experiencing a phenomenon called kettling: sound of boiling water emanating from the boiler itself.
This sound is only heard when the oil burner is firing: once the demand for heat is satisfied, the burner shuts down and the noise immediately stops.
A few things to note:
-Its a 4 month old system
-It worked just fine until we started opening zone valves in the heating circuits.
-Noise starts about 30 seconds or so after burner firing begins.
-Water chemistry: we are on well water, although we don’t have a water softening system: never needed it. Out water test shows slighlty/moderately hard water. We do use a 1 micron whole house water filter.
The most popular answer I’ve encountered online in regard to this issue is: its scale buildup on the boiler wall. Not sure I am convinced that this is the culprit, given the system has only been in service for 4 months, and given that this problem did not exist prior to opening the heating circuit zone valves.
FWIW: I’ve never observed/heard the air vent bleeding any air from the system. There is just a single vent just above the main boiler return connection. I suspect air in the system may be a contributing factor but my contractor has dismissed this as a possible cause.
Contractor plans on doing an acid flush of boiler, per the manufacturer’s recommendation so we will be trying that next week. Given everything I’ve stated above, I have strong doubts that this cleaning will resole the problem.
Any thought on what could be happening and possible remedies?
