Installing forced hot water baseboard in basement on a steam boiler.

[Canton]

I have a friend who wants to put heat in the cellar of his house. He has a steam boiler piped in the Hartford loop configuration, the condensate drops down from the above radiatiors into a 1" copper line that pitches back to the boiler. My question is, can I tap into the lowest point of the boiler, put a pump (with aqua-stat) and check valve and run forced h.w baseboard around the cellar?

 

[Dubldare]

No, by no means should that be done.

Electric baseboard would be way cheaper than a correctly installed steam/hot water converter.

 

[Sponsor]

 

[Finnegan]

ou can run a short length of hot water baseboard off of a steam boiler. However, you should get an experienced steam guy in there to do it. There is not a ton of info on the web about this, but it is out there. If your heat demand for your basement is significant, you can use a hot water heater in place of a boiler as a cheap alternative to a boiler.

 

[Bob NH]

It's a basement, not a living room. What if you put a steam radiator or fin-tube system high enough on the wall so it would drain back to the boiler?

Or run steam to a heat exchanger and pump the hot water from the water side of the heat exchanger around the room.

 

[hj]

hw heat

What you are asking can be done, but it takes a bit more than what you are asking. I doubt that it would be a DIY setup, since an improper installation could affect the rest of the system.