I know it's bad - but what is it?!?

[Ruski]

Evening all - Russ here - new to forum: general property maintenance is my 'trade' but mainly Kitchen fitting.

Friend of mine rents out her house - it's empty at the moment but she asked if I could have a look at her 'noisy pump' (sniggers)
Well and truly stuffed as you can see - the build up of whetever it is was catching on the impeller blades causing a right stink.
Anyway - swapped it out for her - after draining the system becuase I had to fit new gate valves either side (got a bit of a shock when I thought I'd isolated the pump and got an airing cupboard full of water.. live and learn)

Anyway - what IS the blockage - looks like coarse wire wool....

And on another topic - is it very/possibly/improbable likely that I've got an airlock inside the coil after refilling the system - as the flow into the cylinder is hot but the return is cold and doesn't seem to be heating the cylinder...

Any answers gratefully recieved




Russ

 

[Billy Bob Bob]

thats common or garden corrosion my friend,your new pump will go the same way regarding the cylinder it can take a while for the return to get hot depending on system type how long did you run it for?

 

[Mbear]

Aslong as you've filled it back up correctly then the return pipe is cold because it's the return pipe lol. 60/70 degrees going into the 10/15 degree cyl, it's not going to be warm for a gd bit anyway.

 

[Ruski]

Cheers guys - nice to know it's 'just' corrosion!! Is this amount common? I've read stores of these things lasting 20+ years?

Yep - feel a right numpty now regarding HW coil... just didn't think that much heat loss could occur...

Going back tomorrow and will give it half an hour or so to see what happens.

Thanks very much for your quick answers guys - v. much appreciated.

Russ

 

[Billy Bob Bob]

Cheers guys - nice to know it's 'just' corrosion!! Is this amount common? I've read stores of these things lasting 20+ years?

Yep - feel a right numpty now regarding HW coil... just didn't think that much heat loss could occur...

Going back tomorrow and will give it half an hour or so to see what happens.

Thanks very much for your quick answers guys - v. much appreciated.

Russ

there may be system issues Russ but more than likely it needs descaling

 

[diamondgas]

Nothing "normal" about that pump interior Russ IMO!

You have some serious issues regards corrosion and possible pumping over! Temp diff should be around 11 - 22 deg C so if it's mad hot to the touch going in and easy to touch coming out then you have a circulation problem. Looking at the pump I wouldn't be suprised 🙂

General rule of thumb I've come to accept regards colour of sludge; Black old, Brown/Orange fresh, new and on going!

 

[AWheating]

system probably needs a good flush. or you could be back fitting another pump sooner than you think. Valves show signs of leaks at some point which could have been a path of air into the system increasing corrosion? i would replace any valve that looks like its seen better days when you flush out.

 

[Ruski]

Blimey - I don't mind changing a pump but I'm going nowhere near descaling or flushing... chasing the bleedin' air out of the system was hard enuf!

Glad I'm thinking like a pro tho - changed the gate valves at the same time:


Now you've mentioned colour of water - when I bled the pump the spill was brown - definately nt black - me thinks that's not good from what you're saying?
Also I was suprised that the old impeller itself was very clean - no sludge whatsoever??

Diamond - you mentioned 'pumping over' - excuse my ignorance I thought that meant pumping back into the f/e tank - you obviously mean something else - care to enlighten me?!?

Cheers again

Russ

 

[Gray0689]

Pumping over means water will be pumping out of vent in to f/e tank

 

[Ruski]

Pumping over means water will be pumping out of vent in to f/e tank

That's what I thought it meant - just can't see the connection between a fudged pump and diagnosing pumping over?!

 

[AWheating]

if you can drain the system to change the pump you should be capable of a basic flush with chemicals.

 

[Ruski]

Ahh right - understand - thought you meant attaching machines and powerflushing, rather than 'just' a chemical flush. I'll ask her what she wants to do - although I think I already know the answers going to be 'can't afford it right now' ;-)

 

[MattWeth]

That's what I thought it meant - just can't see the connection between a fudged pump and diagnosing pumping over?!

Pumping over continually introduces fresh oxygen into the heating circuit. Oxygen = corrosion (oxides).

As others have said, it looks like the system could do with a chemical clean and fresh dose of inhibitor at the very least.

If she's short of money, Scr*wfix's 'no-nonsense' brand stuff is pretty cheap but of course your time to do the flush needs to be factored in.

 

[Ruski]

Ahh - right - I see the correlation now - thanks for the explanation!
Apart from the state of the internals of the pump - is there anything else that would suggest that pumping over is occuring? The f/e tank looked pretty 'stable' - no sign of tidemarks up the tank of anything, and it certainly didn't do it whilst I had the pump going on speeds 1/2/3 whilst I was chasing all the airlocks...
Yep - added a dose of no nonsense inhibitor when refilling the system - who knows - it may be the first time in many years that it's had any!!!

 

[tamz]

It will take more than a couple of bottles of no nonsense to clean that soup out. She'll be forced to afford a new system shortly and the new pump will be lucky to last 3 months.

 

[Ruski]

Very fast coming to that conclusion - but you know what it's like - offer all the advice in the world and it'll still come down to 'got no money, so I'll wait till it goes kaput'

Ho hum

 

[diamondgas]

It may not be "pumping over " Russ, it just suggested to me by it's colour that the corrosion seemed on going. Main culprit for that is as said. Try the system on water only and heating only if you get the chance just to make sure it isn't that! It can be worth checking to see what happens when the pump is turned off. You can sometimes get a surge of water up the vent that dumps into the tank. That indicates issues with the feed and vent positions and/or a restriction in the cold feed!

Other symptoms are sticking valves, radiators pinholing, 'Pink' looking brass fittings and white crustacions around brass! All indicate air getting into the system somehow 🙂