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My house is the old style "levitt".
I have a boiler room in the middle of the house.
My question is regarding the boiler. My family and I will be out of town for 2 weeks.
1)Should I turn off the boiler or leave it on?
My headint is baseboard.
Also should I turn off all the water supply from the out of the house to my main supply in the house?
It depends on how much work you feel like doing. If you want to turn the boiler off to save energy you will need to drain your water lines so they dont freeze & blow out the lines with compressed air.
IMO I would set the boiler to its lowest setting which is prob. 55 deg. And then I would turn the water off at the valve AFTER the boiler feed. Dont turn it off at the main line or your feed for the boiler wont have water.
The only reason I say turn the water off is due to a incident my uncle had. He was away for 3 weeks and came home to a flooded house! The old elbow sprung a leak and flooded his entire house. What a mess!
In my opinion, it's not worth the trouble to flush out your entire system if you are only gone for a couple weeks. While it's true anything can happen, unless you know of a potential problem, I would just turn down the temp to 55 sothe pipes don't freeze and shut off the valves to the pipes that go outside (garden hose, etc.).
My neighbors go to Arizona for 6+ months starting in Sept\Oct and I can see why they might shut down their boiler but for only 2 weeks, I probably wounln't bother.
Naw do not mess with the boiler for only a two week trip. Ain't worth the potential grief. Just lower the setting to something like the low 50's. We don't have clue where you live or the climate situation, need to prevent freezing.
Shutting off the water supply for a longer period is a good idea. I shut it off fully. Then I just open it back a wee crack. Enough to allow drops. Gives the best of all Worlds. The house will not flood if there is a leak but the wee cracked opening is enough to maintain full system pressure on all the piping. Strange things can happen, if things cool down and a partial vacuum occurs in water piping, heating type piping, water heaters, boilers, etc. The few drops flow capability allows the systems to always stay at full pressure without allowing much in the way of flow.
Yeah, there are other professionals who will check you out for nothing......
Quote:
Originally Posted by harry chickpea
I wouldn't leave any house unattended for two weeks. There are professionals who can check in on the place every couple of days for a small fee.
Yeah, that is true in most big cities. Some of them boys in a place like Boston won't charge anything to move you out quick.
Might even take the boiler, maybe the piping too.
Shame is today, they probably live right across the street. Not true every place. Some shacks in my area don't even have locks. Better not go messing about, you definitely will not like what the locals will do to you. If real lucky the cops will find you first.
There still are places where you don't really have to worry much about it. Depends on the local culture. Guess we must be throwing in house security as a bonus on this one. Put that security stricker thingee on the lawn and windows, even if you ain't got it.
You can also rig up some automation and be able to view inside the house via the Web. Can also do remote control of things like thermostat, see what the temps are, on and on.
You must live in my neck of the woods. We do not have a lot of crime here. In fact, the cops get lost trying to find the place, so you know they are not here much.
If you are in a levitt house I'm guessing you are in NY or PA. If you are leaving during cold weather keep the heat set at 55. If your system is old it probably has an expansion tank. I would think you could shut off water to boiler. You can also turn boiler temp down so you are not heating water that is just sitting in the boiler. Do not empty water from system. There are other water pipes you need to protect. Have a nice trip.
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Have it all different ways.......
