A tankless job -someone's gotta do it

摘要

Several years ago, I got a call from an HVAC contractor in southern Minnesota who was troubleshooting a radiant system for a residential customer. Since he wasn't really confident working with radiant, he called to see if I might shed some light on this job. Apparently, the customer was experiencing extremely high heating bills, and some of the rooms in the home were cold. He related that the boiler, pump and controls seemed to be working properly, so he wasn't sure of the next step in the troubleshooting process. As he continued to explain the whole story, it became quite a sad one. The customer, it turns out, was an 80-year-old widow who had sold the family farm when her husband passed away and built her dream home on part of the old homestead. The new home was a 2,250-sq.ft., slab-on-grade structure with the entire living area on one floor. Everything was nice and convenient. She had put extra money into the home for good insulation and high-quality windows to prepare for those long, cold Minnesota winters, so the house was exceptionally airtight and energy-efficient.