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[Scratch]

I just fired my Classic 6048 up for the first time last night.  I'm not getting it to circulate very well though...
I'm confused as to how the mixing valve works.  It has a setting of 1-6 on it.  Is it possbile that the water is going throught the valve and skipping the rest of the system?  What should I start with? 
I wish I would have put a regular valve on there just so I could close it and figure out how it works.

[Steve]

Congrats on your new furnace.  Not sure exactly what your problem symptoms are, is it the whole circulation system or just the domestic hot water?

[willieG]

I just fired my Classic 6048 up for the first time last night.  I'm not getting it to circulate very well though...
I'm confused as to how the mixing valve works.  It has a setting of 1-6 on it.  Is it possbile that the water is going throught the valve and skipping the rest of the system?  What should I start with? 
I wish I would have put a regular valve on there just so I could close it and figure out how it works.

not sure what you mean by all your water going through your mixing valve...your mixing valve in most cases is only to be used for your domestic water and not hooked to your furnace water

now you could have a mixing valve hooked into your furnace lines for radiant floor heating? if this is the case, you should only be cooling your floor lines for radiant heat and not any lines going to radiators?

can you be more specific as to your  setup and your problem


if this is the first time you have used the furnace......are you sure you have all the air out of the system?

[Scratch]

Yeah it was the first time it's had a fire in it... There was air still in the lines.

We got it heating the floor now, at least it's starting to.

Right now it's just hooked up to the radiant lines in the floor, so the mixing valve is in that setup,  I wasn't aware that the future line to the furnace heat exchanger shouldn't be in there though... makes sense though...  Thanks for that info.

I should post a pic of my setup so you guys can tell me what I'm doing wrong.  Is there a certain section for that?

[Scratch]

Ok so I know I don't want my mixing valve before the line to the furnace.  And I'm guessing same goes for the water heater right...?
So is the mixing valve suppose to be just for in floor radiant heat lines?  I understand what it does I think, lets cooled water coming from the hot floor lines enter back into the hot "in" for the floor.  But I don't understand why you'd want to cool the lines going into the floor?

[willieG]

Ok so I know I don't want my mixing valve before the line to the furnace.  And I'm guessing same goes for the water heater right...?
So is the mixing valve suppose to be just for in floor radiant heat lines?  I understand what it does I think, lets cooled water coming from the hot floor lines enter back into the hot "in" for the floor.  But I don't understand why you'd want to cool the lines going into the floor?

scratch..you dont want you rfloors t obe 160 or 170 degrees you couldnt walk on them and you would likely damage your floor most floors run under 90 degrees

also some folks put a mixing valve on thier domestic water leaving the hot water tank to cool too around 140..you dont wnat water coming out of you tap at 170 it would scald you

but at your furnace you want the water as hot as the furnace is making it to ensure a good supply of heat

i ope this makes sense to you

[MyLeakyWoodDoctor]

I have a post up (under plumbing) for a home-made heat syphon tube that uses a mixing valve to shut off the syphon when domestic hot water is called for!

Got pics up too!  Have a boo at this application!

[Scratch]

Holy necro thread revival Batman!
...but I still have questions about my mixing valve...

It's been almost ten good years of great heating with my system and I love being able to walk in my basement and actually "feel" the heat on my feet.

But over the past 3 weeks or so, my basement doesn't seem to be getting warm.  In fact... it's downright chilly down there which it has never been since I got the stove running.  It could be a pump not flowing very well, since I have no idea how to see how much "flow" it's actually putting out, but in doing some testing, I've turned the knob on the mixing valve and can't remember exactly how it works...

Here's a crappy pic of a small section of my system:


The water comes in the house, being pulled by in a Taco 007-F5 pump, goes into my heat exchanger in the furnace, then comes into this pic through the top left 1" red PEX, goes through the second Taco 007-F5 pump, into the mixing valve, through my 3 radiant heat zones, then comes back by the mixing valve and out the red 1" PEX on the bottom left of the screen.

Question #1: Is my mixing valve installed correctly?
It seems like the hot water should come in on one side, the cold water should come in on the other side, and the "mixed" water should come out on the bottom, but that's not how I have it plumbed?  It's worked for almost 10 years though so maybe it's ok... it just seems like it should be plumbed different.  I can't see the other side of the valve so I'm not sure if it's marked differently or not, maybe it doesn't matter...?

Question #2: What should it be set at? 
It has settings 1-6 and I'm not sure where it should be set at.  Does setting #1 mix the water the most, and setting #6 mixes the water the least, or is it the other way around?  Can't remember what I had it at either before I started messing with it.  I've had it at #1 for a few days and at #6 for a few, but couldn't tell a difference.

Here's a close up pic of the valve:



HELP ME...MY TOESIES ARE COLD!

[E Yoder]

How do you control it? Is it all piped in series? The mixing valve looks wrong but I don't know what brand it is. The pump should pull out the mix outlet or it won't mix properly.
Floor should be a secondary loop so the flow can start and stop without affecting the main loop.
Maybe I'm missing something. Help me out guys...

[RSI]

I am surprised it worked at all like that.

[Scratch]

The floor is a secondary loop, just out of picture to the left, this "floor loop" ties into the main loop, but it has its own pump and if it's pump is off, the main loop still pumps and bypasses the floor loop.

The mixing valve is an ESBE 28.

[Scratch]

I am surprised it worked at all like that.

Do you mean the mixing valve...?
It's been working great every year, (and some of this year) till now.

And like I said... It might not be the mixing valve causing my cold floor.

How should it be set up?

[RSI]

Are the ports labeled on it? Usually the mix port is in the middle but not sure on that one.
Like mentioned above, you need the pump after the mixing valve. The mix port should go to the pump inlet, the hot port should go to the hot supply tee from the main loop and the cold port should go to a tee in the return to the main loop tee.

[E Yoder]

I found a Danfoss ESBE 30 that does have a mix outlet on the side like it is plumbed. I learn something new everyday.
Pump should pull through though for best temp control.

[wreckit87]

I'll third the above. Never seen an ESBE mixer so I cannot say, but generally the hot and cold are opposite each other with the mixed output on the branch (bottom here). Pushing a pump into the mixer from what I've seen, short circuits the loop and basically skips the floor altogether. One would want the pump on the output of the mixer, pulling through it and sending the mixed water into the floor. The return water from the floor would obviously go back to the return main, with a tee heading to the "cold" port of the valve to use return water to temper the hot water but only pull what it needs to reach X temperature while the rest goes back to the main. If your ports are labeled and the left is hot, right is mixed, and bottom is cold, this would be piped correctly aside from the pump pushing into the mixer. If they are labeled as such, you could move the pump to the right side of the mixer (mixed port) and it should work fine if the mixer is in working order. I'm surprised it's ever worked that way at all, unless of course the valve is not thermostatic, which would change things but Google tells me it is. The fact that you can't tell the difference between 1 and 6 tells me the valve is troublesome. Most of them range from about 90 to about 130, which is very noticeable with your hand on the pipe. Usually 1 is low temp and 6 is high temp. It looks like there are unions on that valve, perhaps there are valves off the mains that you could isolate and remove the mixing valve to see both the backside for labeling as well as the inside to see if it's full of crud and not working right?