Normally Open Zone Valve - Should I disconnect in the summer?

[Wood Pirate]

I happend to lean on the zone valve that is on my power outage loop on my boiler. Its pretty warm.
Is this OK. I guess its built to have power on it all the time.

I was wondering if I should disconnect it during the summer months?

 

[Gooserider]

I happend to lean on the zone valve that is on my power outage loop on my boiler. Its pretty warm.
Is this OK. I guess its built to have power on it all the time.

I was wondering if I should disconnect it during the summer months?

It is probably OK... Most zone valves are designed to stay energized for extended periods, and will get warm doing so, but how much energy they will take will vary somewhat - it might be worth looking at, allthough none use huge amounts, so I don't know if you would ever save enough to justify changing out one valve for another if it didn't need replacing. Are you sure you have a zone valve in that location? My understanding is that an automag valve is more commonly used in that location, and may require less power. The other thing that is probably heating that valve up some is there is probably at least some hot water flow going up to the valve on the boiler side...

Turning things off in the summer is probably not a bad idea just on general principles, as long as you aren't using the boiler. If you are using the boiler you definitely want to keep it on. The only caveat on that is that some folks have problems with circulator pumps freezing up if not used occasionally. For this reason, some control setups have a circuit that "exercises" the pumps by running them for a few seconds every so often when they aren't getting calls for heat otherwise. Probably worth the tiny amount of juice this takes as a preventative measure. If you turn off the entire system that will of course also take out the exercise function.

Gooserider

 

[steviep]

I take that you use this boiler in the summer or it would not be hot. you could easliy put a toggle switch in line to turn off the the valve. But remember you will need a manual ball valve before it to shut the flow of water off. If not water will flow through that zone everytime the boiler starts up heating up that zone.