I have a heating system with a oil fired furnace feeding both the heating and hot water. The heating system is divided into 3 zones. The basement, the main level, and the upstairs. The problems are as follows:

The upstairs zone doesn't respond to an OFF signal from the thermostat. Leaving that circuit on all the time. So that has to be shut off manually.

The main level circuit responds to an OFF signal, but occasionally will stay on. What is more is eveery morning, the zone valve has shut off as the heat is manually turned down overnight, and does not respond to the thermostats ON signal. To get that zone vavle to click on i need to go down and manually force the zone valve lever to the ON position. Then it seems to work just fine.

The basement zone valve suffers the same problem as the upstairs.

The main level valve is a honeywell, and it appears to be missing its model No. sticker.

The upstairs and basement valves are both: Erie Motortrol Valve - 465B307- GA1.

The furnace is a NY Thermal. Model number not clearly marked, but i know i could figure it out if that makes a big difference.

So the question is: is it the zone valve motors? Is it the valves themselves? Is it as expensive a problem as i fear? So you know, i dont fear plumbing or electrical, i just need to know what's what.

 

I don't have experience with the honeywell zone valves so I don't know common problems they have but what do you have for a thermostat? Electric or a standard(round honeywell) one? If its electric, have you tried changing the batteries? A week battery can cause all sorts of problems.

 

You need to get out the volt meter & find out if you have 24 volts out of the transformer, if you do, where do you lose it?
If when the thermostat is turned up to call for heat, you get 24 volts all the way to the zone valve motors, the motors are bad.