Steam installation is simple for those who know what they are doing. Unfortunately many do not. It may be worth paying a little extra to someone who is a steam expert.

The price may be high. Is there a lot of plumbing involved? What return will be added?

Can you get another quote to valid the price?

there is no return pipe to the boiler from the end, Not much plumbing at all, should really only be a day project talking to other people at work who had their heating systems replaced.

Yep, need to get another quote unless they will find a way to lower the quote.

Unfortunately, residential steam heat is a dying trade. Simple, maybe, but you gotta know what you are doing. Unfortunate that it is dying? Maybe not for the many, but for the few that have it now, very unfortunate, indeed. I think that circumstances have conspired against steam. First, steam lost its advantage to hydronic when circulator pumps were introduced and pressurized systems allowed higher temperature water for more heat transfer (smaller radiators and pipes). That is all a lot of water under the bridge now as cooler water means a more efficient boiler and residential steam can't approach that. It might be theoretically possible to make an efficient condensing steam boiler, but too costly to implement and the economies of scale work against you since hydronic (and forced air) installations outnumber steam by huge margins.

Now i'll get off my soap box and say that I feel for you deeply since the knowledgable steam workers are dying off very rapidly. There are a lot of steam heads posting on these fora. Go there. Good luck!

terrylove.com

heatinghelp.com (the wall)

Still many people in the Northeast have it, have another quote for around $7K (plumber will be stopping by Thursday to firm it up). The first guy came down on his quote to around $9K (my normal steam guy, but sounded like they were drinking when they did the quote, as it included stuff that could not be done unless they tore it all out). Would be great to convert to something else but that might be too costly,

I feel your pain re conversion. Practicality is paramount most of the time. I understand that in the old days, conversion was not uncommon with two-pipe systems. it might be practical with an older, updated home with all of its original radiation. That is for the same reason that an efficient modulating-condensing boiler can often be installed and run at a lower temp than the original hot-start, bang-bang boiler. If the home's envelope has been significantly improved via insulation and air sealing (better windows and door included), there is radiator way beyond the need so they can run cooler. If I were you, I'd look into it since you have time. I understand that with a steam boiler, you have to size wrt the radiation, you can't right-size the boiler for the heat loss of the house. You end up with an oversized boiler cutting efficiency even more. You may just be able to switch to hydronic. With your cast iron radiators, it could be a beauty of a system compared to the folks with fin-tube aluminum baseboard convectors that don't work as well at lower temps. Be prepared, however, for the steam chauvinists to come down hard on you. There are some wonderful steam chauvinists on the two web sites that I posted. If I were a masochist converting from steam to hydronic, I'd post my plans there :-)

I do not believe that there are any reasonably-sized steam boilers that make even close to 90%. A good mod-con water boiler with a well-designed system can make upwards of 98% most of the time. If you have an exceptionally tight house, in a mild climate, that won't make much difference in cost. Steam heads argue that steam does not consume electricity for circulating pumps and draft inducers. How does that add up? Good question. Then there is the fact that your steam pipes will not freeze if the boiler quits on you.

It is not just my conclusion that steam workers are hard to find. I've seen and heard it from many quarters. I don't know if you are urban or rural. The latter is really tough. Even in urban areas of the NE there are complaints.