Denver Boiler Repair And Installation: Residential And Commercial
Boiler repair, boiler installation, and boiler replacement across Denver Metro. Hydronic heating is plumbing work, not duct work. We service radiators, baseboard, radiant floor, and steam systems in homes, plus multi boiler plants in apartment buildings, offices, and churches. Licensed plumbers, permitted work, and a written price before anyone starts.
Tell Us About Your Boiler
What Is Your Boiler Doing?
Six symptoms cover most of the calls we take. Find yours, then call and describe it. A licensed plumber will tell you what is likely happening before anyone comes out.
No Heat Anywhere In The Building
Some Rooms Cold, The Rest Fine
Water Pooling Under The Boiler
Banging, Rumbling, Or Kettling
Pressure Too Low Or Climbing
Firing On And Off Constantly
A Boiler Heats Water, Not Air, And That Changes Who Should Work On It
What is a boiler? A boiler heats water and circulates it through radiators, baseboard, or radiant floor tubing. A furnace heats air and blows it through ducts. A boiler system is piping, pumps, valves, and pressure, which is why the work belongs to plumbers rather than duct technicians. Almost every boiler page in Denver is published by a heating company. Ours is not.
Denver has more boilers than most cities its size because so much of the housing stock predates forced air. Capitol Hill, Congress Park, Baker, Washington Park, and the older Highlands are full of hot water and steam systems that have been running, patched, and partially converted for a century. Our licensed plumbers handle the hydronic piping, the gas piping, the pumps and controls, and the water heater interaction that comes with a boiler replacement, for homes and for commercial buildings.
The Five Boiler Types We Work On
What you have determines what makes sense to install next.
Cast Iron Atmospheric
The workhorse in older Denver homes. Draft vented up a chimney, durable, and inefficient. Most of the replacements we quote are these.
Condensing, Mod-Con
High efficiency, modulating, side wall vented in PVC. Only reaches its rated efficiency if the radiators can run at lower water temperature.
Combi
Heat and domestic hot water from one appliance, removing the separate water heater. Sized against peak hot water demand, not heating load alone.
Steam
Still running in many older Denver homes and small apartment buildings. Different controls, different pressures, and a shrinking pool of contractors who work on them.
Electric Hydronic
No combustion, no venting, no gas line. Draws serious current, so the panel has to have capacity for it.
Boiler Services We Provide
Residential and commercial, repair through replacement.
Boilers are one part of our full range of Denver plumbing services, which also covers water heaters, drain cleaning, sewer and water line replacement, gas lines, and leak detection.
Repair It Or Replace It?
Every competitor answers this with a vague list of warning signs. Here is the actual decision framework we use on site.
| Factor | Repair Usually Makes Sense | Replacement Usually Makes Sense |
|---|---|---|
| Age | Under roughly 15 years and holding pressure normally. | Past roughly 20 years, or repeated failures in consecutive seasons. |
| What failed | Circulator, zone valve, aquastat, expansion tank, relief valve, fill valve. | Cracked heat exchanger, cracked section, or a leaking boiler block. |
| Parts | Parts still manufactured and available same or next day. | Obsolete controls, discontinued sections, or salvage-only parts. |
| Efficiency | Sealed combustion unit already operating near its rated efficiency. | Standing pilot or natural draft unit sending a large share of the fuel up the chimney. |
| Distribution | Radiators or baseboard sized to run at the temperature the boiler already produces. | Distribution being reworked anyway, which is the moment a condensing unit actually pays off. |
| Venting | Existing flue in good condition and correctly sized for the appliances on it. | Chimney needs relining regardless, so the venting cost is already in play. |
Residential And Commercial Boilers
The physics is identical. Almost nothing else is. Most Denver boiler pages only cover the left column.
Homes And Small Multifamily
Apartments, Offices, Churches, Schools
Four Things That Come Up On Denver Boiler Jobs
Two of these catch homeowners completely off guard, and one of them is something other Denver contractors are currently getting wrong.
The Orphaned Water Heater
In many older Denver homes the boiler and the water heater share one chimney sized for both. Replace the atmospheric boiler with a condensing unit that vents out a side wall in PVC, and the water heater is suddenly alone on a flue far too large for it. The exhaust cools, condenses, corrodes the liner, and can spill combustion gases back into the house. The fix is relining the chimney or replacing the water heater at the same time. Any quote for a condensing boiler on a shared flue that does not mention this has not looked at the whole system.
Colorado NOx Law Does Not Apply To Boilers
House Bill 23-1161 took effect January 1, 2026 and requires new gas furnaces and water heaters sold or installed in Colorado to meet ultra low NOx emission limits. Boilers are exempt from that legislation. Some Denver contractors are citing the NOx law on their boiler pages, which is not accurate. Where it does reach a boiler job is indirectly: if the orphaned flue problem above means your water heater has to be replaced alongside the boiler, that water heater must comply, which affects equipment options and lead times.
Derating At 5,280 Feet
Combustion appliances lose input capacity as altitude increases, and manufacturers publish derate requirements that apply across the Front Range. A boiler sized off a sea level rating comes up short on the coldest nights. Sizing has to account for elevation, for the measured heat loss of the building, and for how the existing radiators perform at the water temperature the new unit will actually run.
Suspected Asbestos On Old Pipe
Pipe insulation in buildings from before roughly 1980 may contain asbestos, commonly on the near boiler piping and the mains. We do not disturb suspected asbestos containing material. Where we find it, we stop, tell you plainly, and coordinate with a licensed abatement contractor before our work continues.
Circulator pumps, zone valves, relays, aquastats, thermostats, and the low voltage control wiring that ties them together. A dead zone is as often a control fault as a plumbing one, and diagnosing it means being able to work on both sides.
A boiler also needs its own circuit and an accessible service switch. On older installations we regularly find the boiler sharing a circuit it should not be on, or a service switch that was never installed at all. We correct that under our own electrical license rather than scheduling a second contractor.
Electric hydronic boilers draw substantial current, and whether the panel has room for it is a load calculation under NEC 220.82, not a guess. We run it before quoting, which tells you honestly whether a service upgrade belongs in the project.
What To Expect On A Boiler Job
Call Or Request Service
Reach a real person at our Centennial office. No heat calls get dispatched immediately, day or night, for homes and commercial buildings.
On-site Diagnosis
A licensed plumber inspects the boiler, the near boiler piping, the venting, the controls, and the distribution before saying anything about cost.
Repair Or Replace, In Writing
You get the honest comparison against the framework above. Where replacement makes more sense than another repair, you see both paths side by side.
Permitted Install And Inspection
We pull the mechanical and plumbing permits, coordinate state inspection where the equipment falls under it, and meet the inspector.
Commissioning And Handover
Combustion checked, controls set, system purged and balanced, and the documentation handed over for your records and your insurer.
No Heat, Day Or Night
If you smell gas, leave the building first and call from outside. For anything else, shut the boiler off at the service switch and call. After-hours rates apply, and you still get a written price before work starts.
Frequently Asked Questions About Denver Boilers
Repair Or Replace, Priced In Writing
A boiler that will not fire, a zone that stays cold, a relief valve that keeps dripping, or a unit at the end of its service life. A licensed plumber inspects the whole system and gives you the honest comparison before any work begins.
Homes and commercial buildings. Financing options available for qualifying projects, subject to credit approval.
