Welcome! Here are the website rules, as well as some tips for using this forum.
Need to contact us? Visit https://heatinghelp.com/contact-us/.
Click here to Find a Contractor in your area.
If our community has helped you, please consider making a contribution to support this website. Thanks!
Best Of
Re: OLD B & G COMPRESSION TANK SIZING..DO I NEED A NEW TANK?
These tanks work just fine. Maintenance is minimal -- but what I don't see on yours is any sort of gauge glass to check the air/water level in the tank. In principle, the Airtrol is supposed to do that. The only thing that can really go wrong with them is they can get waterlogged -- lose the air cushion -- and the solution is simple enough: close the valve to the rest of the system, open a tank drain, close the drain, and open it to the system.
In theory the Airtrol has a little valve on the bottom which you can open. If water comes out, let it drain (patience) and close it right away when air starts to come out. That should set the proper level in the tank. It's a good check.
One caution: do not put an air separator such as you would have with a modern expansion tank on the system. The compression tank depends on trapping the air in the system to work.
In theory the Airtrol has a little valve on the bottom which you can open. If water comes out, let it drain (patience) and close it right away when air starts to come out. That should set the proper level in the tank. It's a good check.
One caution: do not put an air separator such as you would have with a modern expansion tank on the system. The compression tank depends on trapping the air in the system to work.
Re: OLD B & G COMPRESSION TANK SIZING..DO I NEED A NEW TANK?
Hello ww,
If you have a steel compression tank between the ceiling joists in the basement you do not have steam heat. do you know where the circulators are that push hot water from the boiler to the radiators???? We need pictures of them too.
What you have a steel compression tank not an expansion tank and it is a very reliable way to provide the point of no pressure change in your system.
The only time a steel compression tank goes bad is when a weld ruptures or the tank rusts out at a weld.
I have the same tank but a newer vintag with an airtrol valve, and gauge glass and an Internal Air Separator to feed any airbubbles into it.
With my coal stoker using the steel compression tank I run summer temperatures of 140 low 160 high with a 190 dump zone temperature.
If you want a reliable triple gauge you should purchase a Marsh Instruments triple gauge as it is built by them, tested and certified by marsh industries and they offer a 2 year guarantee on the gauge and they can be easily calibrated by the lay person. I have had my fill of chinese gauges and will not buy them; BUT i would not hesitate to purchase pressure gauges from Taiwan, those I would buy in a heartbeat.
When you have time would you be so kind as to provide us with many images of the near boiler plumbing as possible being the water feed valve, pressure relief valve. back flow preventer, piping leading to the steel compression tank and the pipe runs from the boiler to the ends of the basement plumbing.
The more pictures you can upload the faster one of us can help you.
Do not lose hope, you can keep the tank in the ceiling you just need to do some work.
leonz
1
Re: Radiant heating resetting itself
look at the power supply to the controllers. that is kind of the classic symptom of a failed switching power supply, it can supply enough steady state current but it can't supply enough current at start up because the capacitor has failed. Either there is one central supply that is bad or the supply in all of them failed last year and when you powered them off and tried to power them back on this fall they couldn't supply the startup current.
mattmia2
2
Re: New jersey BFP required without feeder?
Is your location under a State adopted code? Which one?
There may be local codes that require a specific device
In some areas if the country a non vented dual check is accepted.
This non vented BFD has an ASSE 1024 listing, for example
Your local plumbing inspector should know and be the final say?
hot_rod
2
Re: Pressuretrols and Gauges
I too like to see the actual working pressure. I like this type of gauge (Dwyer Magnehelic), many on eBay, but you really need to know what pressure your system runs at since that would determine the type of gauge you purchase. They come in many pressure varieties.
109A_5
2
Re: Do you prefer the wool felt or the white fiber heating oil filter cartridge?
I have an RACOR 500FG fuel filter with a drop in 10 micron filter cartridge.
The 500FG fuel filter system has a centrifigal fuel flow system with stationary vanes in the housing to slow the fule flow to allow the crap to drop out into the large clear sediment bowl that can be drained of water and sediment when needed without bleeding the system.
The drop in cartridge and o-rings can be changed without losing the prime in the system as it has internal check valves.
RACOR has a 2 Micron filtration cartridge as well. These cartridges are good for 10,000 gallons of fuel.
The 500FG fuel filter system has a centrifigal fuel flow system with stationary vanes in the housing to slow the fule flow to allow the crap to drop out into the large clear sediment bowl that can be drained of water and sediment when needed without bleeding the system.
The drop in cartridge and o-rings can be changed without losing the prime in the system as it has internal check valves.
RACOR has a 2 Micron filtration cartridge as well. These cartridges are good for 10,000 gallons of fuel.
leonz
3
Re: Do you prefer the wool felt or the white fiber heating oil filter cartridge?
I never let my oil go under 1/4th tank so i dont think it gets to the bottom to suck up the sludge.I'm posting this poll because i have no idea which is the better more efficient cartridge.EVERYTHING is 10 micron, the smaller sizes at up to ~10 gph, the larger General 2A filters up to 25 gph, the spin on garber's say flow up to 45 gph but firing rate up to 10gph.
pretty much you won't be worrying about anything above 10gph flow rate unless you are using a fuel transfer pump -my 12v cheapo was less than $50 and is 10gpm or 600gph (300gph with ~30min duty cycle).
I've pumped tanks, I use a cheapo goldenrod diesel transfer oil filter from amazon, like $10 each, with a 1" hose line; the filter is rated for up to 25 gpm ( to go with a 10gpm pump) and I think they say theirs is 10 micron filtration but realistically these kind of filters are up around 30 micron. Regardless, they clog immediately upon sucking up black sludge from bottom of oil tank.
weather it's your lawn mower or oil burner, recognizing fuel cleanliness is one of the most important things and is often stupidly overlooked. I've done a double filter in series at the tank with a general 1a-25b followed immediately with a Garber spin on having the vacuum gauge. But given there's no real filtration benefit of the spin on's doing two 1a-25b filters in series in my opinion is the most economical way to go, with ball valves before and after the filters to facilitate changing and purging. Doing them at the tank keeps the oil line clean to the burner, and reduces hassle when working at the burner. And if you build your filter setup with some forethought in mind it will prevent many burner issues that are taken to be normal. Using the white rayon filter is better than the black wool because the white will show how much black gunk is in the fuel. The white rayon ones (RF-1) are now also cheaper than the black wool, I have like 20 now because of padding them to my supplyhouse order to get free shipping.
chowchow
1
Re: Do you prefer the wool felt or the white fiber heating oil filter cartridge?
You stated in your first post you're not mechanical. And post after post of DIY. I strongly recommend letting a competent professional work on your system, or at least guide you onsite if you insist on continuously attempting repairs and service on every part of your oil burner.
Nozzle changing, aquastat settings, working on burner motors, combustion set up, filters...not much left.
Nozzle changing, aquastat settings, working on burner motors, combustion set up, filters...not much left.
Re: Do you prefer the wool felt or the white fiber heating oil filter cartridge?
I upgraded to spin-ons about 6 years ago. I'd never go back. Quick, clean, and apparently filters better.
