Weil Mclain Ultra 3 Lockouts

Gary_31

"the ultra is very critical on primary /secondary piping--if is not done exactly you will have trouble-"

nope. The p/s loop is not required on this or any mod/con. The purpose is to help protect your very expensive boiler, but it is not necessary. Just highly recommended.

Gary_31

weil mclain will not help you. That is not the way they work. While it may be frustrating, they DO NOT support do-it-yourselfers. They are set up to help distributors who in turn help professional plumbers.

Don't give up yet, I still need to read more...

(I thought I had a bad motherboard too, turns out I had a loose connection).... I LOVE my ULTRA, don't give up yet...

Gary_31

that won't help solve your problem. The modulate on/off is designed to help the boiler keep running. Setting it high can make your problem worse... set it low. Mine is +3 -3 with cast iron and it works like a charm.

Greg_49

There it is : )

Thats right folks, take this hypocrites advice.....NEVER EVER do anything for yourself! Just plant your lazy butts in your chair and.....

Need to go out and cut your grass? Hire a lawn care professional!

Need a simple asphalt shingle roof done? call a roofing professional!

Need your room painted? Call an ineterior coating professional!

Need a storage shed for your yard? Call a carpentry professional.

Need new furniture? Get an interior design professional.

Need your walk cleared of snow? Call a snow removal specialist!

Etc. Etc. Etc. Etc. Etc.

Need to scratch your ****.....oh never mind....he is the professional at that.

This guy cracks me up!

Greg

Gary_31

Ok, here goes...

I have a 105. It's an awesome machine. I run it around the clock and have no errors. I do not have DHW hooked up, I have a separate water heater.

Ok first issue. You do not indicate what type heat emitters you are using, just that you have three zones. I have cast iron radiators and a single zone.

Second issue, outdoor reset and temperature of system. 180 all the time is REALLY HOT and probably not necessary. And what are you doing with your thermostat? I have mine on full all the time and let the outdoor reset do the hard work.

With the ULTRA 105 there are three separate heating priorities. 1 is for dhw 2 is for your house 3 is for an additional circuit, like a snow melt.

Do not turn modulation to a limit of 50% you'll freeze to death, turn it back up to 96%.

So, dhw circuit is working as expected. So let's not touch priority one, leave it alone.

When the dhw circuit needs heat the boiler should fire up to 100% (96%) so that it can put out the incredibly hot 190 degree water you want in your dhw. (actually that's too hot, but you can temper it with cold water... or turn it down to 140... because NOBODY needs 190 degree hot water.

But again, let's leave priority one alone... fiddle with it later but not now.

Let's talk about priority two, your house circuit. The default setting for cast iron is 180 degrees at 0 outside and 120 degrees at 70 outside. That's too hot. I fiddled with it alot and ended up with 180 at 0 and 75 at 70. Now I live in an old house that is drafty and again I use cast iron radiators... they are HIGH MASS and want to be heated all the time at a low temperature.

first things first, hook up the included outdoor reset.

Next, and this will seem weird, but trust me... turn your thermostat to maximum and leave it on all the time.

One of the ways this boiler will save you money is to match your heat loss with the outside temperature. When it's warm outside (55) you do not need, or want, your water temperature to run at 180 degrees. (Unless you want to live in a sauna). at 55 degrees my 105 is putting out water that is about 100 degrees. Today the outside temp is about 30, and my boiler set a target of 130 degrees. (imagine how much money I save by not needing to heat that extra 50 degrees).

So I run the boiler all the time, circulator on all the time, it shuts down only when:
1) The outdoor temp is 65 degrees or more (setable)
2) The supply temp is 3 degrees above the target temp (setable modulate off)

It turns back on when:
1) The outside temp drops below 65 or
2) When the supply is more than 3 degreees below the target (setable modulate on)

Otherwize it modulates to meet the heat loss as determined by the target temperature and supply and return temps (not boiler temps but the thermocouples on your secondary circuit).

My guess at your fix:

Turn all your zones on full when the heating cycle (priority two) comes on (in fact, just turn them on and leave them on 24/7 for now). Since I have no idea where your circuits are and how long they are I can only guess that your circuit is too small. Then the reason you would get a supply temp rising too fast error is that the heat is not going anywhere. Turn all your zones on and see if, in fact, you no longer get the error. You indicate the problem goes away after the reset. This is because your circulators are now drawing the heat to the zones. If you do not turn those zones on, the entire circuit is about 10 feet long... way to short and hence your supply temp rising to fast error. Turn the circulators on 24/7 and your problem should disappear.

Then the way you set the temperature is to run around your house with a thermometer and measure the actual temperature. If the temp is too high, the key is not to adjust the thermostat, but to adjust the target temp by changing your high and low targets. (I spent $15 at radio shack to get a themometer with a seperate outdoor temp module that I can place anywhere I want and I can see two temps at the same time... my thermostat is set to 78 but my house is a nice toasty 69 all the time regardless of outdoor temp).


While a board the pre-circulates the water will do the same thing as my fix... I think the fix is simply to turn all the circulators on. Mine are always on 100% they never shut down and I am saving a ton of money.

Good luck, let us know...

TimS

hooray yippie!

Congratulations Greg you figured it out making progress enjoy your boiler enjoy the heat and hot water! Gary you rock man! thats exactly how I feel you should take advantage of a mod/con boiler with outdoor reset & everything the control offers, comfort and efficiency. I'm not going to lose any sleep tonight cause I'll be dreaming about what is the coldest water my boiler can put out to make plenty of dhw and heat. I'm celebrating!

Paul Cooke

Do it yourselfer\"s

Greg

It appears you are equating the building of a storage shed to the installation of a complex hydronic system. Perhaps now that you have solved your problem you can realize that the two are no where near equal in the skills required.

You came to this site for answers and many professionals stepped up to help you. Then you begin to call names and spew venom and sound quite selfish in the process. Your attitude makes me, as a heating professional, not want to help you, a do-it yourselfer, or others like you.

One of my teeth has been bothering me lately....I think I will go online and buy some dental tools and perform my own root canal. What the heck, I have some free time this weekend. If I have a problem I can always go online and find the "dentalhelp" website and post my questions.

By the way, please go back to installing TV antennas. From the look of the photos you posted your near boiler piping looks like an abomination.

Greg_49

I agree / More Info

Gary,

I agree 100% that the extra options should be utilized...you pay for them and they will save $$ in the long run. Don't worry...I will add the outdoor reset and get everything else going the way it should. However....The boiler should be capable of operating properly and stay up and running within design parameters without the optional bells and whistles as well. So...I prefer to get it working properly as designed without the extra features....and then add them.

Perhaps if it were running 24/7 and not allowed to cool...it would stay up...but I can run you through scenarios that it would not be happy like that as well. EG: power outage for 1 hour....power comes back....DHW calls...gets priority...call satisfied....2nd floor zone calls...boiler loaded with hot water / zone has cold water....same lockout scenario that I stated. Shouldn't be allowed to happen.

Weil Mclain engineer agrees with me, no combination of pumps / flows / CPU settings / sensors etc. will help in my scenario except the pre-ignition pump run to pre-mix the water before ignition. Now...I could have concocted my own pre-ignition pump run with a couple of delay-relays...but it is the manuf's responsibility that these things operate under varying field conditions.

The reason I was able to talk to the engineer for 40 minutes is because he actually appreciated all the data that I had accumulated for him. I had conditions under what the fault happened, teperatures, temerature ranges, observed flow conditions by manually cycling pumps in the system, the time it took for initial flow to travel through my heating zones, modulation rate at time of lockouts, heat load of my zones etc. etc.

I am an engineer by trade, so observing and gathering as much data as possible to validate assumpsions or conclusions, in order to implement solutions....is part of what I do every day. So folks.....keep in mind, when you get the opportunity to speak to an engineer at manufacturers facility, gather as much information as you can beforehand...we like that.

Apparently the Series 3 control was pushed out into the market, for a good reason, but perhaps a bit prematurely. Series 2 folks usually won't experience this kind of nuisance fault because the series 3 controller's behavior is quite different (I have 3 friends that I helped install series 2's last year). Also, engineer noted that it is mostly the 105 that suffers this issue when it happens. Most likely because the 80 does not generate as much heat (it uses the same aluminum casting as 105) and the 155 / 230 has more water capacity and gets more water flow (it has a totally different aluminum casting than the 80/105)It would be nice if the series 3 contoller firmware was field upgradable because I'm sure the revision I get will not be the final one, but hey....if my heat keeps working this winter, I will be grateful.

Sorry for being long winded...but I think this info benefits everyone here.

Greg

Greg_49

Do it yourselfer\"s

Paul,

If you don't know why the near-boiler piping is like that.....Bite your tongue!

I had it piped nice and neat and the first Weil Mclain tech guy I spoke to recommended changing it....and if you read the posts, I believe I mentioned that.

To get it the way that they recommended, I had do it that way due to space limitation. Also, Weil Mclain had no problem with it the way it is now....they got pictures.

You and Fred both contributed no useful (or any suggestions for that matter) only to bash DIY'ers and my piping, which is fine....I know why it is the way it is.

So please sit back down in the peanut gallery.

Greg

Rob_56

Greg

Thanks for doing all the legwork for us. Now if I could get a call back from Weil Mclain's NJ office.

Rob

Greg_49

Ufortunately, That was the hardest part. I had to raise dust at both ends (NJ office and their main tech support number). Many times results don't happen by being nice. But to be fair, I think they only have a couple of guys there and they are never in the office. Probably quite busy considering the population density of the Tri-State area.

Greg

Tony_23

Hypocrite ?

You need a dictionary.

To equate what I do professionally with mowing the lawn or shoveling the walk is ludicrous.

Can't defend your sloppy piping without insulting the criticizer ? Grow up. And don't tell me W-M's engineer said it looked good. He probably was just trying to get you off the phone.

So, because I didn't offer any constructive help, I'm no good huh ? Sorry, pats-on-the-back and self-esteem are earned, not given without merit. Paul and I don't have to shut up and sit down because we didn't help you, either.

It's people like you who are the cause of manufacturers and pros not coming here or posting anymore. You think you know more than you will and won't listen without hurling insults.

I see you're an engineer. Not an ME, I'm betting. A sound or electronics engineer isn't the same.

As far as I'm concerned, you're all that and a bag of chips.

Ralph_8

Ultra 155 series 3

I have the same "supply too fast" lockout issues. I'm a do it yourselfer who has no problem paying a pro when I can afford it. I read a lot of books, and a pro friend of mine told me I would have no problem with the install. He offered to help but then got way too busy when the weather turned cold. I only get the lockout once every week or so. I haven't called Weil Mclain. Does anyone know what I should do now? Has anyone actually had the problem resolved?

chris_93

board update

Hi Greg,
Spoke w/ you at the beginning of the week. I installed a 105 last week. We had a bad board for priority 2. We moved the heat over to priority 3 so the customer would have heat and hw.
It was working fine until this morning. Boiler locked out on same code supply to fast, thinking it's becasue it was really cold here mid, 20's. I'm trying to get the updated board, and was wondering if you got your in an running? Also what did you set the preburner times for (if you can do that).
Thanks, this is extremely frustrating, Customer owes me a lot of money and now they want to hold back final payment for 30 days to make sure the boiler is going to WORK...

Mike Brown

Greg_49

Weil Mclain Ultra 3 Lockouts

Hi Ralph,

Look at the fault history, is it happening during a heat call? or a call for DHW? If it is happening on a heat call, you may be experiencing the same situation I have. Have your pro-friend come over quick and check your work first AS I DID when I started noticing problems. He said my piping and circulator sizing was fine and it shouldn't be a problem. He also was stumped and ran out of advice for me, except to call the Weil Mclain main tech number.

Also in the meantime, you folks experiencing these problems can make some observations to see if you have the same problem I experienced.

1 - let a heating zone go cold.

2 - make sure there is hot water in the boiler from a previous zone call or a DHW call.

3 - do a heat call on the cold zone.

4 - feel the return pipe for when the initial flow of hot water returns through the zone you just called.

5 - about the time that it hits the boiler return tee...watch the supply temperature on the boiler display (by this time the start up sequence with low flame modulation for one minute has passed and your flame modulation is probably quite high).

6 - count in your head (or on a watch) the elapsed seconds every time you see the sampled supply temperature go up.

7 - if it is rising a couple of degrees per second or a couple of degrees every 2 seconds, it is rising too fast and on the margin of becoming a fault (manual states rise of greater than 2 deg. per second will cause lockout).

8 - if after that point, the temperature rise on boiler supply becomes much more gradual, then you definitely have the same thing I am experiencing.

I received the new control module with the revised firmware today. It came with a new screen to support more lines of text for the added menu settings.

I will put it in tonight when I get home from work and report back to the forum after it has run over the weekend.

Greg

Greg_49

Wow, I missed a good one by being so busy. I will probably offend someone here but what the hay?

I don’t know what it’s like in the rest of the world but I work in Northern NJ and there is enough work here to not have to fight with DIY’s trying to discourage them from doing their own thing. I am quite a DIY’er myself as well as a heat pro by day and I’m all for DIY.

I’d rather that more DIY’s did their own heating jobs of the magnitude of this guys. Lets face it, a 2 or 3 zone baseboard system is not rocket science and quite frankly the homeowners of these type of systems tend to be a pain more than a pleasure. Then when you get one that really screws it up and has nowhere to turn, you get to charge them alot to come in and usually do a few easy fixes.

I get enough high-end homes and commercial business too keep me busy and quite frankly I enjoy doing those more than small systems like this guys. The bigger jobs are what pays the bills and I like the challenge of the complexity of the larger jobs. The people with high end homes typically don’t care what they spend and the commercial has no choice if they want to keep running or expanding their business.

Sounds like some of you are hungry to scoop up all the crumbs that you can.

We should not try to hinder people who want to do stuff for themselves and learn on their own. That is the type of thing that has made this country so great. Do not try to impose that you have never tried to do something new on your own, whether it be at home or for the business. If you say that, you are not being honest with yourself.

The way that the economy is going, don’t be surprised if you see a lot more people DIY’ing trying to survive.

This guy does not seem like a typical homeowner that only knows how to hang pictures and flip the main switch on the boiler either. He has provided lots of good solid info which might even help you. In fact, I have a few problem Ultra-3’s in my region that I am going to re-visit now.

Jeremy

Greg_49

Weil Mclain Ultra 3 Lockouts - Problem solved

Mondays are rough...wanted to report earlier but....this is the first chance I had to sit down at a PC today.

I ran the new controller over the weekend. I have had no lockouts (neither auto-reset nor manual reset) since I put it in. Working like a swiss watch. It was down in the 20's in Queens NY over the weekend and there was plenty of cycling going on. There would have been plenty of lockouts with the old controller.

I basically set the Pre-Purge time to 2 minutes. That gave the initial slug of hot water a chance to mix-down through the boiler 1 time as well as it having a second pass through the heating zone to cool it even more while the boiler is doing it's start-up sequence.

Some more info on software versions :

Old Controller:
Display : v1.02
Main Micro : v1.00
Second Micro : v1.03

New Controller:
Display : v1.03
Main Micro : v1.00
Second Micro : v1.04

I did not find any other added features besides the Pre-Purge capability.

Everyone, Thanks for all the input and suggestions. Hope all the info that came out from everyone on the forum helps everyone else.

Good luck with your Ultra 3's and stay warm!

Greg

chris_93

105 lockout

We changed a troubled 105 board last week, and so far so good. Pre pump is at 45 secs. Seems to be ok.
Customer hasn't called with any lockouts.

Looks like we were the suckers to test the unit out for them.
Customer is still holding back final payment for 30 days to make sure there are no "other" issues.

Chris M

if your end switch is gettin low voltage to it the board will say supply to fast remove end switch reset unit use jumper as your t-stat see if that takes care of it worked for me iused a 24v contactor and i was done SON

alang

weil mclain was the worste investment i ever made

freaking no good pile of junk.

edit -

installed 90+ days ago.

6 visits to my place and the installer FINALLY solved the "SUPPLY TOO FAST" errro that was shutting me down.. only to solve the issue he had to prioritize all the zones.

Hiotwater is first, i can handle that.

.. but I have a hydro-air and tewo basement zones to serve... and when the hydro air is calling, my basmenent workshop is like the south freasking pole! It used to get up to 70 degrees in an hour. Now it won;t get near 70 degrees even when its above 40 degrees outside
I didn;t pay this much money to turn my workshop into a 3 seasons room!!!

the installer says my problem is that my type of house is not well suited to this type of boiler... I need higher temps and continuous supply to the baseboards... in which case I wish he had not told me it was the best soluition for my application...

Tony_42

Your problem

Isn't the boiler, it's the installer.

[Deleted User]

and again

our install locked out over the weekend, but the owner has been shown the reset drill

lockout history; supply > return

solution to try to 'counter' the temp diff; move the sensor, closer than the spec distance, to the return t

Tony_42

Try this

Oversize the header to get a better "mix". Or, use a low loss header like Caleffi's. Maybe a buffer tank on the return into the boiler. I've piped a few with the boiler being the primary loop and the emitters being the secondary loops. Gets a better mix-down into the boiler.

If the return temps are coming back that hot, that quick, I'd say your zones are too small and probably over-pumped.

Rob_56

Got in touch with the Weil Mclain rep and he was able to drop off a new control board and screen. The new control board has a pre pump time of 20 seconds on it. I installed the board (took about 10 minutes) on Saturday morning and have not had a lockout since.

Bill_112

running boiler all the time

The idea sounds logical but how does it know the temperature inside and what if you want to change the inside temp. Also, what are the costs of running the pumps 24/7 compared to having the thermostat working with the outdoor sensor? In other words the heater output temp. fits the requirements of the day but when the house temp. is satisfied the unit shuts off.

Bill_112

outdoor temp. sensor

When I attach the outdoor temp. sensor to my WM. Ultra 105- will it recognize it and will I need to adjust any of the settings? It currently is all factory default for cast iron radiators. This site is great.

Tony_42

Yes, and Yes

It's in the book.

[Deleted User]

Oversize the header ?

not at this point. but that very idea was used on a previous install with a series 1, i think it was, and we were advised by a local old timer to go from 1-1/4" to 3" bec of a known problem with the w-ms. and after all was said AND done, w-m said that it wasn't necessary bec they had compensated for the problem by shipping the unit with a different pump. soldering 3" cu? arrrggghhh!

'return temps are coming back that hot' well, there's the real rub for me; how can the return be greater then the supply? what, it's a 'perpetual motion machine'? how could it gain heat after it just dissipated it to a cold room? now that's an efficient boiler! over 100% the baseboards became heat pumps?

Tony_42

mike

re-read my post as far as return temps.

Are you zoned with valves or pumps ?

Greg_49

outdoor temp. sensor

I believe you need to power cycle the boiler once you attach the sensor. The microprocessor seems to poll and detect the sensors during a power-up.

Greg

Greg_49

weil mclain was the worste investment i ever made

"freaking no good pile of junk"......

It's not really a piece of junk. read the whole chain of posts on this forum. You probably have the older control module with no Pre-Purge feature. Weil Mclain had an oversight when they released the Ultra 3 control module. They have a fix which your installer can do. He needs to look at the sofware versions in your boiler and contact a weil McLain rep. to try to get the newer module which contains a software revision.

Mine works like a swiss watch now....it's great.

Greg

Greg_49

running boiler all the time

I did some calculations and it seems that running the pumps 24/7 like that person mentioned, would use alot of electric over the whole winter. Thus...there goes your boiler efficiency out the window! What you save on gas goes toward electric....especially if you have more than 2 zones.

Also, it would be a really hard to balance multiple zones with the same temp water flowing through all of them all the time and not utilizing your wall T-Stats.

I followed up with the Weil Mclain engineer in Indiana yesterday regarding my resolved issue (he wanted to know how my new control board worked and if it resolved the problem). He agreed that the system is designed work in conjunction with your wall T-Stats to obtain maximum efficiency and to not run pumps 24/7.

He also verified for me that the external supply / return sensors that you strap to the pipes have no influence on boiler operation and are simply there so you can obtain a temperature reference of supply / return of your heat zones (any settings for differential etc. rely on the internal sensors within the boiler).

The only external sensor that has an influence on boiler operation is obviously the outdoor reset sensor. And you want to set up the reset curve so that on milder days it will send cooler water through your heating zones and take longer to satisfy a heat call (but not run 24/7). That keeps from overshooting the wall T-stat temp. and allows for cooler water returning to the boiler (condensing condition - maximum efficiency) on all but the coldest of days.

You can also increase the temp differential (modulate on diff)so that the boiler will not cycle on and off as much yet will still provide warm water through calling zones.

Lots of settings to tweak to suit your particular installtion!

I know some people that have had these type of boilers installed and the installers never even bothered to hook up the outdoor temp. reset. They either did not have enough knowledge on installing these newer mod/con boilers, or just did not want to be bothered spending the time to tweak the settings. So...I wonder how many people have mod/con boilers that are not getting what they paid for.

Greg

[Deleted User]

re-read my post as far as return temps

we're zoned with pumps, and i understood what you meant. but the only way that i can get my head around it is if the return is coming back so fast that it hasn't lost enough heat + mixing with the 'supply' at the boiler loop, where the 10deg rule comes in

and then, i get another recall today; circuit 2 pump took a dump. original pump, b&g slc-30. how long are the circuits? it wasn't my installation, so i can't give you an accurate answer. but tomorrow, if i'm not on the run, i'll see if i can get the approx feets. very old bldg, dirt floor/stone wall basement, many 'strange' areas/runs, and poorly insulated

Rich_47

Ultra 3 230

I am a contractor and recently installed a Ultra 3. 3 zones, circulators w/ fan coils and dhw What a temperamental piece of equipment! I was having the some lock-out issue's at first, return>supply, supply too fast and temp sensor faults. i was able to stop the lock-outs by running the post-pump time up to 75seconds on both system and DHW to pull heat from the block, cutting my max temp by 5deg (190 to 185) and lowering the off differential to 3. I haven't had any faults in 3 days but I will look into the software version now. Glad to know I wasn't alone on this.

ChasMan

Well has everyone solved the mystery of the Weil Mclain Ultra
3 boiler,supply too fast error. Is the only known cure for this the pre purge setting, has it actually made remedy of all of the postings here. Follow up as I have the rare breed of Ultra 3s twinned up for double my fun. One unit shows no auto or manual lock outs in error history, while the other is having regular lock outs logged in error history. Both units are 310s and are piped the same, sitting side by side. Primary/secondary piping arrangement was used with the sensors on each side of the supply and return tees. Return sensors are six pipe dia. away and supply maybe two feet down stream.

alang

My problems are solved. I received the new board from WM yesterday, although I haven't put it in yet. I found the supply too fast lock out was occurring during the post purge after the call for heat had ended. Adjusting the post pump and lowering the Off Diff took care of that. How is your system piped and when is it happening.

Rob_56

I replaced the board a week and a half ago and I haven't had a single lockout since. The new board was the fix.

dave_141

beautiful

Guys,
Lets all give Gregie a pat on the back. You da man! We should all now return to our meager existence.

Greg_49

beautiful

Oh please....get some thicker skin. If any of the comments here offended anyone...oh well! All of it was aimed at Mr. "Well...you should have had a professional do it" who thinks that all homeowners and DIY'ers are idiots. Nobody here is meager exept that narrow-minded idiot.
I had a valid problem that was not caused by the install...but regardless....I got accused of being a dumb DIY'er and it was my fault. Everyone should realize that these systems adopted a technology that was not previously used much in the United States in residential and light commercial heating systems....CPU control. That being the case, a DIY'er who does something for a living other than hydronics and heating systems might just have more experience with CPU and logic controls. Alot can be learned by just listening and observing. That said, your buddy there should learn to be a little more open minded....and maybe he'd then absorb some of the useful knowledge that gets posted on these forums instead of barking and whining like a nervous dog who's bone is about to be taken away.

Greg

Tony_42

You're the beaut

Nobody ever said the things you're attributing to me.

Remember, everyone can go back and read what was posted, so you can't really lie or embellish.

I've installed more heating equipment with CPU's in more types of applications than you can imagine. I've not had a problem like yours that couldn't be fixed w/o crying for a new version of control logic.

So, while you're feeling all vindicated and righteous over your one foray into another field, there are hundreds, maybe thousands, who do this every day and do it properly and neatly and don't have issues with equipment due to incomplete understanding.

The Ultra Series 3 in these pics has the original control board configuration and has no problems because it was sized properly and installed properly.