the burner booster

kcopp

Any one heard of this? Is it as good as they say? anyone unstalled one? Sounds too good to be true..... <a href="http://www.theburnerbooster.com/">www.theburnerbooster.com</a>

Al Letellier_21

great technology

I have hd some experience dealing with the developers of this unit. It is amazing in how it works. They installed one on a steam boiler I repaired in NH and the savings were very impressive. Preheating the oil and increasing the operating pressure on the nozzle to levels that scared me at first, I see great things for this unit. Had two to install to test but UL listing problems kept us from installing them at first.'

If you have any interest in new technology. Give it a look. The engineering and quality is incredible....looking to install some when they are ready to go.

Unknown

Skeptical

Interesting idea- The only thing I initially see wrong is that the figures they publish are a bit suspicious.   If you use the figures on "How the Savings Add Up" page, they show a monetary savings of 35%. http://www.theburnerbooster.com/savings.php

On another page, "What is the Burner Booster System" http://www.theburnerbooster.com/burner-booster.php we are told that "owners to date have seen a savings of 30% - 45% on their heating costs."  Other pages claim up to 50% savings.

 I know only the very basics about oil burners   Does heating # 2 fuel oil change the BTU rating of the oil at all?  Increase it by 35+ %?  I know they do heat fuel oils, like Bunker C, to get them to flow and atomize but have no idea if heating changes the BTU ratings in any way. Since the average steam boiler is rated at around 80% + efficiency already, where is the room for this tremendous increase in efficiency?  BTUs are BTUs   Am I missing something here?

- Rod

Steamhead

I believe

heating the oil gives better atomization even with #2, allowing it to burn cleaner with less excess air.  This is one of the key features of the Carlin H2L lo-hi-lo burner if memory serves, also the Buderus blue-flame unit.



I agree that BTUs are BTUs, but if we can capture more BTUs that would otherwise go up the chimney that's a good thing.



Note that they're using the Wayne Blue Angel chassis.

Unknown

Carlin H2L

Steamhead-   Have you heard anymore about this burner and whether it is ever going into production?  They hyped it with great fanfare a while back and I haven't seen / heard anything since.  The residential oil fired steam market could sure use a good modulated burner.

- Rod

Steamhead

Nothing official yet

but I make that point every time I talk to someone from Carlin. To their credit, the guys I talk to accept the point. I'd love to be able to sell this burner.



As I understand it (and if someone from Carlin sees that I have it wrong, please correct me) one of the main issues is that such a burner must be properly set up so the stack temp is kept high enough that the flue gases won't condense. This requires that the burner be matched to the boiler, so it's not just a simple matter of bolting it on. You have to set the firing rates, flame pattern etc. just so.



There are a few manufacturers who helped sponsor this burner's development, and the H2L will appear on their gear first. I don't know when it will be released to everyone. There are a bunch of boilers, like the MegaSteam or Solaia, that I'd love to put this burner on. Savvy manufacturers will offer the H2L as an upgrade to existing units where the same model will be sold new with it- perhaps as a kit with a Vaporstat for steam or a suitable slope or outdoor-reset control for hot-water.



Back in the 1970s and 1980s, a lot of older boilers were upgraded with flame-retention oil burners. Once in a while our company still does this, if the owner cannot afford to replace the entire boiler, and the typical fuel savings is 10% at minimum- often higher. Flame-retention was the "killer app" of that time, and was relatively easy to install and tune.



But going to lo-hi-lo is quite a bit more complicated. There are enough things that can go wrong, that manufacturers are not (yet) comfortable with the idea of offering such a burner as a retrofit the way they did with flame-retention. I hope that will change!

Unknown

H2L

Thanks for the update.  It would seem to me that they better get moving otherwise they will have a lot of oil customers switching over to gas. If oil prices keep going up the savings from modulation will be too much to ignore.

- Rod

Al Letellier_21

burner booster

By atomizing the fuel and cranking up the pressure ( over 1000 psi) it produces a tremendouly hot flame, so white it is almost impossible to look at. I have personally seen a 1.35 nozzle replaced with a .45 and generate the same heat and stack temp, with better efficiency. Amazing stuff out there.

Robert O'Brien

H2L

As much as I'd like to see this come to fruition,I have my doubts. I don't ever see it available as a retrofit and even worse,as anything other than DV. The  cost is also a factor, how many consumers would pay $1K more for this? I have no idea if that is the right number or not but I bet it's in the ballpark. What % of Buderus are sold with their blueflame burner? The oilheating industry seems unable to get moving in the right direction and if they do it will too late by then!

Steamhead

One of my customers

who has a very large Broomell system, saved 40% on his gas usage when we hooked up a dormant lo-hi-lo setup on his boiler. We set it up to drop to low fire at 3 ounces, with a Vaporstat. And this was on a large atmospheric boiler, where the lo-hi-lo only controlled the fuel, not the air.



40%. That number is too big to ignore. Lo-hi-lo can't come soon enough. It's relatively simple, and its easiest application is on steam and Vapor. It's the "killer app" we need, just as flame-retention was 35 years ago.



Your quote "The oilheating industry seems unable to get moving in the right direction and if they do it will too late by then!"



This goes back to the way my thread on OTT developed. Much of today's oil-fired equipment is being installed by oil suppliers. Independents like us will install, for example, a MegaSteam instead of their pin-type steamer because of its better efficiency and easier servicing. And we'll be the first to embrace lo-hi-lo on residential oil-fired boilers.



Eventually, increasing efficiency standards will require lo-hi-lo on oil equipment. Then the economy of scale should kick in. Whether or not this will come too late is anyone's guess, but...................

Unknown

Two Burners ?

Keeping in mind that I know absolutely nothing about complexities of burner combustion, I often wondered whether it would be possible to mount two small burners on a single boiler using a door with a slight "V" shape (outward bulge).  The burners would be mounted on each leg of the "V".  One burner for "low" and the second one kicking in for "high".  With this approach you could use existing, proven, burners and it would only add the cost of the second burner which should be no more than $500.

Would this even be feasible ?

- Rod

Charlie from wmass

not really feasible

The each burner would impinge on the other. two stage is proven technology it is just not used on small boilers as the added complexity is thought to outweighed the potential savings. I believe the burner booster is simply increasing pressure and warming the oil. This should lead to cleaner burning which would lead to less soot build up on the heat exchangers walls and this would also increase efficiency over time. I am just wondering why it can not be incorporated into the burner with out the suitcase added on.

Steamhead

I might stop by the BurnerBooster company

either before or after Brookhaven later this month, to see this for myself. If Al says it worked for him, that tells me it's worth a look.

Noodles

Any More on the burner booster?

Has anyone had any communication with the buner booster company. Has anyone see this product in action? Has anyone had one installed?

Steamhead

Well, their rep

was supposed to get in touch with us when he came thru Baltimore. So far, he has not done so.



But I'm going to try running 200+ PSI and a Start Helper on my NX to see what happens.

Noodles

Thanks for the information on the burner bootser

I went to their website and there is no mention of reps or how it is sold. Who did you speak to  and where did you find a representative so that i can try to reach them.

Steamhead

Not sure what his name was

but he works out of their main office. Try calling them and get back to us. 

0010

use it for heating your home not your yard

hi. i have a burner booster at work and have used it for about 3 months now. we don't have all the data logged in for savings but heres what i can tell you so far. we have seen a drastic drop in emissions, so much so that we no loger need a draft inducer fan on our boiler. (smith steam boiler made in 1950). the stack temperature is about 250 degrees f. which is about half the temperature we use to have. also to prime the unit after running out of oil is easy. just push the reset there is no need to bleed the unit , soit is alot less messy. so far it been great.

0010

heat your house not your yard

oh yeah theres one more thing that impressed me so far about this burner booster. there has been no condensate problems in the boiler or the chimney. as best i can tell the unit can do this by greatly reduceing the amount of air blown into the combustion chamber. due to the way the oil is sprayed into the chamber it requires much less oxygen to combust.  so far its been very impressive. i will let you know when we have the fuel savings info.

Robert O'Brien

David

I think this may violate the no advertising rule!

Steve_175

Cost

Looking at the web site and what they are charging I did a quick calc on what the pay back period would be for the average HO and I figure between 15-20yrs. A tough sell. As usual it always comes down to economies of scale. Big boilers in appt blds or institutional would make more sense for this.

boket

Burner Booster

I have seen the BB in operation and the flame truly is remarkable.  They did a demo for me and were able to show the difference in flame temp as well plus using an electronic combustion analyzer (a Bachrach I think) and saw the difference in flue gas compistion.



They put me in contact with two school agencies and the end user is very satisfied.  On one of them, they indicated the old boiler was getting cleaner the longer they used the BB.  I believe they have also been listed by UL

CapeCodOilGuy

a good idea, but...

Seems like a good idea, but good luck convincing a customer-especially a residential customer-to spend at least $5900 to install the Burner Booster (that's the price on their webpage). The new Carlin H2L seems like a more cost-effective solution, though I haven't seen any prices. According to Carlin's website, it would appear that the equipment is in production-at any rate, the brochure is available.

CapeCodOilGuy

a good idea, but...

Seems like a good idea, but good luck convincing a customer-especially a residential customer-to spend at least $5900 to install the Burner Booster (that's the price on their webpage). The new Carlin H2L seems like a more cost-effective solution, though I haven't seen any prices. According to Carlin's website, it would appear that the equipment is in production-at any rate, the brochure is available.

Rod

Carlin EZ-H2L

Hi- Could you give me a link to the address where you saw the brochure on the EZ-H2L?

It's not on the website address I have for Carlin. I've emailed Carlin asking for info /update on this burner and received NO reply. With oil prices going up I would think people would be standing in line to get these units. If fuel oil goes to where i think it will be going, the payback is pretty quick if these units are as efficient as reported.

Thanks!

- Rod

Robert O'Brien

Carlin H2L

Is still not available and will never be for retrofit,it will be OEM only

Rod

Need a 2 stage or Modulating Oil Burner

Robert - Thanks for the information. Any idea if we're going to see the H2L available on a steam boiler anytime soon and if so which one? This seems like a "no brainer" on a steam boiler as you could save on the pickup factor.

- Rod

EddieG

Bob...

Bob is correct, unfortunately! I wish it was. I remember about 5 years (I think) ago at AREE in NJ, when they introduced it. Since then nothing! I did however read an article in one of the oil magazines, that they were testing it on some Boyertown Furnaces. But that's still OEM. Oh well, maybe we will see it some day. Kinda like Bigfoot or the Lochness Monster! 

Steamhead

Just got back from meeting with the Burner Booster people

I think Al may be right. We are looking at doing a demonstration install, to see for ourselves. 

Bob02053

Sale of The Burner Booster had been delayed

The sale of The Burner Booster was delayed due to difficulties internal to UL. After the extensive delays ETL entered into a testing agreement and successfully completed testing late last month or early this month and now the product can finally be sold.

SteveHayes

The Burner Booster update

Greetings - the Burner Booster has been on the market for over 1 year, is fully ETL certified, is available as a refit for most current burners, is saving nearly 100 installations between 28-32% in fuel use, reduces emissions by up to 90%, has experienced zero (0) no-fires or failures in the past year, is in full production and in stock (ready for shipment today) and is distributed by Nelson and Small, Inc. of Portland Maine.

Simply put, the performance of this unit in the field has exceeded our wildest expectations all around.

It is available for any size boiler but the payback gets fantastic for users who are over 2000 gallons per year.  At 10,000 gallons per year the payback is less than one year.

We are working on a residential unit that will likely provide a 3 year payback and we are hoping it will be available mid-2013.

More information is available at www.nelsonsmall.com or www.theburnerbooster.com

Cheers,

Steve

Rod

Burner Booster

Hi Steve- Thanks for the update. I will be very interested in the new residential model. Any idea of the target price? At the present price you'd have to get sign, in blood, guaranteed savings before you could get a residential customer interested.

SteveHayes

Residential vs. Commercial

My pleasure to provide an update on this subject.  We have been having a ball with the technology with 94% of the installs completed receiving a 28-32% fuel use decrease.

Lowest gain was on a new Weissman at 18.7% less fuel used for the same BTU output.

Regarding residential vs. commercial applications...certainly the ROI is quicker with more fuel use...however, many home owners are taking the product and seeing about a 5 year ROI at 1600 gallons per year use.  Much below that, like at my home at 500 gallons per year, the ROI is longer, though not as long a return as the new high performance windows I installed a few years ago.

Residential unit is being worked on but currently no promises about delivery date. My advise is if someone is using 2000 gallons of fuel oil per year or more, then they might consider the BB.  Much more cost effective than converting to propane, only takesd a couple of hours to install and burns almost as cleanly as a natural gas appliance.

Cheers!