Burnham Mod-Con

sixoilguy

A long time customer is switching from oil to gas. The local utility is offering them a discount on a Burnham Alpine or Burnham CHG boiler. I have plenty of experience with

Laars, Lochinvar and Weil-Mclain modulating condensing boilers but haven't come across any Burnhams yet. Haven't had any service issues with Burnhams in the past. I was just curious if anyone out there has had any experience or service issues with these particular units.

Robert O'Brien

I'll assume you mean Nat Grid?

Alpine is OK,typical Giannoni based  design. The Nat Grid discount is really nothing spectacular unlike the Burnham ES2 discount they offer,that is a good deal! If you want a mod/con spend a few extra bucks and get a Viessmann or  Triangle Tube IMO

sixoilguy

Burnham

LIPA it is! Alpine and CHG are all they offer over 200,000 BTU. I was looking into a Triangle indirect.

Robert O'Brien

200K !

Do a heat loss!  Lots of 200K boilers around,very few 200K houses!

Jason_13

Alpine

The Alpine is stainless steel and the CHG is cast aluminum. The most important thing is proper sizing. The CHG comes in two sizes, 150 and 225k. the Alpine ranges from 80k to 800k. The Alpine Sage2 control is far superior than the MCBA on the CHG.

sixoilguy

Burnham

I'd be cutting it awfully close with the alpine @ 210k. I generally work with commercial units. Plan A was a WM Ultra 230 w/ a Plus 40. I've got about a dozen 299's in the field with no problems for 5yrs. Ultimately, I'll leave it to the homeowner. Unless I hear that these units are troublesome. Going through NG the Burnham is half the cost of the WM.

sixoilguy

Burnham

I'd be cutting it awfully close with the alpine @ 210k. I generally work with commercial units. Plan A was a WM Ultra 230 w/ a Plus 40. I've got about a dozen 299's in the field with no problems for 5yrs. Ultimately, I'll leave it to the homeowner. Unless I hear that these units are troublesome. Going through NG the Burnham is half the cost of the WM.

And yes 210K, it's a hundred year old house in Brookville....need I say more! LOL

CMadatMe

A 5,000 sqft plus House?

Your use of a 40 gallon indirect tells me your way oversized on the boiler. I'll give you the benefit of saying it's a 5,000 sqft house cause that's 40btu's a square. Which the windows would have to be 100 yrs old, same 100 yr old siding, no insulation but that's a guessing game. One thing,  5,000 sqft houses have a much higher domestic demand. So which is it, the boiler oversized or the indirect undersized?

meplumber

I have some 200K houses up here.

Some of these old Captain's Houses were built in the 1880's.  No insulation.  Busted up into apartments.  Old single pane windows.  Ran the heat loss program many times and yes, they come up in the 185 - 210k range.  -10 to -6 design temp.  Roughly 47 btu per sq ft.  Not efficient at all.



As a comparison, I recently did a Post and Beam structure with an elaborate wall and roof system.  It is 4,820 sq ft and has a heat loss of just over 60k.  Insulation is a wonderful thing. 

sixoilguy

Burnham

Yes, the heater is undersized in my opinion. The homeowner only wants a 40. There are only 2 people living in the house, plus they have DHW returns throughout the house which counts as storage. House is approx. 4500sq, ft. Old converted gravity system

with a 4"loop through the bsmt.. 1" risers feeding 26 radiators on 3 floors (bsmt not incl.)  and each one has a zone valve. Talk about stepping in pooh!