Beckett AFII 100 HLX needs help

Abels

Ok so this is my first post on this site I have usually just been an outsider searching and finding help. But I haven't been able to figure this one out. I bought a house from my sister this year that has a becket Oil heat/electric cooling pack. This system is around 5 years old I believe. Last year this unit gave her lots of problems. It would initially light run for 5mins or so and go out. Someone would have to reset and it might for a few weeks or a few minutes never knew. She paid four different companies to come out and repair the unit each one would adjust it and replace the nozzle. It would work when then left then a week or two later it would start acting up again. Her ex husband who was a mechanical engineer know it all then decided to adjust it also and he actually got it to work for a month or so and then he left the picture and the problem with me. I adjusted the electrodes (according to the book) and cleaned them and replaced the nozzle and fuel filter. It worked till she no longer needed it which was only about a month. I tried to turn it on today and no heat just blowing cold air. So I went out and hit the reset button which was popped out. It sounded like it tried to light and the button popped again. So I turned it off and opened the rear access door. Turned it back on and got huge amounts of smoke and it went out. I waited a few minutes for it to clear and tried again this time it light but continued to smoke heavily. It went out again and I closed the access door and screwed it secured again. Reset again this time it would light but sounds like it is skipping or rumbling. I adjusted a little bit on the Air dial setting between (3-5) each repair man had it at a different place. The rumbling changes but never goes away. It ran good for about 8 mins. And then as I was walking back up to it after the flame went out I had a fireball come out of the stack and almost take my head off. So I shut it off for the night. I'm at a lost as to what is going on. I'm not a hvac guy but I do electrical and mechanical work. I know to ever make it efficient I need a service guy to adjust and take a smoke reading. I just wanted to get it to run and have a smaller repair bill. If anybody can help I would appreciate it.

lchmb

sounds like the unit needs a full tuneup. At the time that is done someone can check the HX and locate the ignition issue. Some time's it's best to just let a pro fix it before you lose your head to it... O.o

Steamhead

Agreed. This is not a DIY job. Where are you located?

Abels

Steamhead said:

Agreed. This is not a DIY job. Where are you located?

North Georgia (not a lot of these units in the south) out of the four repairmen that came only one had ever worked on one of these units before. I need to could find somebody that actually knows what they were doing. I grew up with this type of unit its the hottest heat and I love it just wish it would work.

Abels

I have a short video of the flame while running.

https://youtu.be/uHq5xGjXhdE

hvacfreak2

Good burner guys are hard to find , and an AF-II is a very
" specific " burner. You would do well to go to a local supply house ( R.E. Michel may be in your area ) and ask .

I am going to be a burner hero today myself. I borrowed a new Bacharach digital from a friend at work . I'm going to be like
" hold my beer bro I got this " ( as a swirling ball of atomized fuel on fire blasts from the draft regulator ).

776v63

Definitely a good idea to have a professional look at it. If you post the unit's make and model information I can look up Beckett's OEM spec for the burner.

In my somewhat limited experience with the AF II, if you're not careful with the air band, you can blow the spark off the electrodes which will cause delayed ignition (aka BOOM).

Robert O'Brien

http://www.thermopride.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/09/MO-4554.pdf

This it?

rick in Alaska

You Do NOT want to try running the burner with the rear door open. The air needs to go down that tube with pressure behind it. With the door open, it has no pressure, and the flame backs up and soots. Try running it again with the door closed and see what happens. If it did load up, it should clear up fast .If it doesn't, and gets worse, shut it down and call someone in.
There is a possibility of air in the fuel, a bad primary control, bad fuel solenoid, bad transformer, wrong air pressure, or even a bad cad cell. You really want to have someone check the cell before doing any thing else. Could very well be your only problem.
I would also see if any one set the burner up with an analyzer. Most units I work on the air is closer to a 2. Not sure how big you unit is though.
Rick

Abels

So I thought I would put an update. I spent about a grand and bought a propane fireplace but couldn't get enough heat so back to working on the beckett I decided to go check my fathers unit which is identical to this except his has a single fuel line with no return and has never given any problems. His was set at 4.25 on the draft dial. So I came back and set mine at the same and went to change the fuel filter. The filter was clean but only had a small amount of in the bowl its a 1a25a it pulls the fuel from the top of the tank and has a return line back to the top. When I put in the new filter I tried to bleed the air from the filter but couldn't so I decided to try to bleed the air at the pump like the book recommended. But all I could get was foam. So I got to think something was wrong. I checked the filter bowl and it still only had a small amount of fuel in the bottom of the bowl. I open one of the access plugs on the top of the tank which by the way had a half a tank of fuel which should have been fine. Except for the fact that the guy who installed this system bent the supply line at an angle which put the pickup at a half a tank. So the problem the whole time was the fact that the system was starving for fuel! When I bent the supply line straight down and turned the system back on it runs like a purring kitten. I have been using it for the past two weeks with no issues it had always had a rumbling noise in the past that the guy who installed it said was ok but that the dial couldn't be set above 3 and it run correctly. It may not be running as efficiently as it could but it is running. The guy that installed the system is the only one in the area that has said he would work on it but he has been putting me off since November because according to him he couldn't get nozzles. I order two online last week and got them two days later.

Anyways my fathers system has the single fuel line with no return its a gravity feed system with two in line filters from the bottom of the tank. My tank could easily been converted to the same. Is there any benefit to having the return line system like I have now?