water heater spilling

Paul S_3

I went on a no heat to fix a boiler. boiler was on a different chimney. customer asked me to take a look at his water heater. wh is a standard atmospheric 50 gallon 40 k btu. the water heater was spilling..... chimney is 5 in bvent....and has a 80k furnace on it too....upon further inspection I found that the baffle in the wh was removed.... can that cause the wh to spill?? im going back tomorrow morning to do a combustion analysis and a draft reading....

ChrisJ

You wouldn't think it should spill without the baffle, I always assumed that was just to increase efficiency. Why was it removed?

IMO Something's wrong with the B vent assuming there's plenty of fresh air.

Paul, do you have a Dwyer 460?

Paul S_3

No i have the bacharach insight plus which tests draft....it looks as if the water heater has always been spilling....there is a 6 in duct in the mechanical room for combustion air....there's 5 in b vent with 20 ft height ....the b vent is reduced to 4 inch then a 4 in t wye picks up the water heater first then the fan assisted furnace

ChrisJ

Paul S said:

No i have the bacharach insight plus which tests draft....

The 460 is nice because it's just a cheap small light gauge you can carry around without worrying about it getting lost, stolen, damaged etc.

I think the kit can be had on Ebay for $30 or so.

Paul S_3

This is what i found in the selkirk manual....its similar what i have there besides the fact that there is a 4 inch t wye ....instead of the full sized 5 in interconnection tee shown in the pic below

Henry

The 4 inch TWY is insufficient. According to Table C4, Fan/Nat is minimum 5 inch up to 177K if there is no depressurisation.

ChrisJ

Henry said:

The 4 inch TWY is insufficient. According to Table C4, Fan/Nat is minimum 5 inch up to 177K if there is no depressurisation.

My problem with this is I highly doubt if code calls for 5" that a 4" would cause spilling.

Something still sounds wrong.

Obviously, as you're suggesting the whole thing needs to be brought up to code, but I doubt it's the only issue.

Paul S_3

I know that it calls for a common 5 in with 2 4in vent connectors. ...but when i have the furnace off....the water heater still spills....the water heater has 3 ft of conn rise....and to mention the draft hood on wh is not for this appliance it looks like they took it off the water heater it replaced...

ChrisJ

Paul S said:

I know that it calls for a common 5 in with 2 4in vent connectors. ...but when i have the furnace off....the water heater still spills....the water heater has 3 ft of conn rise....and to mention the draft hood on wh is not for this appliance it looks like they took it off the water heater it replaced...

What do you think you'll end up doing?
New heater?

Paul S_3

New heater and change all venting in mechanical room

Mark Eatherton

Not having the baffles in the flue ways is wasting a HUGE amount of energy. The thermal efficiency is probably hovering around 30%. Not sure if that would be contributing to the spillage, but I do suspect so because by not having the baffle in place, it is pulling HUGE amounts of air into the combustion process, and over powering the ability of the vent to handle the load.

Best to refer to the National Fuel Gas code as it pertains to vent size, vent connectors, fittings etc to make sure it is in compliance with the intent of the code, but you absolutely have to replace the baffle, if you can find one. If not, replace the whole heater.

No spillage is good spillage...

ME

Abracadabra

What the roof termination look like? Good clearances?

Paul S_3

Thanks for all the comments guys....i wish took a before pic of the venting...below i posted the pic of the old heater you can see how discolored it is from the years of spillage....co readings were climbing well past 1500ppm before i took my analyzer out...new heater co air free ppm is 42ppm.. i resolved issue with venting and installed a new water heater

ChrisJ

Is there a light bulb in the cleanout for the evaporator drain!?

Paul S_3

Lmao...yes i removed it

Danny Scully

You gotta go all in @Paul S, get yourself some press ball valves!

Paul S_3

I only had non potable water ones on my truck....plus i have so many sweat ones that i never use ....i use viega and legend valves for press

Mark Eatherton

You may have saved a life(s) and a lot of fuel. Congratulate yourself.

And they will have a bonus of more hot water as well.

WIN WIN WIN.

Good job.

ME