ACME BOILER CIRCA 1905

CVRealtor

I was in an old home today and came across an old, active boiler installed sometime around 1905 by the T. Eaton Co. in Canada. It appears that the boiler has been converted to gas and I'm wondering if anyone can tell me anything about this system. I've never seen it before. Generally these old boilers are still working with radiators, which this one is not. Any thoughts, tips etc? I do have pics if that would help. Many thanks

Steamhead

Pics will help. It's probably still there because someone was too cheap to remove it. What kind of boiler heats the place now?

CVRealtor

It still heats the house. That's the confusing part. I've included a pic as my profile picture. I'd assumed it was installed when the house was built but it could be slightly younger than that, but not much.

Tinman

Your profile pic is one of a furnace.

CVRealtor

Yes it is. I wanted to make sure anyone commenting could see what this monster actually looks like. Trying to find info on this crazy old boiler.

Fred

It doesn't look like a boiler to me??? It looks like a gravity feed hot air furnace.

CVRealtor

Well that would certainly make more sense. I've never heard of a gravity fed hot air furnace. I'll need to research. Anything you can tell me about them? Thanks Fred.

Fred

They originally were coal fired and were basically a galvanized metal outer shell with a heavy cast iron interior and fire box. The outer shell was much larger that the cast iron interior and as the cast iron got hot, it heated the air between it and the outer shell. That air is what rose into the structure. A lower portion of the interior had a grate to allow ash and clinkers to drop through, where it could be scooped out. On smaller houses, especially one story houses, they often only had a single large register, somewhere around the center of the house and the heat would rise to heat the entire house. On larger house, there would be large asbestos wrapped ducts that would feed heat, using only the natural gravity of the heated air to move the warmed air up and into the rooms. They were affectionately called an Octopus because of the large ducts the ran out around the upper portion of the furnace, resembling an Octopus. There were no blowers, just the natural rise of warmed air. There typically may have been one or two large floor registers somewhere in the house to allow the cool air to be naturally drawn back into the furnace. Typically, when these old gravity furnaces were converted to gas, the fire box, inside the furnace, was lined with fire brick and the burner unit was installed in that fire box. There was no thermostat on the original coal furnace. The amount of heat was controlled by dampers and the size of the fire. When converted to gas, a thermostat was added and electric was added to provide for automatic temp control, much like the typical forced air furnaces of today, but still with no blower, just gravity. They were very reliable as there were no moving parts, just a mercury thermostat and a gas valve.

CVRealtor

That's all quite interesting. Thanks so much. I'm curious as to whether or not you think there are many still in operation. The system seems simple enough that they could still be working in the occasional older home. It looks to me like this one has been recovered in some type of sheet metal. Do you think that might have been something they did when it was converted to electric and the duct work was redone? It's hard to tell if the boiler is still covered in asbestos. No coated pipes are visible so they've likely been removed at sime point.

ratio

I don't know the install date, but I recently removed from service a coal-fired gravity furnace that had been converted to natural gas several decades ago. It had kept the place at 85* no problem, aided by the fact that the gas meter was no longer registering flow of any magnitude...

Fred

CVRealtor said:

That's all quite interesting. Thanks so much. I'm curious as to whether or not you think there are many still in operation. The system seems simple enough that they could still be working in the occasional older home. It looks to me like this one has been recovered in some type of sheet metal. Do you think that might have been something they did when it was converted to electric and the duct work was redone? It's hard to tell if the boiler is still covered in asbestos. No coated pipes are visible so they've likely been removed at sime point.

There are many, many of these old beasts still in use, converted to natural gas, of course. I suppose that will vary, depending on the region of the country. Here in the Midwest, they are still around and in use. The sheet metal on there is very similar to what would have originally been on there. Maybe they replaced it because of some damage or rust-through but it looks good. I don't see any asbestos on anything I can see. If that sheet metal on the furnace itself is replacement metal, there may be some asbestos on the old stuff under it, or it could have all been abated when they redid the duct work. I would think it was converted to natural gas, not electric. I see a gas line near the furnace. The electric is only to power the gas valve on the burner and to provide a power source for the thermostat. Those old converted gravity furnaces aren't at all energy efficient but, as I said earlier, they are very reliable. Wouldn't hurt to have the burner and the firebox checked and cleaned, if you intend to continue to use it. It looks like it's been well cared for. Remember, it's not a boiler, it's a gravity hot air furnace. There's no water in that furnace. If it were a boiler, there would be water in it!

JUGHNE

Many used Thermopile operated gas valves. The standing pilot generated enough electricity to operate the gas valve thru a special thermostat that would be upstairs. No electric power needed at all. Great to have in a power outage.
Probably very inefficient but if you're the only one on the block with heat you gain a lot of friends.