No way a first skim could ever be quick....

adamfre

Pretty dirty! This is gonna take a while....

Fred

Never quick but when it done, it'll run amazingly well! Take your time and let it roll.

Danny Scully

Don't be skimpy with the drip leg on the gas line, make it 6"!

adamfre

Whew!!!! And now I need suggestions for pipe insulation that won't break the bank lol

Hap_Hazzard

It can be quick; it just won't be effective.

adamfre

I skimmed for about 3 hours, until the water ran clear. Then fired the system up and brought everything to temp. Letting it cool back off, and wow is the water nasty again! I'll get it, just going to take some time.

Fred

Drain the radiator from the bottom drain valve to get most of the crud out then refill it and skim. The skim process is onlt to get oils off of the surface of the water. The crud will lay on the bottom of the boiler and just get stirred up again when the boiler cycles.

Hap_Hazzard

You should've seen mine after I repiped the header. If you replaced any piping, all the greasy residue has to wash out of the piping too. Get a book to read.

adamfre

LOL @Hap_Hazzard, I replaced all 110' of my wet returns, 60' main, and all near boiler pipe. (Not to mention replacing the boiler) I have LOTSA oil in my system I'm sure

adamfre

Do have a few questions for y'all.

1) How fast are you skimming your boilers? I think I was filling a 5 gal bucket in about 10 minutes.

2) Hot, or cold skim? I've seen people recommend both.

3) Peerless has a procedure they recommend no later than 1 week after boiler is put into service. It's basically a hot skim, but to use 'common washing soda, like Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda'. Thoughts on this? It seems I've seen mentioned on here several times to avoid adding anything to boiler water.

Thanks!!!

RomanGK_26986764589

1) It takes me about 15 min to fill a homer bucket
2) I do both, hot and cold. But I think hot will yield a better result.
3) I don't add anything to my EG 40, not even a steam master tablet since my PH is pretty high as it is. It's around 9.

BobC

Slower is better, it takes me a couple of hours to fill a 5 gallon bucket. I putter on the workbench while waiting for it to fill.

Bob

CKNJ

Don't know about breaking the bank part, but i have been getting my insulation (1" owens corning) from these guys. Usually have the material within a day or 2. Don't forget the Elbows, Tees and Unions too.

Finishing this project right now. House seller removed all the asbestos, but left pipes bare. The payback on insulation is enormous.

http://buyinsulationproducts.com/

ChrisJ

RomanGK_26986764589 said:

1) It takes me about 15 min to fill a homer bucket
2) I do both, hot and cold. But I think hot will yield a better result.
3) I don't add anything to my EG 40, not even a steam master tablet since my PH is pretty high as it is. It's around 9.

You could likely still use 1 tablet without a problem.
I think Steamaster's PH is somewhere around 9 or 9.5, meaning no matter how much you add, the PH won't go above that.

You'd still benefit from the corrosion inhibitor as well as it's ability to stop minerals from sticking to the boiler. I can't remember, but I think it may also work as an oxygen scavenger.

adamfre

I had to go to work today, so the wife cold skimmed the boiler all day. Got 8 4 gallon buckets in 10 hours, it was much slower this time. When I got home I grabbed a small pan of water straight from the skim port and boiled it on the stove. Didn't see foam, but it did leave a dry ring around the pan, that felt slightly oily. drained the boiler down (I can see down to the bottom of the bucket I'm using, but it's still rusty water) refilled and skimmed another bucket off the top, still some oil. Should I tell her to keep skimming tomorrow? She is only comfortable doing it cold, so I'm unsure how much good this is doing.....

KC_Jones

If it was me I would run the system for a week maybe 2 and then skim again. With all the piping you changed it's going to take a while for all the other oils to work back to the boiler, and the only way to do it is run the system. You did a lot of piping so there will be a lot of oils. You will know when it needs skimmed more from the unstable water line. It's not going to hurt anything to run it like that, you are steam cleaning the pipes.

ChrisJ

It takes a long long time for all of the oil to wash out of the new piping and boiler. And if any ended up on the other side of the Hardford loop that could take even longer.

Patience................... Skim and wait until the water gets dirty again then skim again.

RomanGK_26986764589

One thing that I observed on my EG 40 is that when the water gets dirtier/oily the needle of 0-3 psi gauge starts to shake more when the boiler is steaming. The water in gauge glass fluctuates as normal about 0.5 of an inch. But the needle shake is enough to kick my OCD and I start skimming and then flushing. Of course the regular 0-30 gauge never moves.

Hap_Hazzard

I tried hot skimming first, and while I could see an oily film on top, it seemed like it wasn't improving much. Then I added the washing soda, and oh man, the crap that came out!

Bear in mind that I'm doing this to a 30-year old boiler that had probably never been skimmed in its life--it didn't even have a skim tapping--and yours is brand new, but it still might help. Try pre-washing some dirty, greasy shop rags in it if you want to see how it works on grease.

Some instructions I read say to completely drain the boiler to remove every trace of washing soda, while others recommended leaving a little in. I can see where it might make sense if you're on a really low pH water supply, to bring up the pH and alkalinity to keep your boiler from rusting out, but otherwise, I'd recommend against it. Anything that basic is probably going to foam.

By the way, washing soda or soda ash, it's all sodium carbonate. It's very hygroscopic, so keep it in an air-tight plastic container.

BobC

Peerless manuals used to recommend the use of washing soda to clean out a boiler.

Bob