Endurance eating ignitors

archibald tuttle

Have an EBP-110 thats been in this installation for two years running the same ignitor no problem. got the no heat call early in the season about two weeks after startup and the ignitor was shot. didn't think that unusual after 2 years (and the ignitor had unknown hours on it when we got the boiler).

This looked like a standard failure. the hot surface element had bubbled a little. was not completely broken away at any point but ohmed infinity.

so i go to our great stocking dealer for these parts grab one. the boiler runs through about half a dozen cycles and blows the 110 fuse on the board and when i refuse it, the ignitor is blown again. no obvious marking or damage. a little bit of soot on the ceramic barrel, but no cracks, the element looks as good new -- it should it was new . . .

so i called the great help line in the sky that has been one of the better support lines i've found since the heatmaker days. they suggested i do a combustion test to see if soot marking indicated poor combustion and indicated that flamer rod cycling could happen with condensation in the early run before the onboard tank was over condensing temp.

combustion is right on the money. to the high side of the acceptable CO2 range.(which is a fairly narrow range).

so my supplier gave a replacement element and i put that in and exactly the same thing happened.

during the failure that produced the service call, the 110V fuse was not blown so this doesn't seem to be a repeat of the intial symptom. And of course the boiler was started from cold and in shoulder season goes to no call and the hot water is not hooked up so it experiences zone valve closed heat tank from cold regularly and never had this problem.

I took off the fan and put a scope in. it looks to me like there is no part of the coil itself that could drip on the ignitor or flame rod. if the flue would really condensed a lot for a long time i guess it could saturate the mineral fiber insulation panel across the top of the combustion chamber and you could get a drip through, but the boiler is running up over 135 or 140 on the feed temperature realtively quickly.

the one other symptom i did notice the second time around ( i wasn't paying as close attention while i was packing up the first time because it seemed like a simple straightforward ignitor replacement) is that there were several slowdowns and flame off cycles in the initial warm up which is not the theory of ops for the board which should run full fire until the feed temperature hits around 180 i think.

i don't think changing fire would be a result of result of condensation dripping in the chamber but obviously laars techs say flame loss can result from a significant drip onto the flame road that essentially disproves flame even when there is one and then the gas valve is killed and you get a re-ignition cycle. And if that were happening it would obviously indicate the possibility that there is a drip onto the ignitor itself in this warm up but there is no evidence whatsoever on any external parts of the ignitor of failure or spawling or marking of any sort. and this setup with this venting has been running fine for two years and i'm running it with the front open while its warming up to watch for the zone valve trip so it isn't even taking in significant outdoor air in the concentric vent that would exacerbate low flu temps. total vent length is about 5' with one elbow.

Clearly because it is taking down the fuse, the ignitor or circuit anyway is suddenly showing very little resistance and then it shows very high resistance well out of the operating range when i measure after the incident and then if i try to fire again it draws a little bit of current and then nothing and shows infinite resistance.

so there is the novel on the this hopefully not so novel problem that someone will recognize.

icy78

I dont know this boiler but I would ask first, what is the required voltage to the ignitor and what is the actual. If 24v to ignitor then maybe you have a shorted transformer.

archibald tuttle

good idea, but its a 120V ignitor. there is separate fusing for the 24V and 110V circuits. in the answering my own question department, just got off the phone with laars, or teledyne or whoever it is this week that still provides excellent support for that entire line and they suspect some failure, erosion or displacement of the refactory around the ignitor. the ceramic that guards the coupling of wire to silicone carbide ignitor is meant to be largely insulated from heat in the boiler. while i was not aware of anything going wrong or flaking away when i inserted the new ignitor, this seems to be the exact set of circumstances that would lead to two ignitor failures hidden in the ceramic potion of the ignitor. going to pull it apart again and focus on feeling the refactory around the ignitor and put the camera in there again.

so i might have to patch refactory and i have to think how to that, high temp silicone and the broken piece if that is what i find, little piece of wetpack . . . ? ? ? ? or maybe i could get a refratory sleeve for the ignitor . . . any creative genuses out there feel free to chime in.

JUGHNE

How about a picture of the boiler front or where ever the igniter is installed?

BobC

Are they having any electrical problems in the house like lights dimming or seeming to bright? If the incoming neutral were loose your line voltage could be anything from 60 to 180v depending on what loads were active in the house. Put a meter on the ac line into the boiler and make sure it's not going crazy.

Bob

Tim McElwain

What is the voltage to the igniter. They do not like voltages over 125 VAC. Also igniters on these units after time seem to have condensation issues when first started up for the season.

archibald tuttle

tim, thanks for your great base of knowledge. spent a good deal of time yesterday on the phone with heatmaker. condensation usually shows up, according to them, in obvious failure of the silicone carbide element. these ignitors are failing in the ceramic where the wires join the silicone carbide.

yesterday i went to my own graveyard of boilers and pulled an old ignitor off one of these units. after looking in to other possible causes and concerns, including the health of the refactory lining around the ignitor and flame rod, i put that used one in yesterday and it hasn't failed yet. i think they might actually have a problem with a run of ignitors.

i'll check the voltage. i think it was under 125, i checked it once, but i wasn't thinking specificity so much as making sure some wiring error hadn't resulted in way high voltage or something. i'll check it today, but the older used ignitor that was ohming at 75 or so is not burning out the way the two new ones i put in did.

Tim McElwain

Are you getting these igniters direct from Endurance? A while back I found that over the counter replacements on igniters had built in faults until I ordered direct from (Laars) actually now Bradford White. I also wanted to make sure the igniters come from Koors Tech (used to be Norton). Some replacements are not as good a quality. I actually plug igniters directly into a wall socket at the supply house before I will but them. Too many that failed out on the job caused that to be my protocol.