I have a hypothesis about why Burnham IN boilers rust out above the water line.

ChrisJ

Hap_Hazzard said:

Maybe we could help the manufacturers by compiling photodocumentary evidence from every boiler that suffers a premature failure, including the make, model, location, age at failure and photos of the failed casting and the near boiler piping. I know a lot of you have posted picture and related details here, but it's difficult to locate them because they're not organized in any systematic way.

I'm sorry but I'm not helping them do free R&D. I have better, more profitable stuff to do with my time especially after I bought a finished product from them.

As far as I'm aware there were some fairly decent three pass boilers out almost 100 years ago. Knowing how to make a good, efficient long lasting steam boiler isn't a secret.

B_Sloane

HB Smith BB14 was a fine steamboiler
perhaps they will re-cast that one

anyways,
as long as they make boilers from ground up brake drums
they will continue to fail

ChrisJ

B_Sloane said:

HB Smith BB14 was a fine steamboiler
perhaps they will re-cast that one

anyways,
as long as they make boilers from ground up brake drums
they will continue to fail

I don't know, brake drums seem to hold up pretty good.

Hap_Hazzard

Who still uses brake drums? The last car I drove that had brake drums was a 1967 Volkswagen.

ChrisJ

Hap_Hazzard said:

Who still uses brake drums? The last car I drove that had brake drums was a 1967 Volkswagen.

My last 3 had rear drums including my current 2019.
Many still do especially cheaper ones.

And practically all tractor trailers?

Hap_Hazzard

That's crazy stopping an 18 wheeler with drums. I hope they're hydraulic at least.

ChrisJ

Hap_Hazzard said:

That's crazy stopping an 18 wheeler with drums. I hope they're hydraulic at least.

They're air.............
And nothing scary about it, drums do fine in certain applications.

You're scaring me now Hap....

Hap_Hazzard

Only if you're fond of brake fade. In a '67 bug it's pretty terrifying.

ChrisJ

Hap_Hazzard said:

Only if you're fond of brake fade. In a '67 bug it's pretty terrifying.

Don't forget, this thread has nothing to do with brakes.

Yes a lot of modern cars have rear drums.
Yes tractor trailers use primarily, if not exclusively drums. - Deactivated by air.

No I do not think modern steamers are recycled drums.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@Jamie Hall

Don't Jinx Cedric LOL

I would replace it with the same thing, hope you never have to.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@SlamDunk

I look at some of the old equipment and wonder how they moved some of that stuff. They didn't have the equipment we have.

I would have liked to see them assemble one of the old "snowman" boilers where the sections were horizontal.

When we cleaned out my grandfathers house 1970 we found paperwork where he had the old gravity coal furnaces ripped out and put coal fired steam in, this was around 1920.

Average size 2 family house it was around $750, 2 boilers, radiators piping and insulation

ChrisJ

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

@SlamDunk

I look at some of the old equipment and wonder how they moved some of that stuff. They didn't have the equipment we have.

I would have liked to see them assemble one of the old "snowman" boilers where the sections were horizontal.

When we cleaned out my grandfathers house 1970 we found paperwork where he had the old gravity coal furnaces ripped out and put coal fired steam in, this was around 1920.

Average size 2 family house it was around $750, 2 boilers, radiators piping and insulation

What cost $750 in 1920 would cost $9730.47 in 2019.

ethicalpaul

Kindly remove your prices from your posts, we don't discuss price

ChrisJ

ethicalpaul said:

Kindly remove your prices from your posts, we don't discuss price

SlamDunk

@EBEBRATT-Ed ,

I merely did a restoration on my system: boiler, near piping, additional radiation, traps & insulation and it was expensive , probably not a good business decision.

But, I figure a new system from scratch in my house if it were Being built today, would be in the 30k range with labor. And, it wouldn't cool the house in the summer.

My original boiler was coal to oil to nat gas. I think they dug the pit it was in then built the house over it.

jhrost

I remember a common refrain of my Dad used be that everything was made better prior to WWII. Actually I think he was on to something. When you think of all the metal shortages they had every manufacturer must have been under pressure to build their products with as little metal as they could. The price of metal undoubtedly became high.

So when the war was over why would they go back to paying more to build the pre-war product when they came up with something that would work with a lot less metal? If it didn't last as long - well the concept of planned obsolescence probably conveniently came along at about the same time. It really is pretty amazing when you compare some of these really old faucets and showerheads to modern ones - you could probably make a dozen of the modern ones out one of one of the pre-war vintage. They certainly were sturdy but they may have been a little wasteful in their use of metal, but the pendulum has probably swung too far in the other direction.

The mention of 67 VW bugs and there brakes brought back some memories, the brakes sucked but what really stands out in my memory was going up a hill, you could almost get out and walk faster. They were still a fun car too drive though I'm not sure why.

Dan_NJ

I can imagine also shipping products around the world in a post WW2 economy it couldn't have hurt the bottom line to use half or less material.

My 71 bug heater was just about non-existant. It heated the door jambs and that was about it.

Dave0176

I used to drive a 1998 Mack RD700 Tri Axle dump truck it had all drum brakes. Remember in big trucks it’s not just brakes that stop you it’s downshifting. And that truck had a 13LL Fuller trans. The tag axle has brakes also and believe it or not even with 80,000 pounds of steaming hot asphalt it stopped pretty good when the brakes were in good adjustment.

Dave0176

As far as these modern boilers go, we too have pulled many Burnham boilers in the ten year range. As others have said Burnham uses narrow sections with small 2” tappings. Not sure if that’s the problem as @gerry gill seems to use Burnham exclusively without issues, however I chalk it up to a lot of us being on the immediate coast and we end up with a rough water.

As far as Weil-McLain EG series of boilers go, I’ve pulled many boilers that are around the 40 year mark so we can’t conclusively say the rubber gaskets are no good. Outside of what Weil tried to do to us in 2018 by eliminating one tapping, heard our **** and then returned the double tapping, I do like exclusively like the EG boiler. The 1-1/2” skim tapping goes into the center of the steam chest which makes for wand washing the boiler a cinch. They are still the only ones who offer a tankless coil on a gas atmospheric steam boiler, which makes for a great closed hot water loop and about 30,000 btu. They still have the Hydrolevel 400 LWCO that don’t intermittently cycle. And they have that awesome 3/4 tapping at the top of the boiler which makes a perfect spot to run the water seal and drop the problemsome to clogging pigtail. However my complaint with Weil-McLain is they need better quality control over their individual components. Ask me how I know.

As far as the Peerless 63, it’s a great boiler, has about a gallon more water capacity then WM EG for the same section count. Has push nipples (not that big of a deal) and is somewhat a heavier casting then the EG.

The 63 is about a 12-14 year old design from around 2005 or so. Peerless redesigned their 61 series boiler which had narrower sections and only 2” tappings. The 63 really is the ultimate modern atmosphere steam boiler because they basically took the best of what they can put, 3” tappings, and wide steam sections, heavy cast iron and decent water content. Peerless 63 has 1” tappings for your hot water loop, no tankless coil option and a 1-1/4 skim tapping in the rear of the right section. That I don’t like however.

As far as Dunkirk and Utica steam boilers go, you can keep them, their side steam outlets Utica 2” Dunkirk 2-1/2” VERY narrow sections and extremely overfired boilers fail badly to produce dry steam even when we pipe big drop headers.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@Dave0176 & Jhrost,

My uncle used to say they thinned out the metal during WWII and never went back to it.

My first car was a 65 VW Bug

Basically No Heat froze, vacuum wipers stopped going up a hill, 6 volt battery under the back seat

But I wished I still had it

The Steam Whisperer

Dave076 Are you seeing 40 years on EG/EGH with steam, or just hot water? I see much longer life on the hot water models myself. I do believe the LGB does seem to be the shortest life boiler WM makes. About the longest life WM seems to be the little CG models. Lots of them around from the 70's still. My church has an old Weil hot water boiler from 1967 and still going.....however those were all push nipples then.

Dave0176

> @The Steam Whisperer said:
> Dave076 Are you seeing 40 years on EG/EGH with steam, or just hot water? I see much longer life on the hot water models myself. I do believe the LGB does seem to be the shortest life boiler WM makes. About the longest life WM seems to be the little CG models. Lots of them around from the 70's still. My church has an old Weil hot water boiler from 1967 and still going.....however those were all push nipples then.

I don’t like LGBs either they have terrible longevity and have the dumb side steam outlets. I feel most people don’t test their LGB blocks after assembling them, which would point out any potential leaks. Plus it’s a commercial boiler so most mechanics install them with fully welded headers which twist the hell outta the sections and cause leaks easier due to the gaskets. They are simple to repair though.

The EG seems to have an average life span of 35 years on steam. I’ve seen more but that’s probably attended to better maintenance. In the 1990s it seems WM put some bad castings out as I’ve replaced a good number of them. The modern die casted EG block is very good.

The CGs seem to last forever. The 80s and 88s are very nice boilers and I’d rather use them then a LGB.

Charlie from wmass

The Utica Heating 16 series boiler has two and a half inch tappings. You need to ask for these boilers as opposed to the Utica boiler peg series. This gives you a 2 and 1/2 in skim tapping. But truly I don't find myself spending much time skimming a boiler. I don't know what magic I do but if I have not skimmed all of the oil off in two skimmings I think I have done something wrong. I have also never had to wand a boiler.

jhrost

I've got one of the dumb steam side outlet boilers. From the engineering point of view why do they make them this way? I assume the old designs all have top outlets? Is it supposed to provide more height to put in a header?

EBBEBRATT-Ed. In my nostalgic look back at the VW double I thought of one really useful quality - if you put it in first gear it was light enough that you could push and control the steering wheel - if you got it moving towards a slope it would usually start.
The bad thing of course was how often you needed to do this.

Hap_Hazzard

I assume they make them that way so they can use the same casting for all the sections.

The Steam Whisperer

Side outlets are used because the sections are not wide enough to accommodate a large tapping on top. Wide sections tend to be very heavy. The end sections on the Peerless TC (Smith 28) are upwards 1200 lbs, each, IIRC. The WM 88's about 800 or 900 IIRC. All these use 5 inch top tappings The LGB's I think are about 350 lbs. Not too many contractors want to handle those heavy sections. The Peerless 211's are side tapped too, but are pretty heavy.

Charlie.... the 16 series looks like the Dunkirk castings... 2 1/2 inch side tappings but only 2 inch passage in the boiler. The instructions for skimming these boiler were (are?) wrong. They have you skim from the bottom of the 2 1/2 inch tee off the side. The 2 inch passages in the boiler are above this, so you only end up skimming the last section. Its dumb stuff like this that I have seen repeatedly in Dunkirk products. However, they, like the Uitcas seem to last.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@""The Steam Whisperer
The Smith 28s are heavy but not that heavy. fronts and backs are like 8-900 and intermediates are around 600.

The heaviest one I ever did was a Weil #94 those sections are like #1500.

@Charlie from wmass

I have never had to skim more than twice either. I just use TSP.


We must have better water around Springfield

The Steam Whisperer

Ahh, A manly man ( and /or a really smart man) that can handle those huge Weil 94 sections. I have yet to even see one of those boilers here in Chicago. The really big stuff I see here is always steel. But we haven't broken in to the really big building market here yet. We've only done work in one downtown building yet, and that was replacing the 3 inch main vacuum return piping, a bunch of traps, and raising return manifold near the vacuum pump to get rid of leaks and an unecessary lift for the vacuum system. Nobody else was willing to change the configuration of the system to get rid of the lift.

Charlie from wmass

I don't like getting beyond 88 series being a one man shop they are heavy enough

EBEBRATT-Ed

@The Steam Whisperer

They still make the Weil #94 I wasn't sure so I looked it up. Not that many around here. The largest one is 25 sections, shipping weigh is 26,020/25=1,040 so they are not as heavy as I thought.
And the shipping weight probably includes the jacket, front plate smoke hood and hardware so that would have to be deducted.

i am sure I won't do any more of those.

EBEBRATT-Ed

How about the Weil SGO oil boilers. They have been out a long time don't recall to many problems with them. How are they holding up?

The Steam Whisperer

I would of thought the 94 sections were heavier. They are not much more that the TC sections then.

Dave0176

> @EBEBRATT-Ed said:
> How about the Weil SGO oil boilers. They have been out a long time don't recall to many problems with them. How are they holding up?

Only thing I can say is, they are doing great. Their some downfalls that are personal, like 2-1/2” tappings and only one tapping up to 5 sections, 6 sections and beyond have two. I really can’t complain as if their piped right they do produce dry steam. The skim tapping don’t go through the steam chest which I don’t like. However these boilers seem to really like the Carlin EZ gas burner. The last conversion netted me a 84% combustion efficiency.

EBEBRATT-Ed

Thanks @Dave0176

We here about the ones that go bad, It's nice to here about the ones that last.

Do you know if Weil has any issues with using a gas burner in one of those?

Not sure if they are available less the oil burner like the old P-66 where you could buy packaged, knocked down or just the block

JeffM

On the SGO:
I agree with Dave above. Had an SGO on the steam system in my last house which is going into 20 years running now, and it was great. I switched it to a Carlin EZ-gas early in my ownership, and it did really well with that and saved me a bundle.

Dave0176

EBEBRATT-Ed said:

Thanks @Dave0176

We here about the ones that go bad, It's nice to here about the ones that last.

Do you know if Weil has any issues with using a gas burner in one of those?

Not sure if they are available less the oil burner like the old P-66 where you could buy packaged, knocked down or just the block

WM don’t recommend a conversion, however if you call them they will tell you that and then recommend a Wayne gas burner which I do not really like. Why they recommend Wayne idk.

Truthfully I’ve seen these things piped as bad as you can imagine and they still work. They are a very heavy casting, just a three section is over 600 lbs.

EBEBRATT-Ed

@Dave0176

They have been around a long time. Are the sections the same a what they used to call the WM Gold? Those started in the mid 80s I think

Shalom

Can someone maybe make a chart as to who recommends what?

Hap_Hazzard

I think you should start a new thread and conduct a poll.

New England SteamWorks

The following is a copy of a post I placed on OilTechTalk to an individual that has had more than of his share of internal corrosion issues where he is located in the South Shore area of Massachusetts.
Regarding all of the exchanges that we have had over the past couple of years, I would like to clarify the results. As discussed in the past, you have had more than your share of V7 and V8 steam leakers due to internal corrosion. As also discussed, we have paid VERY close attention to this occuring out in the field and have taken several steps to find out why. We have taken water samples from several of the jobsites where this has occured as well as a real close look at the possible contributory things that the system itself can cause. I have discussed most of these things here and at other sites.
As discussed in previous posts, yes things like uninsulated mains, lack of venting and unattended excessive water makeup can kill steam boilers rather quickly regardless of the brand. One of the primary reasons you folks in your part of Mass. see this happening more often also has to due with the fact that Burnham Steam boilers were installed with greater frequency than other areas so just by percentages you will be seeing more failures. As I stated in all of the previous posts, we have not been resting on our laurels waiting for this problem to go away. We have been exploring the whys of this by sending engineers to your area and to a handful of other areas where this happened with greater frequency than anywhere else. We also brought several of these boilers back and sent them out to independent laboratories for analysis (a very expensive procedure I must add). Most of the people that monitor these sites can support me in saying that they may not see this happening in their geographical areas.

With that in mind, we concentrated on what may be different about your geographical area than other areas where it does not happen. The one common denominator happens to be the water. It was not so much the water itself but what is in the water which ended up being higher than normal chloride levels. This is also something that we have been closely monitoring regarding stainless steel Indirect Heaters failing sooner than desired. With the indirects we began providing glass lined tanks to use where clhoride levels are high. With the steam boilers the answer is now MegaSteam.
What we did find is that in areas with higher than normal chloride levels a process was occuring within the steam dome of the boiler called "Temperature Induced Chloride Activated Graphitic Corrosion". This reaction is something that begins with high chlorides in the water and is accelerated by heat or contact of the vertical and upper horizontal surfaces in the steam dome with the flue gasses. It is the contact with the flue gasses that triggers this process and once the ball gets rolling you just can't stop it. Yes it happens with other brands of steam boilers as well but possibly less often for reasons I will explain.
Now you ask, what is going to make the MegaSteam different than any other boiler out there currently being used for steam? The difference is the flue gas passageway design. This is a horizontal passageway three pass boiler where all contact with flue gasses is below the steam surfaces. There is absolutely no flue gas contact with the cast iron surfaces that have steam on the other side. If you take away the HEAT you no longer have "Heat Induced Chloride Activated Graphitic Corrosion".
You also ask why this is not happening to some of the older boilers that have been out there for years and years as well as other brands of similar vertical pinned flue design. As far as the

newer ones go, they are also susceptible but due to variances in exposed surfaces, pin location and iron thickness it just takes longer. They are all prone due to flue gasses being on the other side of the section walls and dome. As far as the older boilers are concerned, the wall thicknesses were much greater and the exchange of flue gas temperature was not as pronouced due to wider passageways and ribbed surfaces instead of pinned surfaces. In otherwords they just were not as darn efficient. Most of the flue gas temperature was simply going up the chimney.
We also took a close look at the design of some of the much, much older boilers thant have been out there operating on steam for say 50 to 100 years. Many of these had a common denominator as well. That common denominator is the rear outlet for flue gasses below the water level. They were of either 2-pass or 3-pass design, not very efficient due to the area of the passageways, but none the less below the water line. With all of this in mind we are now glad to introduce the MegaSteam boiler. It is the most efficient steam boiler out there and with protection from the Chloride Activated Corrosion by design....three pass flue gas flow. The testing we have done with this has shown no signs whatsoever of the trigger that starts the chloride corrosion process rolling......heat. That's why we are also the first company to step up to the plate with a warranty that covers internal corrosion.
Keep in mind that even with the MegaSteam system issues such as uninsulated mains, lack of venting and unmonitored excessive water makeup still have to be paid attention to. We address this in the I&O manual and even go as far as to show a water meter installed on the makeup water line in the I&O drawings. Sorry for the longer than lengthy post and explanation, but I thought you were entitled to it. Thanks for your continued support Heaterman and others.

The distributors now have their pricing and related information and several have orders in already. These are in production and some may begin to roll ot as early as this week. They will all be shipped out Knocked Down with an assembled block, cartoned jacket and all other related items all enclosed on the same pallet. All I ask is to be patient as the reaction to this boiler being introduced has been outstanding. You will see them very shortly. For now they will all be equipped with the Beckett AFG with other burner options to follow. Thanks again!
Glenn Stanton Manager of Training Burnham Hydronics U.S. Boiler Co., Inc. 2006