Burnham America Series 4 (1978) Saveable or Move on?

Precaud

Sounds to me like you're pretty close. What you don't want is the slow, lazy yellow flames that happen when the mix is way too rich. The soot buildup suggests that is what you might have had before. Have you located the air adjustment(s)?

When the gas guy came to my place last season, he tested mine and said it was a clean as he has seen. I told him I had adjusted the air controls for "the least amount of air that results in the least amount of yellow at the top". He said that made sense and was probably a good rule of thumb. You might give that a try.

mattmia2

Yellow can bee too little oxygen or just sodium in the air. It needs to be set with a combustion analyzer.

Chris_L

I don't know about NY, but here in MA, you can have a free energy audit of your house done through an energy efficiency program paid for by the utilities.
They'll do a combustion efficiency (and draft) test of your boiler as part of that.
(And if the CO is too high, they'll call in the gas company, which might want to shut your boiler down.)

EBEBRATT-Ed

Flame looks ok but that doesn't mean much. But you will get some yellow in the flame if you are moving around the boile that is from dust you sit up makes the flame go yellow a little that is normal.

I agree with @ethicalpaul

You might try finding a good oil tech with a combustion test set up. I thought of that myself earlier but didn't mention it

JUGHNE

FWIW, I just watched a Utube with snooted up burners and tubes.

It turns out the gas valve was not closing completely and there was a small yellow flame burning after the gas valve was powered down.
Not impossible that that did happen with your old valve.
Not every firing but it can occur.

EdTheHeaterMan

The yellow at the top of the flame may be burning off some residual carbon ( soot) that you missed in your cleaning. You did an excellent job cleaning BTW. But every one will miss some. Nobody is perfect.

Getting a combustion analysis might come from a guy that does service calls for small oil dealers who don’t do their own service tech on the payroll. I was one of those guys, and i also worked on gas heat.

Precaud

mattmia2 said:

Yellow can bee too little oxygen or just sodium in the air. It needs to be set with a combustion analyzer.

I wasn't suggesting something to replace combustion analysis, just something he could try before they arrive. Surely you understood that.

SuperTech

Call Air Professional Associates (APA) they are out of North Salem, they will service Eastchester. Ask for a senior tech, I know they provide their employees with Testo Testo combustion analysis equipment. They should be able to figure out what's going on and if that boiler is safe to use. 

motoguy128

Precaud said:

Around here if you call the gas co and report a possible combustion issue they send out a tech with a combustion analyzer, at no charge.

Haha. Around here they come out, check CO and then red tape it an tell customer to call HVAC company, they don’t want to take any liability. They’ve red tagged for normal minor draft hood rollout on warm weather days too.

adrian123

Had to wait a while for an appointment, but had a technician from Air Professional Associates come yesterday to assess the boiler and test it. He tested the gas valve and did a combustion test. He put the probe in the draft hood and got 2% O2, 10.8% CO2 and 3293 CO PPM (!), read doesn't say the flue temp, just -OC-. He said that the boiler might be on the underfired side but he was reluctant to adjust it. Not sure of the numbers but my take away was that he thought it was borderline.

He recommended that we install a duct to run fresh air to the boiler as the combustion air mix is, in his opinion, the cause of the CO issue. But he didn't say stop running it, just wanted to confirm we have CO monitors in the house. We do have multiple ones, with the Kiddie KN-COEG-3 next to the boiler in the basement showing a highest reading of 17 PPM. What do you folks recommend, shut this thing down and replace, shut it down and wait until we get the ducting in and see what happens?

SuperTech

I'm glad that APA was able to get to you and perform the combustion analysis.  My personal opinion is that equipment is unsafe to operate with those levels of CO. Has anything changed inside the structure that would affect the makeup air to the boiler? O2% is way too low. Did he take draft readings? Measuring draft overfire and in the flue is crucial. 

adrian123

I confess I have been going around the basement plugging up where I feel cold air coming in. We have a gas dryer and gas hot water heater in the basement also. The boiler and heater used to be closed off in a small utility room, which I am now thinking may have contributed to the soot build up over time (?), but I ripped all that out and the basement is just one open room.

Would the fan in a can/ducting option potentially resolve this, or am I chasing a lost cause? The tech did recommend to do the fan in a can regardless, I'm waiting on the quote from them for that.

Chris_L

As @SuperTech said, you need to get the draft measurements. Did the tech give them to you? And have you had the duct work and chimney inspected?

I'd check these things out before doing anything else.

adrian123

thanks both, they said they send me the report via email but I haven’t gotten it yet, will call them first thing Monday to ask. 

I haven’t been able to get anyone in to look at the chimney yet because of how busy they are this time of year. Won’t have a chimney company to us until January 10th.

SteamCoffee

The cleaner that does the trick is Easy Off Heavy Duty oven cleaner WITH conditions. It’s active ingredient is Lye, and essentially wears off as it eats carbon. It’s VERY STRONG , but harmless to cast iron and plastics. It WILL destroy aluminum, tin and brass faster than you believe. Lye was a fixture around every house in the old days, especially when making soap. The usual precautions would include 1)Ventilation- a nice draft will suffice. 2) insuring NOTHING other than cast iron gets sprayed. 3) SERIOUS eye and skin protection etc. 4) no ignition sources. It has thickeners in it, so it will stick to vertical surfaces. Rinse with water, but the residues will be significantly weaker than when applied. Great stuff if used properly. I’ve used lye to clean an internally VERY choked up boiler.....miracle worker...

EBEBRATT-Ed

@adrian123

You readings are awful. You need a tech with instruments who will check the boiler and adjust if needed. You not going to run out of combustion air that fast. Run it with windows and doors open. Once you prove that the boiler will run you can address the combustion air if need be.

Why waste money on duct work when you don't know if that's the problem?