What’s the issue?

JohnRambo76

I posted here a month ago about my new Utica peg112 install, many gave their opinions and what I could do better and such, much appreciated. My near boiler piping looked fine to most…my issue is SURGING still. The last two skims were done by the book according to Utica, used my cooper temp probe to maintain 180-200 degree water while skimming meaning I run the boiler to maintain temp here and there for less than a min each time for the couple hours each skim. The unit hasn’t ran much due to the warm temps but has had consecutive days at points of running. With fresh water following a skim the unit runs fantastic, no hissing vents or surging or water getting sucked up in the header, just a steady bounce. After a few days you can see oily residue in the sight glass with bubbles trapped underneath and the sucking of water into the header sound starts and some knocking ensues when running. Never does the surging trigger lwco but goes down to about 1” in sight glass. Utica doesn’t say not to use chemicals but just recommends skimming to clean. I have a total of 10 hours of skimming…I even did a 5 min skim to remove a top layer of oil after hearing the surging start and just that quick skim eliminated the issue….should I consider KEK? I might have been too liberal with the blue monster dope which blows out the sight glass doing a blow down.

mattmia2

Adding a horizontal reducer to your skim port could help raise the skim level a little bit and let the oil from all of the sections float off more easily. If there is a lot of dope in there it might take the steam a while to melt all of it and bring it in to the boiler. Running with detergent for a bit could help.

JohnRambo76

mattmia2 said:

Adding a horizontal reducer to your skim port could help raise the skim level a little bit and let the oil from all of the sections float off more easily. If there is a lot of dope in there it might take the steam a while to melt all of it and bring it in to the boiler. Running with detergent for a bit could help.

It didn’t cross my mind when applying the dope, along with that thread wick and tape I was just concerned about making a leak proof seal…the amount of a skimming is just concerning to me, then again I’m an inpatient person. I’ll keep skimming but hoping someone could recommend a cleaner to use for a Utica if that matters.

STEAM DOCTOR

Just my two cents. Put some eight-way or scale master into the boiler. Fire the boiler until nice and hot. Maybe 20-30 minutes. Flush boiler. From drain on bottom. Repeat a few times. Fire boiler and see what happens. Good possibility you will need more skimming afterwards

mattmia2

Look at the manual as well. I remember someone mentioned one of these lower end boilers had smaller connections between sections than the outlet such that if you didn't use a reducer on the skim port the surface of the water was below where the internal connections between the sections were. I think that boiler showed the reducer on the skim port in the manual. It certainly wouldn't hurt and might help a lot to reduce the skim port such that the skim level is near the center of that side tapping.

Steamhead

mattmia2 said:

Look at the manual as well. I remember someone mentioned one of these lower end boilers had smaller connections between sections than the outlet such that if you didn't use a reducer on the skim port the surface of the water was below where the internal connections between the sections were. I think that boiler showed the reducer on the skim port in the manual. It certainly wouldn't hurt and might help a lot to reduce the skim port such that the skim level is near the center of that side tapping.

You're thinking of a Dunkirk. This isn't the same unit.

JohnRambo76

Steamhead said:

Look at the manual as well. I remember someone mentioned one of these lower end boilers had smaller connections between sections than the outlet such that if you didn't use a reducer on the skim port the surface of the water was below where the internal connections between the sections were. I think that boiler showed the reducer on the skim port in the manual. It certainly wouldn't hurt and might help a lot to reduce the skim port such that the skim level is near the center of that side tapping.

You're thinking of a Dunkirk. This isn't the same unit.

Utica peg112 manual shows skimming from the 2” port

EBEBRATT-Ed

@JohnRambo76

First look in the manual and find out how much water the boiler holds in gallons. Then add 1 lb of TSP for every 50 gallons of boiler water.

so if the boiler holds say 10 gallons of water use 1/10 of a lb of tsp. Mix the tsp in hot water add it to the boiler and skim as usual.

When done let the boiler cool, drain the boiler fill with fresh water drain refill and start. You need tsp to get the oil out. I would not use any other chemicals