SunTec oil pump w TigerLoop shutting off after a couple minutes, lots of air

borisivan

Hi,

We had an oil tank replaced recently and since the new lines were higher, they installed a tiger loop in front of the furnace and hot water heater.

Since then, the hot water heater shuts off with a red light every 24-36 hours or so. The techs from the oil company come out and get it working and then it's down again. Never had any problems prior to the install of the new lines and tiger loop.

I have a video I've uploaded to youtube looking at the tiger loop throughout the process.

I held down the reset button for 3 seconds, it started running, and then I started filming. Interestingly, the burner is on and running smooth with no visible bubbles or activity up until the 58 second mark.

Then you see the introduction of very fine bubbles for a while, turning the red oil into a pink froth.

It progressively gets worse (bubble wise), if you look at 1:50 you can see enormous bubble activity (at least that's what it looks like to me).

I shut the video down shortly after that, because it ran long enough that it satisfied the pull for heat. I drained a good portion of the hot water and started again, and this time it had strong bubbles right away similar to what you see at 1:50, and I can hear it ignite and puff and repeat, the damper in the flue on the pipe is clanging back and forth, rinse and repeat for 10-15 seconds and it gives up and the red light comes on.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance!

EdTheHeaterMan

#1. Is the Bypass plug installed in the Suntec Fuel pump? You need to take apart the return connection and check with an Alan wrench
#2. Is there a large leak in the supply piping at the high point in the suction line from the tank to the tiger loop.

Only two things I can think of off the top. Will respond after looking at the video if there are other ideas.

EdTheHeaterMan

That looks like the bypass plug is installed properly in the fuel unit. The large amount of air entering the Tiger Loop is an indication of a poorly installed fuel line between the tank and the Tiger Loop inlet. Can you show a picture of the highest point in the fuel line as it exits the tank? Perhaps you can video following the path of the fuel line from the tank to the Tiger Loop. Slow down where you have fittings or valves.

borisivan

Thanks @EdTheHeaterMan ! The oil company had arrived before I read your post, and this time the tech noticed the same thing: that the bubbles right above that supply side looked like a problem.

There were 2 firematic valves in line, 1 right above the tank, and 1 further down the line before it splits into two, one line going to the furnace, one line going to the hot water heater.

With the filter on the tigerloop, and the 2 firematic valves, his initial thought was that the pump on the hot water heater might be struggling to pull. So he took that second firematic valve out of the equation and installed a new section of line where that valve was, and everything has been great since, no air bubbles.

Seems to me that it was likely a loose connection around where that valve was, as opposed to it being 'too restrictive', but I'm a novice and maybe he was right. Assuming it stays working, I'm happy, but proof will be in the pudding re: seeing if it stays stable for a few days.

EdTheHeaterMan

So your last comment left me with an unresolved query. How is the "Fixed" oil piping configured. Since you have two oil burners and you show only one tiger loop in your video, I wonder if you will be having an issue with the design. Attached are 4 possibilities that I could think of, but there are many more!

I am thinking about when you need to operate the other oil burner when it gets cold. Will that be a problem, and since that may be some time off, will you be responsible for an additional charge to fix something that is currently wrong, but will not know about it for months!

This might be a good time to get on the record for a future problem. Since your oil burners operated fine before the new tank, they should operate fine after the oil company work. Did they install only one tiger loop? Did they install 2 tiger loops... one for each burner. You can not operate two oil burners at the same time that feed from the same tiger loop. It may work for some time, but in a year or two, After any warranty on material and workmanship is long gone, you may need to ahve the oil lines completely re-piped.

Some might say that you should not need tiger loops at all. I agree in most cases, but if you have two burners then you should have 2 tiger loops or no tiger loops

borisivan

Hi @EdTheHeaterMan , yep there are 2 tiger loops, one in front of the furnace and one in front of the hot water heater. The additional (now removed) firematic and foot of pipe was a foot or two above the place where the supply pipe split in two directions towards those two appliances/tigerloops.

Furnace hasn't been on since the weather is warmer, while I've been having these problems with the hot water heater for the last 2 weeks after the new install. I had it fire up yesterday AM just before the tech showed up, to get a data point re: whether or not it was having the same problem as the hot water heater, and it stayed running, though I did see the same bubble activity in it's tigerloop. My uneducated guess is that the burner/pump on the furnace was just able to tolerate it better than the hot water heater could.

I haven't fired the furnace up again since he fixed the problem, I'll do that and see if the bubble activity on it's tigerloop is also gone.

rick in Alaska

I had that problem once with a similar setup and found the fuse valve itself was leaking air from a pinhole in the valve body. Since then, I only use the cast body style valves and not the smooth sided ones.
Rick