Adding SurgeX

BoilerGunk

I have an old Superior steam boiler that is powered by natural gas. It's getting to that time of year where I want to make sure we are running.

I had a wonderful person who taught me a lot but he passed away. He swore by Surgex and he would unscrew the pressure safety valve and pour the powder in.

I did the usual maintenance. I opened the ball valve on the LWCO and flushed the system. Sight glass is now clear. The LWCO fires off.

I am extremely hesitant to unscrew the safety valve because I don't have a wrence that big and I am so concerned about cracking the cast iron or stripping the thread.

There is another port. On the return pipe, there is an opening. I believe it is either a manual way to add water if my auto feed stops working or an overflow. I learned of this port when my LWCO did not stop. Water came out of there. I did add a 6" nipple to it so if that ever happened again, it wouldn't spill directly on the boiler.

Do you think it is fine to add to this port?

Jamie Hall

Don't see why not.

ethicalpaul

I'd rather add into the boiler instead of into the wet return, but either way the stuff will get into the boiler. I don't like SurgeX however. I use 8-way

When I added SurgeX to my boiler, surging occurred:

https://youtu.be/GXy67aziqZI

STEAM DOCTOR

8-way for the win. Just be aware that you might dislodge sludge, which will need to be drained out and flushed up at some point.

BoilerGunk

I bit the bullet and undid the safety valve. Added the SurgeX and now firing for 15 minutes. Cast iron scares the crap out of me but I was gentle. So far so good