new boiler bid

flange

i was asked to look at installing a boiler at a school/church. the reason for this was because the current boiler couldnt maintain temp. they wanted to split the system out from primary secondary with four zones, pneumatic outdoor reset etc. to remove one zone from this and put it on its own boiler, hoping this would allow the system to get to setpoint. i walked in the door and found that the existing boiler hadnt had any maint done for at least ten years. Powerflame duel fuel setup. there were no prints, no stamped drawings, yet they already had two other bids! i spent about an hour and explained to the group why they didnt need the new boiler, told them i'd be happy to bring their current system back to proper working order and left. on the way out they offered to show me how they fixed the problem with the sanctuary unit. the outside air dampers were frozen shut on this makeup air unit, so they removed the belts on the exhaust fan. so when they start the makeup air fan it pulls the boiler room to a negative, nice fix! I really dont understand how the other guys could sleep at night. My guess is that their current boiler is running at most fifty percent due to the terrible operating condition.

Al Letellier

church boiler

It's a sad state of affairs, isn't it. This happens more time than I care to remember. We did a church job years ago that had a 600MBH boiler with two tankless coils to feed 200MBH load, two lavs and one kitchen sink. The other two bidders quoted exact replacement boilers (both oil companies) and were going to leave in the old Thrush circulators. Our bid (1/2 the others) was originally rejected as being too low, but with some persuassion and a quarentee of fuel savings, we installed a 6 section Weil with a 20 gal Boilermate, heated the building just fine, and cut their fuel consumption 60%.
The trade is full of people willing to do anything to get a job, even if it's the wrong way to do it. Congrats for standing out for what you believe in. DO IT RIGHT!!!

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Fred P

why is it that churches and other religous organizations

always seem to get ripped off or get botched jobs?