such a thing as 'overflow holding tank' for oil burners?

John@Reliable_10

David, what you have is as Firedragon said an old open expanison tank. This didn't have oil in it but had water.Could have been used even with gas. Most of the time there were two pipes one tied into boiler system and one that was an overflow pipe. If piping has been removed from system remove tank from attic also if you like.

D107

Mystery: 'overflow holding tank' for oil burners?

on the top floor of my 1924 colonial hot water heating system house i found a 3-4" hole in a closet ceiling adjacent to the bathroom. Since the sink is unvented (but the toilet and shower are) I assumed that when the central AC was installed and improperly drained into the waste stack in the attic, that that 3" hole was the old sink vent line. the formers owners tell me:

"there was some sort of overflow holding tank in that closet that was part of the oil heating system that was removed at the time we had the gas furnace installed and disconnected from the oil tank in the cellar."

I can figure out where the old oil tank feed line was, and where the adjacent tank vent used to be, but would they have run another pipe all the way upstairs as some other kind of vent?

David

Firedragon_4

That's an

old open system expansion tank, rip it out!

Climate Creator

Like these???

These are in the next house I am doing, Nice huh?

D107

open expansion tank purpose

thanks for the education. the system was long ago removed. can i assume that this tank was a safety against overflowing if the boiler feed malfunctioned and kept adding water. Not sure why it couldn't have been on the ground level...

Also one end connected to boiler and the other would be to a waste line? I guess you're saying it's good they took it out, even though it could have been used with my newer gas fired weil-mclain. I guess boilers are made smarter these days and don't need such devices.

David