Don't see this every day.

Older than most people alive!

We do not permit conversion burners as the boiler/burner combination would have to have on sit certification. BTW, it also requires a liner.

Henry, you really need to know what you're reading. Here is Charlie's quote:

"PEG 30 OR A PIN 3"

PEG 30 is a Weil-McLain atmospheric gas boiler.

PIN 3 is a Burnham atmospheric gas boiler.

Charlie never said he was going to use a conversion burner on this job.

Anyway, we've already discussed the conversion burner issue. Plenty of jurisdictions in the U.S. permit these units, and as they gain traction I'm sure they will gain greater acceptance. They are popular enough that there was a seminar/discussion on them at OESP Hershey- first time that's happened to my knowledge.

Besides, boiler companies like Columbia and Slant/Fin have approved the use of gas conversion burners in their wet-base residential boilers.

You can disapprove of conversion burners all you want, just like you disapprove of not ripping out or converting steam systems, but that doesn't affect us.

Charlie from wmass said:

My father hated gad power burners because he never came across one installed properly. That is until I started installing them.

That makes all the difference!

But, it was supposedly no different than the product currently on the market. Cast iron sectional pinned boiler. Same ratings as current models. I have to admit, the difference may be that the atmospheric was firing well below the rated capacity. I have been advised by some of the pros that some atmospherics do very poorly in this mode of operation. The wet base power burner unit seems to love being under fired.

Hatterasguy said:

I think these mod-cons with intake air plumbed from outside the conditioned space provide the huge benefits in fuel consumption as compared to an older atmospheric unit. The 10% in combustion efficiency certainly doesn't offer it.

I believe most of the benefits come from modulation (when properly sized.) Thermal equilibrium is a wonderful thing.

With my old Pennco, after installing tunstall inlet orifices on all of the radiator valves, I had to reduce the firing rate to maintain an 8 oz pressure at the boiler. The orifices were sized based on 8 oz pressure and although I had already repaired all of the traps, I decided to go with orifices as a means to achieve even steam distribution, which has been a problem, and was completely remedied by the orifices.

When the new boiler was installed and fired up, the firing rate needed to maintain 8 oz of pressure in the mains was 34% less than the old boiler. Nothing else had changed. When gas bills are analyzed, looking at selected months from old and new boiler, finding months with exactly the same average temperature and the same number of days in the billing cycle, again, we see a 34% reduction in usage. I was advised by one of the pros that my old Pennco boiler had a LOT of excess air when the firing rate was reduced and would have a big loss in efficiency as a result.

Of course, there were many problems with the near boiler piping on the old boiler too. Other changes on the new system were the use of crossover traps to vent and a master check valve on the system vent point, so that air was kept out and the system draws a vacuum between firing.

The old boiler had 2 14" diameter flues connected to the chimney and heat continued to roll out of the boiler during the off cycles. The boiler room does have a combustion air supply the opens only when the boiler is firing. No change with that before or after the new boiler was installed. However, the new boiler burner has a draft plate that closes when the boiler is not firing, stopping all draft and standby losses up the flue.

I don't know exactly what accounts for the increase in efficiency. I tried to apply everything I learned from this site on the new install. We selected a company that did superb work in putting all of the near boiler piping together. I think the result is a combination of everything.

Anyway, I didn't mean to hijack the thread, was just commenting that I installed a we based boiler with a gas power burner, and that the results were VERY good.