AXEMAN 101 *Class Is In Session!*

Today's lesson, after searching for heat conducting compound for the immersion well stuff, nobody has it and they don't send new controls out with the little poly packs anymore. So that goes stuff is going together dry.
I think I solved the mystery of why I was able to come across a showroom fresh boiler 28 years old. I noted nothing had any wear at all. The water coil gasket is soft and resilient, won't crack if compacted. Nuts are clean as a whistle. Everything fresh as a daisy except the coal feed tube. I noticed the bearing bracket cage was a little askew, he must have bent it moving it into the basement. At the outer edge, there was a small amount of tiny metal chips in the corner near the bolt obviously coming from the coal feed tube. I'll bet when he started it up it howled like a banshee and after a day of that it's been parked ever since!

Getting closer. Friday I finished up most of the boiler's reassembly, installed the belts and gave the fan a spin..... and the feed tube belt fell on the floor. Three more tries and back on the floor each time. Twist it to a figure 8 and the belt stayed on. Some things just need to be correct on this thing. Saturday I finished it up, cut out the old Steel King hand fired and Sunday moved it out and put the Axeman in place. Picked up some 24 gauge black stovepipe, elbow and chimney adapter. I got a little lucky when I pulled the old stovepipe from the thimble. It is actually a 7" thimble so it won't be too bad. Had to order the M style baro as they don't stock them anymore. Tonight I hope to get the stovepipe in and some of the plumbing done. Hopefully I can fire this beast up by the weekend.

GREAT CAESAR'S GHOST! I switched the beast on and thought it was going to suck me up the chimney! The thing sounds like your starting the turbine in the Batmobile.

A few things left to do. Thermostat wires and I want to get some stovepipe tape, then this puppy gets lit.

I don't understand

You twisted the belt to get the correct drive direction on the part

Is the motor reversed due to some ones' replacement error? Does it drive anything else like a Squirrel cage fan, that still sort of works when its going backwords?

Yeah, that was my question too.... twisting the belt will reverse direction of rotation. If the feed tube was designed to turn the same direction as the motor, then a smaller-diameter belt will be required. If the motor was set up to run opposite direction as designed, why not remedy that little "Feature" right now?

Wooohhhhhh. The belt is designed to be twisted and run that way. DO NOT change a damned thing. You may think you were smarter than the designers, but check out the logic first. Yes. AHS did away with the twisted belt route by adding separate motors for blower and for ashing, but that is because the don't drive a feed auger with the two groove pulley that runs a twisted belt for gear box power.

AA may not be a tunable as the EFM or the new Royall, but they have been around for 70 years and still sell all they can make. You can find a 1950's unit, disassemble it and find it to be nearly perfect inside. The steel must have been better back then..... Cabinover has an AA that was neutered by removing the auger supports and gearbox, etc. and has a separate motor for the ashing grate controlled by the original anthrastat.

PS: The AA 260 fan WILL 'suck the chrome off a trailer ball! It is not a toy, or a half hearted attempt to bun coal. It is the real deal! Hope you have good demand for the BTU's generated, the puppy will idle and still make 80K!

Getting used to the tinkle/tinkle of of the auger yet?

The thing sounds like your starting the turbine in the Batmobile.

Anxiously waiting for reports on the first fire.

Sting wrote:I don't understand

You twisted the belt to get the correct drive direction on the part

Is the motor reversed due to some ones' replacement error? Does it drive anything else like a Squirrel cage fan, that still sort of works when its going backwords?

It was my error, I checked and the book shows the 260 the belt is twisted to a figure eight. The belt's motor shaft is horizontal and the gearbox is on an angle, it works perfectly that way........ oddly enough. These Axemans are a riot, to start it the first thing you need to do is fill it with ash! It is right out of Willy Wonka.

whistlenut wrote:PS: The AA 260 fan WILL 'suck the chrome off a trailer ball! It is not a toy, or a half hearted attempt to bun coal. It is the real deal! Hope you have good demand for the BTU's generated, the puppy will idle and still make 80K!

Getting used to the tinkle/tinkle of of the auger yet?

When I spun it over and the fan started ramping up, the wife ran to the cellar door and asked what I was doing down there because it sounds like the house is about to take off. The tinkle isn't bad but that blower sounds like the 250 HP Hurst boiler at work.

Sounds like the type of unit I need to heat this drafty dump here!

coaledsweat wrote:It is right out of Willy Wonka.

Has it foamed up your basement yet?

I think I have a problem. Before I set it afire, I figured I would check the draft. It runs about .08 and the baro won't open, If I hold the baro open it will drop to .07. It was worse at first and I trimmed a bit of metal off the muzzle brake or whatever that thing is in the TEE and it came down from .13. This can't be right, can it? Shouldn't it be much lower even with the blower running? The book says the draft control is for excessive natural draft, should it be this high under power?

Test???

Place a couple fire brick in the thimble to close off some of that draft

And see if it does just that

Sting wrote:Test???

Place a couple fire brick in the thimble to close off some of that draft

And see if it does just that

I put two half bricks in the thimble, the draft is .08 and the baro opens by itself now. If you close it it goes to .09.

EDIT: My brother had the mano tube touching the stovepipe, it's .13 with the blower running and it goes up .01 with the baro opened by hand. I may try trimming the pipe in the TEE again and see if it helps. It doesn't look like the bricks did a thing. I think the pipe extension is interfering with the draw to the baro.

Shouldn't the draft cut back when you fill the pot with ash and coal??

Razzler wrote:Shouldn't the draft cut back when you fill the pot with ash and coal??

You would think! I don't know how the fire stays alive once the fan goes off, doesn't the ash choke the air off?
Here is what I did. After trying a few things with the stovepipe at the baro and not getting anywhere, I decided it's too much blower for me. I took out my trusty calculator, measured the fan and motor pulleys and decided to switch them to reduce the blowers pull. I figure the fan was turning about 2K and when I changed the pulleys it dropped to about 1450 RPM. The thing is nice at that speed and pulled .02 draft cold. OK, that's better, I fired it up! Been running an hour and a half and has stopped ashing. I have all the doors open and the heat on to put a load on it as it's still about 60* here now. Every thing looks Kosher, I just need to make sure it doesn't overheat when I cut back on the thermostat. At idle the draft is .015-.02 and with the blower running it runs .02-.025, I can live with that, I think it is just running off the timer right now.