Boiler Won't Make Temperature!

After seeing the size and age of your house, yes, that
is a mystery. You should be in your underwear at full fire.

Buckslayer wrote: Aquastat settings are:
Hi 180
Lo 160
Diff 10

Oil man said baro is wide open when its firing, can't lower draft much more. It's .14 at the breach.
As well the flue pipe isn't that hot. I'm not sure to be exact but I can hold my hand to it.

.14" WC draft yeah partner, if you have any doors not sealing good on that fire box, you are definitely loosing heat up the chimney Even if the flue pipe isn't burning your hand, you could have a high volume of heated air going up the chimney.. I would check your ash pan door gaskets for sealing good along with any where else that air can get into that combustion chamber..

Poconoeagle wrote:Did the oil unit use the same circulator pump and baseboard zones?
Why the secondary air open?

Yes the oil boiler was piped the same, he merely cut out the oil boiler and tied in the feed and return to what was there.
I don't see the problem, the old unit was 80000 BTU output. The Leisure Line boiler is advertised at 110000 with 90% efficiency. I should be able to get 99000 output.

Secondary air?

yes I agree.. it does sound like the draft is quite high...if its .14

Rob R. wrote:It sounds like you don't have enough combustion air. 4-5 lbs per hour of feed is never going to provide good performance. Have you called LL to get their input?

I hate to say it (only my opinion) but even under ideal conditions your boiler is marginally sized for that load and radiation. There is no buffer to allow for extreme weather, or less than ideal coal.

I agree about not enough air, but there is no adjustment.

At an advertised output of 99000 BTU this is 19000 BTU larger than my old boiler, that never had an issue.

Poconoeagle wrote:yes I agree.. it does sound like the draft is quite high...if its .14

I have a good chimny. It's .14 at the breach but between the boiler and barometric damper it's .05
When its a bit warmer and not as windy it's about .08

Buckslayer wrote:I agree about not enough air, but there is no adjustment. At an advertised output of 99000 BTU this is 19000 BTU larger than my old boiler, that never had an issue.

During UL testing we ran the boiler flat out for two days and used an average 65# of coal per boiler operation shift, the output was measured using a flat plate heat exchanger and a flow meter, out put of the boiler was between 85,000 and 101,000 btuh depending on how clean the heat exchanger was. There are lots of variables when trying to get the maximum efficiency out of a unit burning a solid fuel, the first of which is properly adjusting the high fire and idle fire, secondly how often the tubes, economizers, diffuser and combustion areas are cleaned is a large factor, lastly the caloric content of the coal is important, there are coal suppliers out there who mix in less pure anthracite which ultimately affects the output. For the purpose of answering this thread I will address other issues including the one raised regarding combustion air.

At -.14" draft you are too high (the breech is the boiler outlet, so excuse me if I misunderstood your post), although the combustion air issue is a possible cause as well. If you open the small round view port door above the glass and look at the flames, they should be above the diffuser, flickering around the edge and over the top. If not there is an issue with fire size, also how much fuel is burned in one 24 hour period? For the boiler to be at full output with coal valued at 13,000 BTU per # you will have to burn around 205 # if the boiler is running flat out and not keeping up. We have had several discussions with customers over the past week with the colder weather stressing their systems. We have found a possible issue with the performance of the 60cfm combustion fan which is related to coal size and static pressure in the plenum under the grate. If the coal is as deep as it should be (up to the sides of the grate) there could be too much blockage with the smaller rice coal sizes.

We are researching a larger combustion fan and working to get them in stock, all customers who have issues with fire size will be offered the larger fan free of charge. Please contact me via PM or call us at the shop at [Phone Number Removed] if you have concerns related to this thread.

Thank you all for your patience, as always we will not rest until the situation is fully understood and solved.

Matthaus,

As of this morning my boiler is spotless. Me and my buddy cleaned the boiler down to bare metal.
I've had the same problems burning Reading and Blashack. I've burned 100 pounds per day for the last week and can't burn any more. How can I make the boiler burn 200 pounds per day? If I touch the screw in any more I throw burning coal into the ashpan. I can only burn half of this!
My draft right now is .04 at the boiler and .09 at the chimny.
I have NEVER seen the flame go over the diffuser only seen it as high as touching it slightly. The coal only goes up about half way up the sides of the grate as well.

So how do I make this burn twice the coal that I am now!???

Hows the seals on the doors? Did you attempt the dollar bill test? Shut a dollar bill in the doors on the boiler and see how much effort it takes to pull it out. Do this around the full perimeter of any doors on the boiler.. Extra air coming in thru the doors WILL cannibalize your heat right up the chimney..

Lightning wrote:Hows the seals on the doors? Did you attempt the dollar bill test? Shut a dollar bill in the doors on the boiler and see how much effort it takes to pull it out. Do this around the full perimeter of any doors on the boiler.. Extra air coming in thru the doors WILL cannibalize your heat right up the chimney..

The only door is for the ash pan. Checked it out there's no leak.

I'm definatly not losing heat up the chimny. I just can't burn enough coal fast enough to make 100000 btu.

Rob R. wrote:Does it matter which way the combustion fan rotates?

The WL110 blower can only turn the correct rotation, the larger fan is going to provide a solution for those of you needing to burn more coal. We will hopefully have them in stock next week if all the stars line up.

just a silly question,but does the boiler get to 180 degrees without a load on it.