Steam Boiler Info Needed

One of my friends has a 1903 home he lives in and loves it with one exception, the steam boiler that eats oil. I see Keystoker has a steam boiler that has both coal and oil. He would rather not change out the radiators, something about charm. It is a wonderful house.Coments please!

Axeman-Anderson makes two coal stoker boilers depending on load that can be used for water OR steam.

Models NET BTU water NET BTU Steam
130M 113,000 97,500
260M 226,000 195,000

Do you know if it is a one-pipe or two-pipe steam system? If it is two-pipe, he may wish to convert it to hot water heat and keep the existing radiators, and probably gain a fair chunk of efficiency from the deal. Many of the old one-pipe systems didn't work nearly as well going from the hand-fed coal to the intermittent firing of oil without a huge loss in system efficiency.

http://www.heatinghelp.com is a great resource for just this sort of topic.

Axeman-Anderson, EFM, and Keystoker all make coal boilers that can run as hot water or steam.

I lived in a late teens/early 20's home on Long Island, NY with the original coal hand-fed boiler converted to oil. I don't recall what we were paying for oil, but it was the mid/late 80's. I'm sure well under a buck a gallon. Most of the loss of efficiency is having to heat up all that iron and water each cycle to the boiling point just to get steam to rise into the radiators. It did, however, work well and I loved having the steam radiators.

I bet with a coal stoker boiler, the idle fire would keep the water at a low 'simmer' and make for quick steaming when the t-stat calls for heat. It would be 'fun' to build a modern home but style it in the Victorian style and install a 'modern' steam system with coal. You can still get iron radiators new.......

I beleive it is a single pipe system, I'll check current size of exsisting oil unit after the first and I'll start looking into units you all mentioned. Are we looking in the right direction? Any other sugestions? Anyone using one?
Many Thanks
Bogie

If it is single pipe, it will get expensive to convert to hot water. Is there a budget number here to work with or.....?

It's my understanding the oil add-on is just that. It's not meant to be used continuously because it's not very efficient compared to a regular oil burner but certainly nice if you need it for example if you go on vacation in January. I'd check with the EFM guy he'll have more info. I can move this to the EFM forum if you want.

Check out heatinghelp.com Buy the Lost Art of Steam Heating, it's a must. There is a package deal on steam books, that I would buy.
**Broken Link(s) Removed**The AA 130 used to have the steam fittings on every boiler, now you have to specify. But a lot of older used ones are set up for either.

Yes Please do move it. Will it remain here as well? I like the feed back everyone here has as well.
This is a single pipe system we would like to keep as steam and not covert to hot water.
House photo this past Sept. with new roof and built in gutters