New to Harman SF-260

 
newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Sat. Nov. 01, 2014 3:42 pm

OK I will flip the bricks here as soon as everything cools completely and its safe to do so. I will double check 160 dimensions that is a good idea but I believe that it is one grate less than the 260 so maybe I took it down one grate too much.

I am going to have some humble pie and say maybe the blower idea was part of the problem too. I had to have the flapper on the blower almost closed so that I didn't overfire the system and I had to pulse the blower as to not overfire the system. Then when the fire was dying the blower was running but it looks like the door on the blower may have closed more, don't know if it was vibration from the motor running or if I bumped it when doing the shakedown last night or what but if the blower was running with the flapper closed it would not have been able to let any air in and I don't know exactly what would have happened especially when stack temp dropped low enough to not allow proper draft. also I am wondering if that caused the coal to burn away quicker by blowing it. I have removed the blower and went back to origional flapper and origional controls. I would rather fight just one problem (possible draft issue) than add more and hell the people that designed this system would have put a blower on it if it needed to be there right?? I thought it would help when I had a low draft but maybe a draft inducer fan would be better for that if I need something since that is what it was designed for.

 
coalder
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Post by coalder » Sat. Nov. 01, 2014 4:27 pm

I think you are on the right track now. I don't feel there is anything wrong with your stove; it's just a matter of figuring that firebox reducer out. You definitely need a deep coal bed and 4" brick on the horizontal are at least half of the problem. Now looking at the photos it appears that you have a walkout basement, and that the boiler is on that floor. And the cleanout is on the outside below the thimble. Correct?? I ask this because I have seen some crazy things in the past. Like I posted previously, check out Harman sf260 firebox reducer by CAP in google area of this forum. If you fabricate one yourself, make sure it is completely sealed by whatever means necessary. I went through hell last year figuring out my unit, so I understand the frustration.
Jim

 
newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Sat. Nov. 01, 2014 8:15 pm

Your assessment is correct, my furnace is in a walkout basement right inside the man door seen in the pic and the cleanout is on the outside below the thimble. I am going to wait till monday to work on the furnace because I am going to the steelers game tomorrow and have company tonight. GO STEELERS. On Monday I am going to flip the brick to get a deeper bed and alter my reducer. I am going to make it only one grate smaller instead of two and I am going to cement the bottom two rows together. Thanks everyone for your time and for your thoughts on this. I actually do feel better about this now than I did this am even though I haven't done a thing yet to it. I am glad to have such a great resource here to ask questions and hope that with your help I can successfully heat my home this year with coal. Thanks agian to everyone and I will keep you posted when I fire this thing back up.

 
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Post by I luv coal » Sun. Nov. 02, 2014 12:06 am

I have an SF-260 for the past 7 years. Located in upstate New York near Binghamton. I burn nut coal. 7 to 9 tons. I have a similar hook up and chimney height to yours. Manometer readings similar. And about the same square footage heated.

I do not even light the boiler until it stays consistently below 40F. I only have problems with out fires or CO alarms if the temps are in the fifties. The unit is also hard to use with wood unless it is the coldest of winter. If the SF260 idles at all on wood expect a chimney fire. I only will burn nut coal in the unit. I find the manometer useful but the barometric damper has been taken out. It just stole precious draft

The lower air vent is less that a quarter open. The upper ones have one closed and one opened about 1/8" to allow air in to burn off the volatiles. I shortened the temp spread on the aquastat between the Hi water value control and the low water value control. .This keeps the boiler cycling more often. The boiler is burning a bit more consistently. Fuel use is stable. The sf-260 justs runs happilee all winter. She gets fed 40 pounds of anthracite twice a day .


 
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Razzler
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Post by Razzler » Sun. Nov. 02, 2014 10:23 am

How deep is you coal bed? You should be loadin it up to the top of the brick and even a little higher. If you go over the brick some it's not going to hurt anything.

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newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Tue. Nov. 04, 2014 6:50 pm

Thanks again to everyone for their comments. I did add a second row of bricks to the firebox to deepen the bed even though it sounds like from multiple threads on NEPA that it actually isn't necessary and you can have coal piled above firebrick with this boiler since the water jacket will pull the heat from the steel. I actually debated just piling the coal against firebox thinking maybe it would allow more heat to go into the water without the insulation of the firebrick but I did end up adding the extra row. It looked like it was easier to just add another row than flip them vertical but I did cut the side brick tight so that it will hopefully hold without any brackets. I also reduced the fire box reducer. I am now only reduced one grate to make it more the size of the sf160. I did not use the steel plate because I was worried that with it I could not get as good of a seal. I cemented the first three rows of firebrick together and cemented the perimeter to seal it as good as I can. I know this will make it harder the day that I have to replace any of my firebrick but that day isn't today and right now it seems more important to make sure I have a good seal and no air is going through my reduced area.

Razzler... It is wierd that the document states that 10 inches is to the top of the firebrick on a sf260 when it definitely isn't. Wonder if they originally had bricks vertical and flipped them horizontal. It states that 10 inches is far above brick line in 160 so this does somewhat bring home the fact that you can pile the coal higher than the firebrick without a problem as per manufacturers instructions.
I luv coal wrote:I have an SF-260 for the past 7 years. Located in upstate New York near Binghamton. I burn nut coal. 7 to 9 tons. I have a similar hook up and chimney height to yours. Manometer readings similar. And about the same square footage heated.

I do not even light the boiler until it stays consistently below 40F. I only have problems with out fires or CO alarms if the temps are in the fifties. The unit is also hard to use with wood unless it is the coldest of winter. If the SF260 idles at all on wood expect a chimney fire. I only will burn nut coal in the unit. I find the manometer useful but the barometric damper has been taken out. It just stole precious draft

The lower air vent is less that a quarter open. The upper ones have one closed and one opened about 1/8" to allow air in to burn off the volatiles. I shortened the temp spread on the aquastat between the Hi water value control and the low water value control. .This keeps the boiler cycling more often. The boiler is burning a bit more consistently. Fuel use is stable. The sf-260 justs runs happilee all winter. She gets fed 40 pounds of anthracite twice a day .
I was hoping to not use nearly that much coal but I think it may be a little colder where you are so maybe I will use less (keeping my fingers crossed").
I was thinking that maybe a lot of my problems are a result of the warm temps and was actually planning on trying to wait till it got a little colder before I try again but it is actually hard waiting when im impatient and have a new "Toy"...

Weather is too warm to try to burn anything now so I will update people more when I actually get to light it off again.
Thanks again to everyone for your suggestions.

 
newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Thu. Nov. 20, 2014 7:28 am

Ok so here is what I have done since the last post...
-Increased Height of Chimney 2 feet in an attempt to increase draft (helps some but still low draft during extended idle)
Had CO monitor go off again when fire was idling for an extended period.
-Added a draft inducer to stove pipe. My concerns with the draft inducer is that even with the draft inducer set to its slowest speed it still pulls .07 inches wc with baro set as sensitive as it will go. I think that this will pull too much heat up the chimney as wasted BTU's. In an attempt to resolve all concerns I installed a PLC and differential Pressure Sensor. The Differential Pressure Sensor monitors the draft and if the draft drops below .02 inches wc then I automatically turn on draft inducer for a period of time. Currently the time is set to 50 seconds but I am going to change this to 3 minutes or so. My thinking is that this way I will reduce the possibility of outfires during long idles due to a low amount of air through firebox, reduce (hopefully eliminate) the possibility of CO due to improper draft, and since the draft will not be at .07 inches wc (as it would with the inducer running full time) I should not considerably increase the amount of fuel consumption etc.

I am going to design a control board that will replace the PLC but want to test this out and determine exactly how I want it to operate before I design and build a circuit board for this.

When I get the install straightened up a little I will post some pics but right now its a mess cause I was throwing things together to try it out.

Any thoughts or comments?

 
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michaelanthony
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Post by michaelanthony » Thu. Nov. 20, 2014 7:50 am

Why not slow down the draft inducer even more with a proper contol -.07 is not that far from home!


 
newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Thu. Nov. 20, 2014 8:23 am

The only reason it is only -.07 is because the baro damper is open, it would be significantly higher than that otherwise. This is the slowest setting of the inducer. I can try to find a different rheostat to allow the inducer to be slowed down more but I don't know how slow it can go with different rheostat

 
newcoaljunkie
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Post by newcoaljunkie » Tue. Dec. 09, 2014 8:41 pm

Okay so I haven't posted any followups on this in quite some time so I figured I would update this and hope it helps someone in the future that had the same problem I had. Since adding the draft inducer and controller to turn the inducer on and off based on draft the system has been working great and honestly has been extremely easy to manage. I believe that the keys to my success with this boiler were

1. Getting a deeper coal bed. I did this by flipping the bricks as many others have done.
2. Fire box reduction- For my home a fire box reducer that removed one grate from the system was the best. This was done by flipping the grate and covering with fire brick. I used fireplace cement to cement together the first three rows of fire brick to reduce air bypassing my coal bed as recommended by other members
3. Draft inducer with controls to monitor draft. If draft drops below .02 " H20 the draft inducer is turned on for 3 minutes. After 3 minutes the inducer is switched off and the monitor begins again. I could have run the inducer all the time but a lot of time my draft is fine, however there are times that for whatever reason my draft drops off the map. If anyone is interested in the controller or would be interested in setting up a similar system and want more information on what I did let me know and I would be glad to help but it seems that most people are happier just reducing the draft inducer speed and running it all the time.

Since adding the draft inducer control I have been running the sf260 for several weeks and it has been so simple. The inducer even helps in the times that I am not able to shake down the system for more than 12 hours. My theory is that the reduced flow through the coal bed decreases stack temp and therefore reduces the draft. This turns on the blower and keeps the system hot enough that when I get to shake it down it can easily be shaken and coal added in no more time really than any other addition of coal. The system has run through some 50 degree days and even ran through a day that was almost 70 with no issues of CO since the inducer turns on automatically when the draft gets low.
My wife is happy and keeps it quite warm in the house. My kids get too hot and want to run around in diapers, but I would take that over being too cold or CO issues.
I typically use 1/2 to 1 bucket of coal twice a day. Generally I am closer to the 1/2 bucket twice a day but there have been times that I was closer to the 1 bucket twice a day.

Overall I am very happy with my setup and purchase. A month ago I was ready to get rid of the damn thing and now I would rather get rid of the oil furnace lol. Anyway thanks again to everyone on here for all of your help and I hope that my turmoil can help someone in the future. The furnace is great and no that my setup is where it needs to be I look forward to staying warm through whatever mother nature has to throw at us.

Oh one other note... Puff back is a real thing to anyone that has read some of the threads and thought well I haven't seen that...
Leaving one corner of the firebox uncovered and burning well when adding coal as others have suggested seems to work for me. If I am home and have time I will leave that corner uncovered longer than necessary and go back an hour or two later and cover that side but in the AM before leaving for work I wait till it looks like the rest of the coal bed is well engulfed with flames before I cover the last corner. If I run out of time and the rest of the coal bed has not been fully engulfed in flames before I have to leave I will just leave that corner uncovered and I haven't had a problem with it yet.

 
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Post by titleist1 » Wed. Dec. 10, 2014 7:43 am

:dancing:
Great news that you were able to make the adjustments necessary to make it work so well for you!!

Also thanks for posting the follow up with the results!! This will be a great reference for future use as others fight the same battle you did.

I am interested in some details on your draft inducer controls set up. Would you be willing to start another thread with a few pics and description? Again it would be a nice bit of info for others to refer to in the future. Somebody might be able to use a part of the design (or the whole thing) in their system someday.

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