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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: Post some pics of your wood piles and stoves. Heres mine

« on: October 04, 2013, 12:39:33 AM »

Hey guys, it's been a while since I've been on, but I have been busy. Here is my wood setup now. Sorry, it's a video instead of pictures.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-CZfnxwJBwc#

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: Sawdust

« on: January 04, 2013, 03:41:43 AM »

When I was talking to Portage and Main about buying my boiler, the owner was trying to talk me into buying a chip burner. Knowing I had an unlimited source of sawdust, I asked if the burner would burn sawdust instead. He said that yes, they could make it burn sawdust and it would work. Not exactly empirical evidence but an option.

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Portage & Main / Re: Design "feature" of P&M

« on: January 04, 2013, 03:37:41 AM »

Good advice Scott, and I do that. Most times when I fire the boiler it's just starting to drop temperature and is down to just a few coals so I'm running right on the edge of the fire going out. The problem is, as soon as I start adding wood, I start getting smoke. One face full of smoke is enough to still be a design issue in my opinion. Maybe if I'd never run a boiler before I'd think it was normal but my old boiler didn't smoke out the door so it's really noticeable to me.

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Portage & Main / Re: Design "feature" of P&M

« on: December 30, 2012, 02:07:30 PM »

I try and load my 250 when it is cycling, just shut the blower of and load it, this helps with my smoke issue a little.

    I do agree with you on the flapper and i was going to put one in this past summer, but it went by too quick.

I agree that shutting the blower off can help with the volume of smoke, it just doesn't change the fact that the smoke is in my face.

I'm a welder so putting a flapper on will be a quick job. I'm just going to wait till the burn season is over so I don't have to cool everything down and then bring it back to temp. At least with my huge door I can get inside easy enough to do the welding!

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Portage & Main / Design "feature" of P&M

« on: December 30, 2012, 07:48:03 AM »

So I've been running the P&M ML42 for a month or so now. I've noticed that a combination of the features is causing something I wouldn't think is a positive. The fire chamber is basically a big round pot, with a baffle on the back top that causes the hot gases to collect at the top of the fire chamber before going below and then up and out the stack. Same design and my previous boiler so I'm totally comfortable with it and it works well.

Another great feature of my boiler is that is has a great big fire door so I can fit anything inside, including me. Way cool for loading wood and it really helps my back.

Here's the issue, the top of the fire door opening is ABOVE the bottom of the baffle. That means that the hot gas, smoke, etc, boils out of the door when you open it. To my knowledge there is no way to stop it. This means I get a face full of smoke every time I open the door and every piece I put in. My old boiler had a flapper that hung down at the top of the door opening that would simply fold out of the way when you put in wood or closed the door but kept the smoke going out the stack instead of out the door. It's a $2 fix for this issue. My question for you, am I missing something obvious? The boiler is level. I don't see or know of any bypass for loading. I've never heard anyone mention this before. Maybe I'd think it was normal if I'd never owned a boiler before.

Barring any revelations from you good folks, I'm going to put a flapper on my P&M this summer and stop choking on smoke next winter. I just can't understand why P&M would design a boiler to smoke when you open the door. That seems kind of basic.

6

Portage & Main / Re: Pics of ML42 install.

« on: December 23, 2012, 02:36:15 PM »

Would like to know more about the solar panels, is that for summer DHW? Power for the Boiler?
Very nice set up you have there!

The solar panels are for heating the water during the summer. That gives me DHW without firing the boiler, at least in theory. I'm still working out the reality.

Do you heat the boiler water with the solar panels?
Can you explain your setup?

Yes, the solar panels heat the boiler water through a DHW heat exchanger. Since none of my tie in from the house goes to the boiler itself, you heat the boiler water, then the normal heat loop takes the hot water to the house where all the heat exchanger magic happens in the 500 gallon storage tank, and the mass of copper pipes take things to the proper place.

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Portage & Main / Re: Pics of ML42 install.

« on: December 22, 2012, 04:17:17 PM »

looks good
let us know how it compares with ur old furnace

A compare vs. my old boiler. I had about 110,000 btu of fire capacity with the old one. The Ml42 has about 300k btu. While my old one would be working hard, the new one is loafing.

I'd retrofitted my Aqua 2 with Johnson controls, however I had an issue with creosote clogging up my fan so I was unable to run mine hot enough to idle. Now I can stoke the boiler and leave it to idle. My temperature's are maintained at a much more consistent level.

The fire door is much larger and thanks to the legs I welded on, much higher. It's MUCH easier to load the new boiler.

The aqua 2, when stoking, would still draft properly so I got very little smoke in the face. The new boiler rolls smoke out the door no matter what I do. I smell like smoke quite a bit more often now.

If I could have made my old boiler idle, it would have done a fine job for me. Since I couldn't successfully idle, the ML42 is kicking the old boiler behind.

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Portage & Main / Re: Pics of ML42 install.

« on: December 22, 2012, 04:11:43 PM »

Would like to know more about the solar panels, is that for summer DHW? Power for the Boiler?
Very nice set up you have there!

The solar panels are for heating the water during the summer. That gives me DHW without firing the boiler, at least in theory. I'm still working out the reality.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: Help with an Aqua 2 furnace

« on: December 20, 2012, 08:51:24 PM »

As already stated, it should have a DHW coil. They would be the two inside top ports. There are many ports open to the tank, both on the front and the rear. If you can use pressurized air, you can inject each port and see if the air blows out of tank ports or just one port. That's the way we checked ours. I have the manual on the Aqua II. The manual doesn't match the port configuration so you really just have to test to find how your's is configured.

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Portage & Main / Re: Pics of ML42 install.

« on: December 14, 2012, 07:23:08 PM »

Unfortunately I had a bad weld on the boiler that leaked on the first fill. Fortunately P&M accepted a warranty on it with no hassle. I had a buddy who welded it right away so no downtime.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272963893/#in/set-72157631846383780/

Closer view of the weld and the leak.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272964113/#in/set-72157631846383780/

Boiler in and plumbed, stack cut into roof and tied in.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272964419/#in/set-72157631846383780/

I went with spray on insulation for the boiler. It made a mess but it sure does insulate well.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274032582/#in/set-72157631846383780/

We added our own cladding to the front of the boiler to tie it in and give a finished look. This is the bottom half already on.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274032704/#in/set-72157631846383780/

The rear of the boiler, all insulated.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272965435/#in/set-72157631846383780/

The ML42 up and running.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274033420/#in/set-72157631846383780/

First fire. I went from 60 degree water to 180 in 3 hours with it 1/3 full of wood.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274033590/#in/set-72157631846383780/

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Portage & Main / Pics of ML42 install.

« on: December 14, 2012, 07:12:34 PM »

So I've asked enough questions on here. I figured I'd post pics of the install now that it's all done. I'm trying to post photo's for the first time, so forgive me if I mess this up. I tried posting the pics inline. I'm sorry, I couldn't get it to work so I posted the link to the pics.

The old boiler, after removal.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274029800/#

The hole where the old boiler has just left.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272963299/#

The new ML42 after we got it onto the concrete (that wasn't easy!)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8272963413/#

I was height limited on a new boiler. We had P&M make the boiler without legs, no fill tube, no lift eye, no cladding, no insulation, etc. Here is how much clearance we had. This is with the boiler sitting flat on the concrete.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24069905@N02/8274031386/#

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Central Boiler / Re: CB3200 Leaking

« on: December 08, 2012, 08:08:56 PM »

One of the reasons I purchased my Portage and Main recently was the double welded seams for just this reason.

However, when I filled my new boiler for the first time, there was a leak in a weld on the exhaust. I didn't catch that ALL welds are not double welded, oh well. Not a big leak, and not a big deal, but the boiler was brand new. I contacted P&M. I received a one page warranty form, and a request for pics of the leak. I had a certified welder come out and fix the spot and P&M is sending me a check to reimburse me for his labor. No issues, no arguing with P&M. Pretty good warranty in my opinion.

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General Outdoor Furnace Discussion / Re: burn season

« on: December 05, 2012, 03:28:06 PM »

Haven't fired mine yet (75 yesterday) and I'll run it till March/April. Usually November is when I'd fire up but it's been extra warm lately and I've been down while I put in the new P&M (almost done!)

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Portage & Main / Insulation used on Portage and Main boiler

« on: December 03, 2012, 03:42:18 PM »

So I'm installing my new ML42. For reasons not relevant here, I ordered the boiler without insulation or cladding. I honestly didn't think getting insulation would be a big deal. Now that everything is hooked up, it's time to put the insulation on and my insulation guy has run screaming into the woods because he doesn't want his insulation dealing with all the heat.

So what does P&M use for insulation and maybe even more important, what do you guys use for insulation. I'm planning on foam insulation but could use batten if I have to.

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Shaver Furnace / Re: my stove not keeping up

« on: November 25, 2012, 01:41:44 PM »

That's a huge swing. My first question is, is the reading correct? Do you have secondary indications of that kind of drop. At 70 degrees, the water is cool to the touch.