# Oil Burner Problems



## HeatPro

> I have no option but work on it myself. If it id have a "puff back", the insurance company would pay to repair furnace and take care of any damages to house. It is just frustrating to run into something I can not fix. I repair gas furnaces where I work, hot tubs, have had to rebuild truck engines and transmissions. I guess I just don't want to give up
> 
> The only reason a HVAC company was involved with the installation was to have warranty. I called a service man that I was able to locate and he told me he had never heard of "annual service" on a furnace that used clean oil. He said they did not offer anything like that. I guess things are done differently here in West Virginia than they are anyplace else. In this area, you do not hire any work done, you do it yourself. I was trying to learn about something I was having problems with.
> 
> The oil suppliers around here only deliver oil. They will not touch a furnace.


This kind of thinking is a result of recent marketing efforts to promote oil heat. "Clean Burn" aims at having heating units that don't require service. It is possible to have oil burners run without filters and not require adjustment with clean oil and compensating burners. However, IMO, the marketing idea is another example of industry 'foot-shooting' by marketing managers vs. real-world machines - one reason that the oil heat market has gone from 60% of the market to 6% in the US. There are no oil burners out there that auto-adjust. In the near future, burners can be made available that adjust their air bands and check for nozzle drip through controls similar to the automobile control that adjusts injector flow - the idea of injectors is similar to that of the oil nozzle. 

If a machine isn't serviced, there is a greater possibility of selling a new one to replace the one that exploded. Think of having no service done to a car for 5 years. Think of the service required to run a car in delivery service 24 hours a day for 8 months, the run time of an oil burner. Would you trust your life to such a vehicle without looking under the hood or checking tires to adjust before failure?

Oil delivery companies have enough liability handling toxic petroleum products, they won't necessarily like handling the liability of a family fire when they provide service, so those days are gone. The future using algae ponds that can provide 15,000 gallons per acre of food-grade bio-oil aren't quite here yet.

There are independent repair companies that will handle the risk. If none is available in the area because no other will do it, that is an opportunity for you. Go to tech schools until you can offer the service with confidence you won't leave a burner in a condition to kill the family.

Meanwhile think of being prudent about doing something that will knock the heater apart from a puffback and shoot flames around that area. 

f you don't get it tuned right, then there are benefits to the oil company: I've had owners insist that all they had to do was adjust the parts - until they had their oil boiler smoke up on them and refuse to work, then they appreciated the heads up to ALWAYS use a combustion tester when servicing. As an electronic tester can tell WHILE THE BURNER RUNS and provide a printed strip recording of most that is needed, it only takes a few more minutes. Oil companies will tell you that it doesn't have to be done for profitable reasons: 
 It takes techs time to test and time is money spent paying for techs when the oil bill has already been paid.
 Techs typically are responsible for 1200 oil burners each. There is NO WAY they have time to combustion test - or even VISIT 1200 homes a year. Sending a $7 an hour someone with a coat-hanger wire, screw-driver, and pliers to knock a coke-ball off a nozzle isn't service.
An electronic tester to save time over the older chemical pump testers costs over $1000. Most service trucks don't have them, nor men that know what combustion testing requires.
 Bad combustion MEANS INCREASED FUEL SALES, as inefficiency means more fuel used to provide heat.
The only way to tell is by using combustion test instruments, no one indicator will tell all of them:
When a tech uses combustion test instruments to give you a complete combustion test list including the data for:
Oil nozzle pressure ____
Pump suction pressure _____
draft over the fire _____
draft in the fire chamber ____
No smoke setting ____
CO2 percentage ____
room temperature _____
Stack temperature _____
Combustion efficiency _____
Then he will have a starting point to know, after all parts are clean and set to factory specs, if a condition like inadequate draft or other problem is a cause. If he doesn't have or use these instruments there is little chance that the burner will be adjusted to prevent soot or be so wide open that oil is wasted.


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## illwaterpumpman

You must have preventive maintance done on you oil heating system every 12 to 14 months!


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## achtgman

*Recall*

Check for a recall on your unit. Maintance is a must. I have been a service tech for 30 years and cleaned many oil furnaces.


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## delavan

junior437t said:


> I have a Heil oil furnace. It is about 5 years old. There is 24 inches of pipe between the furnace and the chimney. The pipe rises about 4 inches in this 2 feet. The furnace started smoking around the "inspection port". When the furnace fires, you can see flame around this port. There is not excessive smoke or soot around this port. It almost acts like the chimney or the pipe is stopped up. I used a shop cac and cleaned up all the soot i could access. I removed the plate where the "pipe" goes out to the chimney and cleaned that area. Inside there was probably 1/4 inch of soot.


You need to buy the cheapest flue gas combustion analyzer. There are plenty of them on the market. Search ebay


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## beenthere

If he hasn't had trouble in the last 3 years since he made this thread. I doubt he wants to buy his own Ca.


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## delavan

beenthere said:


> If he hasn't had trouble in the last 3 years since he made this thread. I doubt he wants to buy his own Ca.


or carbon monoxide did the job :laughing: I found this what do you think of it? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UqQgiqPmz78


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## beenthere

It looks ok. More elaborate then a home owner would need. And probably far moe expensive then what a home owner would be willing to pay.

A bit more set up time then what a CA should need for doing residential work.

While many commercial techs will have a lap top. I prefer to have a CA that is self contained.

Testo 327's, Bacharach 125's, are all self contained ones, quick to set up, and easy to use and do a print out on the spot.


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## vinpadalino

beenthere said:


> It looks ok. More elaborate then a home owner would need. And probably far moe expensive then what a home owner would be willing to pay.
> 
> A bit more set up time then what a CA should need for doing residential work.
> 
> While many commercial techs will have a lap top. I prefer to have a CA that is self contained.
> 
> Testo 327's, Bacharach 125's, are all self contained ones, quick to set up, and easy to use and do a print out on the spot.


stalker lol. This is a pretty cool site. Sound like a lot of DIYS here. See you around.:clap:


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