Tell a Texan New Englander about oil furnaces

[Dennis T]

Wow, boiler blow. Haven't seen that since 1967. I had a back flash happen to me in 91 which put me in the hospital. Eyebrows,lashes,beard,throat and lungs burnt. On life support for 5 days. After that, I got out of the oil burner business. Kinda scared but in a pinch I'll still do it for family. Verbal for friends.

Dennis T

[D. Tillery]

Thanks Y'all,

I'll use this info and go down and take a look at it.

Fortunately, we are just renting until we get the lay of the area and buy something. So I can practice on the landlord's dime.

Does oil ever go bad with age? My new neighbor is adding on and discovered 200 gals in an old tank he thought was empty in his basement. Evidently the previous owner did a gas converstion 5 years ago or so and left it. He has offered to give it to me. That's like $600 bucks but I don't want to screw up anything.

Steve H, Thanks. I'll miss y'all in SA. It certainly is different up here. Everyone is really nice so I think we'll be OK.

[gailkaitschuck]

Wow.....

Reminds me of the trailer we lived in as graduate students in southern Illinois. Very old with a oil furnace that you worked by lighting it by hand.

Because we were poor students, we'd turn the heat off at night and crawl into our little trailer (twin and a half) bed with the electric blanket (and one dog and four cats; we were thinner then). In the morning one of us would shove and kick the other out of bed to go light the furnace.

You'd run to the furnace naked (we were newlyweds then and things didn't sag so much) and shivering, turn the handle that started the oil dripping into the pan, run back to bed, wait a couple of minutes, run back, light a piece of paper towel, throw open the oil pan door and toss it in (very scientific!).

Sometimes we'd doze off in that nice warm bed, only to wake up with a pan fairly full of oil. Luckily we never did blow ourselves out of that little trailer lighting the thing but I think we came close a couple of times. It did make an impressive sound when the oil lit up.

Gail

[goldcoop]

D. Tillery-

200 gallons for free?

I think if it has been only 5 years and if the tank was fairly full (which at 200 gal. it should have been) would have left little room for condensation (water) to get mixed into the fuel; SO it should be OK...Worst that could happen is you gunk up your oil filter and have to replace it ...

Now how are you gonna move it?

Cheers,

Coop

[Arne]

I'd pay for a service call and have someone with some experience explain the system to me.... they can check it for efficiency and spend a few minutes explaining how oil in your tank turns to heat in your house...

[cracker39]

I'm not sure I saw where anyone mentioned the igniters. An Oil furnace has a pair of ignition rods, one to each side of the nozzle (at least mine did in Maryland) and they need to be adjusted from time to time as they burn down with prolonged use. The ingition area usually has a top access that hinges up and toward you. It isn't hard to work with. I readjusted mine and replaced my nozzles when they got clogged up. Which reminds me. Chedk the fuel line for a replacable filter. If it doesn't have one, GET ONE and install it. You will save the price of the filter by keeping nozzles clear. I replaced a couple of them before putting in a good line filter.

[TomS]

Does oil ever go bad with age? My new neighbor is adding on and discovered 200 gals in an old tank he thought was empty in his basement. Evidently the previous owner did a gas converstion 5 years ago or so and left it. He has offered to give it to me. That's like $600 bucks but I don't want to screw up anything.

You'll be doing this guy a huge favor by taking the oil. Heating oil is hazardous material. Old oil tanks will eventually corrode over time. I wouldn't want to pay for the clean up and remediation when that tank eventually lets go.

I heard a horror story a few years back about a guy who bought a house with a 750 gallon underground tank. The first winter, he calls up a local oil company and fills the tank. One week later the burner won't start. Technician shows up and finds out that the tank is dry. Turns out the tank was corroded. The entire 750 gallons leaked into the ground.

The clean up requires digging up every bit of contaminated soil and hauling it away. They went down a hundered feet and were STILL finding contaminated soil. The home owner was responsible for hundreds of thousands of dollars in clean up costs.

A couple of years after hearing that story from a friend of a friend who owns mechanical contractin business, I changed oil companies. The new company came to my house and inspected my heating system. They told me the tank was rusting. They refused to deliver any oil until I replaced it. I didn't argue with the man.

[D. Tillery]

Wow Gail. It's not quite that bad but I might try that on my wife, see if she'll buy it!

Everything looks pretty new. And it is a pretty nice place in general.

Lots of valves, low water cutoff switch but I don't know how to tell if there is water in it or not. I'm going to call my landlord and scare him a little. He should send someone to help me figure it out.

Coop, I may move it 5-10 gallons at a time. With the price of oil it is worth it. He's just next door but too far for a hose, I think. This type of oil is not that volatile, unatomized, is it?

Tom, I'm not going Exxon Valdez or anything. He has to empty the tank before he can remove it. It is just on 4 legs in his basement. And considering what I hear of the toxicity of most of the soil and groundwater from years of industrial dumping who the heck could tell if it did all leak out? Kind of reminds me of when I worked in Pasa(get down)dena, TX

I just want the darn thing to work at maximum efficiency and not kill anyone.

[cracker39]

It's hard to get unatomized fuel oil to burn. My dad has an old oil heater. You trip a switch to get the fuel oil to run into the burner, then drop a lighted piece of paper in it. The oil has to soak into the paper like a wick before it will burn. It takes it a while for the burning oil to reach a high enough temperature where the oil will burn by itself. Now, gasoline, that's another story...drop a burning piece of paper in it and BOOM!.

[Nitetimes]

Fuel oil is a lot like burning motor oil, ya gots to work at it to get it goin'. So it's pretty safe to play with.

Now, gasoline, that's another story...drop a burning piece of paper in it and BOOM!.

Yep, the vapors ignite pretty good, but drop a cigarette in there and phssst, out it goes.

[cracker39]

Fuel oil is a lot like burning motor oil, ya gots to work at it to get it goin'. So it's pretty safe to play with.

Yep, the vapors ignite pretty good, but drop a cigarette in there and phssst, out it goes.

Except in the movies. They always ignite a trail of gasoline to blow up the bad guy's car by tossing a cigaret in it...somehow it works for them, just like the westerns where their 6 shooters just keep on shooting without reloading.

[Nitetimes]

Amazing how that works isn't it?
I've tried it plenty of times and it's never worked for me, I've even had matches go out tossing them in gas. If the stuff isn't contained it just doesn't ignite that easy. Maybe they just use a better grade of gas than I do.
You ever try counting the shots that come out of some of them six shooters? I've run out of fingers AND toes. Seems like they only run out when they are in serious trouble.

[Dennis T]

Remember, as you keep resetting the burner and it doesn't light, the chamber is filling with oil. And then when it finally lights............

Never trust anyone who say, "I only reset it once"

Dennis T

[cracker39]

Very good point Dennis. I've had that happen and it's scary when you suddenly get a roaring fire in the burner from an oil overload. Luckily, it burned off and settled down quickly, but it sure was noisy while it lasted.

[goldcoop]

Remember, as you keep resetting the burner and it doesn't light, the chamber is filling with oil. And then when it finally lights............

Never trust anyone who say, "I only reset it once"

Dennis T

I took an evening class called "Oil Fired Hydronic Boiler installation, maintenance & repair" at a local VO-Tech after my boiler blew 7 years ago to find out everything I could learn about these things because it scared the SHI_ out of me.

One of the "students" had the transformer hinged back (so there was no spark) and had the boiler on and atomizing fuel in the chamber for about 30 seconds, I remember seeing his hand go down to push the transformer forward and into place....

OK so here we were in a large place with about 25' high ceilings and the room was probably 50' square with 5 or 6 boilers in place to work on.

The BOOM was so loud and the concussion; well my cheeks flapped around!

Blew off a 2' x 2' cast iron clean out in the exhaust stack up high towards the ceiling!

And the "student" well he had his face down around the burner, dazed and confused his face was black & his hair blown back he looked like "BUCKWHEAT"!

The instructor was SO proud of us!

Thankfully no one was hurt!

Cheers,

Coop