Proper Adjustment of Air and Retention Ring on Oil Furnace

steamup, I know what you mean about "rodding out the soot". I fought soot in my 66 series Weil McLain for the first year I lived in the house. Regardless of the burner "tune" it would soot up the heat exchanger. I finally just added more air until the burn cleaned up, but by then the stack temperatures were off the chart and the boiler sounded like a jet engine. I decided to get serious and installed a brand new Riello burner...their recommended settings in the manual produced a perfect burn; 0 smoke and 12% CO2. The boiler has had 1000 gallons run through it since then and the heat exchanger looks like new. Now that I have the EFM running, the Riello just sits there and "looks good".

Smitty, I haven't looked at an older Smith boiler in a while, but my Weil McLain requires that you unbolt a plate off the front in order to access the chamber. It is not a fun job.

-Rob

I had a Weil Mclain 68 series in my house when I bought it. I had to clean it twice a year. It would plug solid and I had to use a rod only. A brush would just jamb as the sections were too close together. I replaced the refactory once. What a nighmare. Finally replaced it with my current wood burner when oil hit $1.00 per gallon. ( a little while ago). Needless to say, the 68 series was discontinued and replaced with a newer series. One day when I was in the Wholesaler, they had a display on the new series. Everything they stated as new and improved fixed the issues I had with my 68 series. Obviously, I wasn't the only one with a problem.

My old Smith oil boiler is in my workshop building and is 7 sections. It doesn't need refactory as the fire box is deep enough to allow a complete burn without the burner targeting the back of the boiler.