Away We Go!

Okay, Van Werters. After months of delays, we started taking down our new [to us] Van Wert VA600 a few days ago. Here are a couple of photos showing the very early stages of the initial teardown process. As we both have other work that keep us jumping, I'll add more photos as the project progresses...

Nice!

That looks like a new one made by A&B Van Wert. Not an old Van Wert Manufacturing Co. Inc. unit. That means you shouldn't have to deal with to much of the "Old Coal Stoker Boiler" problems to get it installed and running.

Happy Holidays!
-Don

Rob R. wrote: ↑

Thu. Dec. 24, 2020 3:48 pm

Well jeez, you didn't say it was a new one! It might have had some coal run through it, but it is at least 25 years newer than most of the other Van Wert boilers we see.

I'm not sure how old it is, Rob R, but I do know that the folks at AB Van Wert rebuilt it at some point and, consequently, liked to send folks out to the [previous] owner's house see it in operation. Once we get it stripped down more, I'll be able to get back to the thread with more of the particulars. Merry Christmas!

Yep, Arnie has always done outstanding work. Shame you're not around here V--he could come & help with the install.

As promised, I'm getting back with the age of the VW VA600 we're working on. IAW the factory placard, it was manufactured in 1981 (nearly 40 years back). The Mr is a baby boomer, so that may not seem "really old" to him, but it does to me.

Once again, have a very Merry Christmas!

Okay...with the help of CPF member VW 600, we got the covers off of our new [to us] VW VA600...




Unfortunately, the hardware used to install the fire door was substandard, which lead to the loss of two ears from the casting. As you can see, both the upper and the lower ears on the right side were sheared off in the process of removing the galled hardware...




With the fire door awaiting welding, we pressed on with removing the Van Wert anthratherm stoker assembly for a close inspection, cleaning and reassembly. Here we are, with the (6) 3/4" nuts that hold the stoker in place removed. By the way, the electric stoker drive motor was removed first to prevent any possible damage...




With the rear of the stoker assembly supported by a hydraulic ATV jack, we began wrestling with the stoker to free it from the boiler housing...




...and, with a bit more elbow grease applied, we're slowly freeing the stoker using the hydraulic ATV jack and wooden cribbing...




...and with a bit of back and forth between the jack and the cribbing, the fire pot itself was eventually revealed. As you can see, a wet/dry shop vacuum in tandem with a wire brush can do wonders...




Here's a close look at the fire pot and, more importantly, the "wind bowl" and the tuyere rings that form it. As you can see here, the rings have quite a bit of ash matter stuck in between them, so the cleaning we have planned for them is past due...but, first, we'll let the folks at PB Blaster do their thing overnight...and, with any luck, the hardware that's holds the tuyere rings in place -- and the clean out cap to the bottom of the fire pot -- will be much easier to loosen tomorrow.




If anyone has any suggestions an how to best remove this hardware -- or what that red gasket material you see in some of the photos is -- we would be much obliged for your thoughts and/or your suggestions.

Until next time ~ HandLogger and VW 600

That looks pretty good. I don't see any cracked, warped or broken rings. Just pull the 3 ash ring bolts out then you can pull all the rings out. Just crank those bolts out. They will either come out, or they will break. If they break, no big deal, put new ones in.

The ash ring uses a 1/4" rope seal in the bottom. When you put the bolts in, don't crank on them, they should be a little more that finger tight. Be careful with the rings, they are very fragile and expensive. The red stuff is probably high temp RTV.

Why didn't you pull the bin auger, pipe and transfer head off before pulling the stoker out? It's a whole lot easier to move the stoker around with out all that in the way. You need to check the augers and pipes for ware.

You should probably pull the blower out and hit it with compressed air to clean it.

Hurry up! It's already cold out!
-Don

Most likely the red gasket material is the Permatex RTV high temperature silicone gasket material that comes in a squeeze tube. This Permatex gasket material is available from auto parts stores and other retailers. Be sure to use disposable gloves when applying it with your fingers.

Hello to all ~ I've used high-temp gasket compound for repairing engines in the past, but the shear volume used to install this boiler sort of threw me off. In other words, the AB VW folks applied a LOT of this red compound to this particular CSB.

As for why we didn't take the stoker drive mechanism apart before removing the casting, we noticed, once again, that there was a lot of red gasket sealer applied practically everywhere, so we wish to avoid all of the ancillary scraping and cleaning that comes with the [extremely] liberal use of the "red stuff."

Bearing in mind that we spent an entire afternoon with the previous owner -- watching the VA600 being stoked and started -- I made a few mental notes. First, the stoker mechanism worked like a swiss clock. It was nice and quiet and he showed me how consistently it was pushing buck into the fire pot. The problem, on the other hand, is that it wasn't lighting consistently. In fact, it was only lighting up one-half of the fire pot. It eventually spread to the other side/half of the fire pot, but my thought was that the air flowing through the pot was being blocked on the "cold side" of the pot -- and what I'm seeing supports that theory. In other words, I'm definitely seeing more blockage, between the rings, on the side that he had trouble lighting.

Neither one of us are VW experts, but, so far, things are pretty consistent with what we've read about the Van Wert VA-series CSBs.

Trial & error is tried & true H. Once the basics are done, it's a given.

HandLogger wrote: ↑

Tue. Dec. 29, 2020 1:26 pm

The problem, on the other hand, is that it wasn't lighting consistently. In fact, it was only lighting up one-half of the fire pot. It eventually spread to the other side/half of the fire pot, but my thought was that the air flowing through the pot was being blocked on the "cold side" of the pot -- and what I'm seeing supports that theory. In other words, I'm definitely seeing more blockage, between the rings, on the side that he had trouble lighting.

Good job on taking it apart and cleaning it out. Remove the air chamber cover in the front. If the bolts don't break, lube them up with anti-seize before you put them back in. You will have to pull that cover at least once a year to clean it out.

Not sure why your afraid of pulling the transfer head off. You will have to at least remove the bin auger and pipe to get the thing in the basement. I can't imagine moving one of these with all that attached. Also, you don't have to remove the stoker if you are just cleaning out the grates.

-Don

Before you take the rings apart, make a mark all the way up the inside so you can put them back exactly the way they were. They heat it up and sort of melted together and fit really well now. If you don’t install them the same way, you were crack them.

The following breakdown work was performed on 12-29-20...

Here's a photo of what Van Wert calls the "wind bowl" (aka, fire pot) with the hardware removed and 13" top ash ring pulled off...





As we [carefully] removed each individual tuyere ring, we ran into one issue. The 5th ring down from the top of the stack -- Ring No. A-6 -- has a fracture in it, which can be seen in the center of the next photo. Although we saw the fracture immediately, this photo was taken after a lot of elbow grease was applied to clean it up...





After the fifth ring down (from the top of the stack) was cleaned up and photographed, we tried pulling the next ring off of the remaining stack of four rings. Well...there was so much residual ash and general crud between these last four rings that we had to pull all of them out as one unit. It's now quite clear to us that this stack of rings were not taken apart and cleaned after this CSB was rebuilt and installed (about eight years ago)...



At this point, we need a replacement fire door -- and possibly an A-6 ring. If anyone has any thoughts on either issue, we would be most grateful for the advice.