AA 130 M Restoration and Installation

coaledsweat wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 6:15 pm

OK, it's adjustable. How is it going to work at 10° when your low and high are 10° apart?

Uh, so far the combustion fan has been shutting off at 170 and then turning on again at 160..

Am I not understanding something?

Mini coal bin full, took 9 bags to heap it lol

Lightning wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 6:37 pm

Uh, so far the combustion fan has been shutting off at 170 and then turning on again at 160..

Am I not understanding something?

The differential is for the DHW. It fires on a falling temperature prior to the low setting so you don't lose too much temperature if there is a call for heat. By having the low and high 10° apart you have eliminated the function. As I understand it, solid fuels should always run the two set points a minimum of 20° apart. Don't recall the reasoning behind it but I'm pretty sure it was in a Honeywell manual.

Lightning wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 6:37 pm

Uh, so far the combustion fan has been shutting off at 170 and then turning on again at 160..

Am I not understanding something?

On triple aquastats like the 8124a, it is possible to get circulator lockout if you used less than a 20 deg between lo and hi limits. I don't even think your system has a triple does it? If you do not use a triple, you'll be fine with 10 deg diff with a single or double style stat...

It's about time!

If you have the T T terminals jumped together it will run on the HI side. The Diff for the HI side is fixed at 10 degrees. Only the LO side is adjustable, 10 to 25 degrees. Looks like it is doing exactly what it is supposed to do.

Don't get hung up about what the gauge says vs. what the aquastat says. They are in different parts of the boiler so the will never read exactly the same, they should be fairly close though.

Lightning wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 5:30 pm

Fixed? This aquastat has a variable adjustment. I set it for 10 degrees.
20191107_172811.jpg

The coal bin mini... slapped together a few moments ago lol

Nice little "bin mini"

-Don

Thank you all for your guidance, I will try to wrap my head around all of that. Yes I do have the TT jumped..

Other than that, this gem seems to be running great! I love this thing!!

I put the belt back on for the coal tube since I had built the fire up to the channel leading into the burn chamber. The tube brought coal up to the transfer head just like it should. I set the anthrastat at 140, its unknown at this moment if its calibrated or not. But given that, it did in fact engage the ash sled for a few minutes, and then disengaged while the fan was running, so appears so far to be doing its job properly..

About 20 minutes ago the aquastat cut power to the combustion fan at 170 like like its suppose to. So far the boiler has climbed to about 195.. not sure yet when/if she'll level out. I may need to turn the aquastat down another 10 degrees, we'll see where she goes.

This thing is freakin awesome!

Keep in mind, by having the high and low real close you are banging your motor, relays and switches more than twice as often as need be. That will reduce their lifetime by more than half as the number of cycles you put them through will more than double.

Your going to need a comfy chair with wheels!

I think we have a successful launch. It did finally appear to plateau between 195 and 200 degrees. I kept it under control quite easily by running hot water. The fire bed is fully established. A little earlier my grandson took a shower and at the end of his shower I ran a little more hot water to kick the combustion blower on. When the fan came on, I shut the water off and it climbed to 170 in about 5 minutes and kicked the fan off.. I get the impression that these units are as close to an on/off heat source as you can get with solid fuel. I was really impressed that the stove pipe didn't get very hot. Most of the time the boiler was hotter than the pipe during combustion calls. Maybe that'll change with more heat load. What a neat piece of equipment.

coaledsweat wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 9:06 pm

Keep in mind, by having the high and low real close you are banging your motor, relays and switches more than twice as often as need be. That will reduce their lifetime by more than half as the number of cycles you put them through will more than double.

Ah, I didn't consider that, good call Coaledsweat.. chair with wheels for sure!

Hopefully all is well now for overnight, I'll check on her just before bed and then again when I get up for work.

You did better than many of us. Leak-free on the first fill, and no sparks or smoke when you flipped the switch. Good work.

Lightning wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 9:24 pm

Hopefully all is well now for overnight, I'll check on her just before bed and then again when I get up for work.

If you worried, just shut it off. They take days to die, overnight is just a quick nap for them.

Rob R. wrote: ↑

Thu. Nov. 07, 2019 9:51 pm

You did better than many of us. Leak-free on the first fill, and no sparks or smoke when you flipped the switch. Good work.

Thank you Rob, my success is owed to you guys for helping me along with the details. I couldn't imagine taking on a job like this without your help.

My original aqua stat that came with my boiler is preset non-adjustable with a 10 degree differential, it’s a 1984, everything is still working fine.

Cool thank you

So at 4:00am I jump up out of bed and scurry down into Ruby's dungeon to find her sitting quietly at 170. Stove pipe just warm to the touch. I jump in the shower, and when I'm finished I can hear that she had woke up by the sound of the tumbling coal. I get dressed and go back downstairs to find she had fallen back to sleep. I was hoping to see if the ash sled was engaging. I peek thru the view port to see a little ring of glowing coal and a smidge of blue flames. Top of the stove pipe only 132 by IR temp gun. Musta only ran about 10 minutes. I don't know for certain but I don't think it ran thru the night either.