atmos

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Feeling the Heat
Oct 1, 2007
306
S.E. Connecticut
Hi. This is to Atmos owners or anyone else with a suction fan boiler. I have an EKO 40 and moved to a new house where the boiler would need to go into our basement. The EKO would smoke from the upper chamber which is pressurized but wasn't a problem because I put the boiler in our garage. In our new home this would be a problem, especially during reload. Anyway I am wondering how much an induced draft boiler would smoke during operation for those of you that have them can you tell me your experiences? Thanks
 
Hi. This is to Atmos owners or anyone else with a suction fan boiler. I have an EKO 40 and moved to a new house where the boiler would need to go into our basement. The EKO would smoke from the upper chamber which is pressurized but wasn't a problem because I put the boiler in our garage. In our new home this would be a problem, especially during reload. Anyway I am wondering how much an induced draft boiler would smoke during operation for those of you that have them can you tell me your experiences? Thanks
I have a couple Attack 45's which have the inducer fan (suction). They are not too bad as long as you can get the bypass to reliably open (they tend to stick closed from creosote). The other key is timing, if you time your reloads correctly so you are opening the firebox when there is only coals there is no smoke to escape. One other thing to keep in mind is any chimney connector pipe in the boiler room that is after the inducer fan will be under slight pressure from the inducer fan so you must seal those up or you will see some smoke spillage at the joints on cold start up. Once up to temp there will be more draft and this effect will not be as noticable. Bottom line is I am happy my boilers are in out buildings because both styles will release smoke if you are not diligent and if your spouse is like mine they are super sensitive to any smoke smells in the house.
 
The Switzer boiler I have is an induced fan boiler. I don’t have any smoke spillage when the door is open, under normal circumstances. When I started it for the first time this year, it kind of “puffed” several times and I wondered what was going on. I opened the door and saw that I had placed a piece of wood crosswise in the back of the firebox, and the fan was actually pulling the piece over the pipe and effectively blocking it. It would get starved for air, the log would fall off, the boiler would take a breath, and the process would start over. It was an interesting scenario. 🤔Note to self- don’t do that again.
 
I own a Polar G2Plus (9 2 cft). It's similar to the Fröling except it is Indoor UL Listed/Outdoor. Also has a suction fan with a Genteq ECM motor. Smoke extraction works very well I don't get any smoke but I personally like my boiler in the garage rather than basement/house to keep the mess outside the house (wood, dirt, bark... ash removal is clean but still more ideal to do everything in the garage.)

On top of that I use my skidsteer to bring in metal totes full of wood which is much more convenient.