This is my first year running the EKO, so it's still basically brand new. For some reason my pressure relief valve opened a couple of weeks ago when I was away. My wife was operating it and so I have no idea what happened. All I was told was the controller had the error code on it for over-temp. She put the fire out right away when she heard the hissing and waited until I returned. I refilled it with water and all seemed OK.
Right away on the subsequent burn I noticed that my storage temp didn't seem to be climbing as quickly as usual. I also noticed the boiler temp on the controller did not seem to be as high as usual. After it cooled off I opened up the rear and cleaned the smoke tubes with the included round tool. There was a bit of brown ash built up everywhere in the unit, including the bottom chamber, so I scraped it all off and figured that was the problem. On the next burn there didn't seem to be any change. I got hold of a thermometer that goes to 600degF (Eastman Outdoors deep fry thermometer) to check flue temps, and it was indicating 500 - 600F range when up to temp and gasifying well. This bothers me because the efficiency can't be anywhere near advertised with this much heat going up the flue. Watching it run today, the boiler was having trouble getting over 70degC output when the flue temps were indicating about 600F. That does not sound right to me!!
My pump is the Taco 3-speed that when on high, is calculated to flow the correct amount to take away 140kbtu at my system head and typical deltaT... I have a Danfoss 60C thermostatic recirc valve.
Any ideas folks? Has anybody used a similar thermometer to measure flue temps? I know this sounds crazy, but could it be something to do with the water having overheated and not picking up heat as well now? This is really starting to bother me so any suggestions are welcome.
Thanks,
B.
Right away on the subsequent burn I noticed that my storage temp didn't seem to be climbing as quickly as usual. I also noticed the boiler temp on the controller did not seem to be as high as usual. After it cooled off I opened up the rear and cleaned the smoke tubes with the included round tool. There was a bit of brown ash built up everywhere in the unit, including the bottom chamber, so I scraped it all off and figured that was the problem. On the next burn there didn't seem to be any change. I got hold of a thermometer that goes to 600degF (Eastman Outdoors deep fry thermometer) to check flue temps, and it was indicating 500 - 600F range when up to temp and gasifying well. This bothers me because the efficiency can't be anywhere near advertised with this much heat going up the flue. Watching it run today, the boiler was having trouble getting over 70degC output when the flue temps were indicating about 600F. That does not sound right to me!!
My pump is the Taco 3-speed that when on high, is calculated to flow the correct amount to take away 140kbtu at my system head and typical deltaT... I have a Danfoss 60C thermostatic recirc valve.
Any ideas folks? Has anybody used a similar thermometer to measure flue temps? I know this sounds crazy, but could it be something to do with the water having overheated and not picking up heat as well now? This is really starting to bother me so any suggestions are welcome.
Thanks,
B.
