Wood boiler advice

[Seast]

I have a old Riteway RB-75 wood fired boiler. It works pretty good apart from a couple issues. First it creates a lot of creosote in the firebox which Ive read can be solved by having longer burns. But I was wondering if there was a good additive to remove some of the creosote? Or what else could be done?
Second and the most important issue is that sometimes it seems like the fire gets out of control in a way that it sucks air past the blower and shoots smoke violently out the chimney. Also when it does this the whole unit shudders and shakes. This is extremely alarming to say the least. The only way I found to get it under control is to shut off the fan and it'll slowly stop. I was wondering what could be causing this and how to solve/prevent this from happening? The unit is currently not in use but was thinking about getting it working for the colder months. Thanks for any help.

 

[peakbagger]

Not familiar with the boiler as its quite an old boiler. but it sure sounds like you have multiple issues. Creosote in the boiler is a symptom of multiple issues. Its highly likely that your wood is not seasoned so you are not getting enough temperature in the firebox for complete combustion. The creosote is partially burned fuel, when your stove takes off like you describe, you basically are having a chimney fire inside the stove. Its very dangerous and most likely portions of the boiler are being overfired. It also could ruin your chimney liner. There is also a good chance that you have creosote in the chimney and may need to get it swept multiple times every season. A secondary issue is you are probably putting out copious amounts of smoke and odor into the neighborhood when you do operate it. Do call a chimney sweep and have the chimney cleaned and inspected before you try to run the stove again.

The cure is only run it when you have truly dry wood that you have checked with moisture meter. The only way to really insure that you have dry wood is dry it yourself. You also should only run the boiler in very cold conditions, there most likely is an air damper on the inlet to the combustion chamber and every time it closes, the boiler is going to switch into incomplete combustion and generate creosote. Alternatively you can try feeding it frequently with very small loads of wood to try to match the fuel input with the heat output but few folks have the patience.

Most modern wood boilers suppliers do not recommend installing without a large hot water thermal storage tank and most will not warrantee an installation without storage. You could retrofit storage onto the Riteway but given the age its probably throwing good money after bad given the potential for existing damage to the current boiler due to frequent overfiring.

If you cant find a good source of wood and be willing to dry it properly for a minimum of one year under cover and not interested in making major upgrades to the current boiler assuming its not damaged, you may want to a pellet stove or boiler. GIven Seattle's reputation of wet climate I expect getting firewood to dry requires a lot more effort compared to buying a ton or two of pellets.

 

[warno]

^^^^^Like he said^^^^^

You need to make sure your wood is good and dry. if you're building creosote I'm guessing the boiler might be doing some idling, where the draft damper shuts completely or almost completely smoothering the fire out. when you idle a boiler you build creosote like mad them when you reintroduced air into that smokey filled chamber it goes up like a cloud of gas fumes. and the huge cloud of smoke you see is all your creosote lighting on fire and burning like a chimney fire, like peakbagger said.

Coming from a guy who has an OWB, that was a creosote making machine, I would say if you want to keep using this boiler it needs more of a load to prevent down time. if adding storage is how that happens then go that route. you could always keep the storage and install a better boiler later on. I added 750 gallons of storage to my owb and my creosote issues are gone.

 

[peakbagger]

By the way, I also have an older boiler that apparently had the same issues in its original installation. I got it for free and after inspecting it carefully hauled it home. I had dry wood but put up with the problem of it idling long enough that I only used it only during very cold weather. Once I put in 500 gallons of storage, the idling issues went away.

 

[maple1]

As stated:

-You need dry wood.

-You need to load it for the heat demand, and avoid it going into idle (damper closed or fan off) as much as possible. This time of year, chances are you are loading it too much - which causes idling & creosote making. Much worse with wood that isn't seasoned properly. So, make smaller more frequent fires - if it's up to temp and there's till fire inside, don't add more wood. You might be better off letting the fire die out, then waiting until the boiler & house cools off a bit, then making a new fire - repeat.

That old thing will only do so much & work so well - but good fuel & proper burning practices will help it.

I would also be worried about my chimney with what sounds like periodic creosote fires....