Bentone ST146 giving trouble

Ken 2014

Hows it goin lads .

First time poster here and i have a problem :rolleyes: . .. .. ..

Qualified P+H apprenticeship two years ago and was out of work for a year in total but always quite busy with nixers so i said feck it , and went out on my own and set up a limited company . All domestic work throughout the last 6 years.

Company going 6 months now and is surprisingly busy .
Well im not breaking any records and iv only my own wage to pay so im not exactly bill gates but im happy enough .

Anyway enough background info .
Im after getting a new van (new to me) , payed public lib insurance , and done the GID course the last couple of weeks so it is a lot of money swallowed up in a short time .
Next on my list is the OFTEC course , although it is another 1000 for that and cant afford it for another few months anyways..

Got a call of someone last week after a recommendation from his friend that i had done work for .
This new customer has several properties and would have a constant maintenance requirement ..
He needed several jobs done in his house such as an immersion changed , siphon , new taps and an oil boiler service ...

I wanted to get my foot in the door so agreed although i havent yet done the oftec course .
I also know its not a requirement but i would have prefered to have it done..

Long story short , it was a bentone St146 sterling on a ferrolli Cast iron boiler 10 years old .
Took the burner off the boiler, and replaced the nozzle like for like (1.5 - 60s)

Cleaned the baffles , photocell , and fitted a new bentone gasket on blast-tube as there was none present , and fumes were leaking out into room.
Cleaned oil filter at tank and checked where flue discharges . Everything ok..
Checked oil pressure with gauge but had not got a flue gas analyser so no flue gas analysis . (I know i should have one) .

Put back together and was running fine .
Then after an hour and half or so the burner locks out .
The burner is coming on and off as the stat calls but after a long peroid it just locks out and has to be manually reset .

I got my friend to come down yesterday with flue gas analyser and we set air intake and Co2 levels to the manual spec but it is still happening .

Any suggestions please ????
The burner was running fine up until this ..

shane0007

Boiler model & kw output setting?
Pump pressure?
FGA readings?
Did you change the burner head setting?
Kerosene or Gas Oil?
Smoke test?

Wearb

It sounds like fuel starvation. Did you check the filter on the pump? It would be interesting to see what a vacuum gauge would read just before cut-out. If the reset button is pressed immediately after cut-out, doe it start up and run for a long time again? If it does, then it may not be fuel starvation. Is there lots of oil in the tank? Did you have any way to check tank for water?

jimf

agree with all shane has said above

being a bentone burner and if the cut out is fairly consistent time wise I would first rule out the solenoid coil

Ken 2014

Wearb wrote: »

It sounds like fuel starvation. Did you check the filter on the pump? It would be interesting to see what a vacuum gauge would read just before cut-out. If the reset button is pressed immediately after cut-out, doe it start up and run for a long time again? If it does, then it may not be fuel starvation. Is there lots of oil in the tank? Did you have any way to check tank for water?

Had no way of checking for water but there was quarter of tank of kerosene . It was working fine before i touched it so dont think it was water tbh ..

I waited for an hour last night and was working fine kicking in and out as it should do , but on way home i got a call off customer to say it has the red light on (Reset Button) .
I havent seen it lock out so i dont know what happens , like does it keep fluctuating as if it was a fuel problem or does it just click off ..

shane0007

How did you turn off the oil, by the oil tank valve or the wheel fire valve?
If you had a vacuum gauge you could eliminate a supply issue.

What's the kw output of the boiler?

DGOBS

`Usually find with the Bentones the solenoid lasts 10-20mins before locking out, if it's running 1.5 hrs, I would be checking the capacitor for sure also!

Billy Bunting

Also i have had a few with Ignition Transformer problems that usually occure when hot, but as your problems seem to start after you touched it then i would following Shanes advice and be checking oil supply first.

jimf

DGOBS wrote: »

`Usually find with the Bentones the solenoid lasts 10-20mins before locking out, if it's running 1.5 hrs, I would be checking the capacitor for sure also!

had 1 recently dgobs first heat call every morn from cold would run for 40 mins after reset cut out again after 5mins I can only presume it took longer in morn to heat coil to fail temp

Ken 2014

Sorry for the delay in the reply lads and thanks very much for the responses .
Feckin computer was on the blink :mad: .....

Found out what the problem was .

When i first arrived at the house , i walked into the boiler house and had a look at the boiler itself and checked the flue .

A stainless steel flue that comes out of the back of the boiler and then turns up vertically to pass through the flat roof of the boiler house .
Then i went outside to see where the flue terminates , to make sure there is no blockages from overgrown trees etc , and also to check the cowel .

Everything looked fine .
As i was taking off the burner and cleaning the baffles i must have slightly nudged the boiler a fraction without realising .
Anyway this was the issue .....

When i returned to the boiler after posting here first i realised some black carbon like soot on the white light switch , which wasnt there previously .
Then i checked the flue again and found a piece of the stainlessflue about 3 inches wide had fallen down and was half blocking the flue .

The pipe directly off the back of the boiler was 5inch with an adaptor bringing it up to 8 inch (i think) .

The installer used this 3 inch wide off cut to seal them together if you like . Without any fire cement or self tappers , so was just sitting there for years ....until i came along .

Anyway mystery solved .
Thanks again
Ken

Wearb

It looks like you never pulled the burner out on the call back. It would have pointed you in the right direction............but we have all been there.
Thanks for letting us know the results.