boiler (oil fired) servicing

Hello,

Has anyone serviced their oil-fired central heating boiler? The manual provides instructions of what to do and an oftec plumber would charge £120 to do it for me (though a non-oftec plumber is considerably less).

Where do you buy the nozzles from? I've not seen anyone selling them.

BES sell some oil servicing kit:

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's an oil pressure gauge for £19.93 and a vacuum gauge for £26.93, so call it £47 but there's also an oil pressure kit containing both of these and a hose for £58, reduced from £66. So my question is do I need the extra bits that are in the kit or can I save £10-£20 (depending how long the offer lasts) by buying the two gauges separately? I thought they just screwed into the pump?

Thanks.

Reply to
Fred
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We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Fred saying something like:

Any *decent* plumbing trade outlet.

The kit contains adapters of various sorts, so saves some hassle, but you could just screw some together if you have a box of various types. For a flexy connection you can use an old flexy supply hose.

Not mentioned here is the smoke tester. Even if you can't afford a basic flue gas analyser, a smoke test pump is a must - there's a cheap one there that will do.

Without an FGA, you're pissing in the wind as to knowing what the real flue values are. Effectively you're guessing. It's certainly not impossible to get it close to good, but what seems good enough might be

10% wasteful at least. I'd suggest you look on ebay.com USA for one of the old Kane fluid testing kits - they are going very cheap this time of year and fluids are still easily available for them. Once you get the hang of the old kits, they are bloody excellent. Not every digital meter is an improvement, just faster.
Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Grimly Curmudgeon saying something like:

I meant to write Bacharach. Doh.

This is the thing - the BIN price is a bit high, but worth it if you're going to service your boiler twice or more.

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an eye on subsequent offerings; they pop up frequently.

Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Grimly Curmudgeon saying something like:

This looks interesting. Not used one of these myself, but it looks like just the job for diy setting up.

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the ebaymotors tag - it's for domestic oil and gas burners.

Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

Thanks. I hadn't realised about the smoke test. I will have to RTM more closely. When I watched the oftec chap last year, the only smoke test I remember was lighting one of those "smokey matches" and checking it all came out the top of the flue. Would the gas analyser have measured the smoke at the same time or did he miss that test out?

I couldn't see a cheap one, they were all about £100.

Thanks will do. Is there a reason they are only sold in the US and not over here? It seems DIY is not as straightforward as it first seemed ;(

Reply to
Fred

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Fred saying something like:

That's just a crude method of checking the flue draft and without numbers, it means sfa.

A proper smoke pump is what you need and it's vital that it's used before the FGA or the FGA gets buggered rather rapidly.

They're essentially just a bicycle pump in reverse with a holder for a piece of blotting paper. As such, there's no need for the prices that are charged. Saying that, they are available more cheaply, from Dwyer.

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See UK number for more info.

Pick up a good book on servicing oil burners and read it cover to cover.

Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

We were somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Grimly Curmudgeon saying something like:

In the meantime, here's something to get you primed. Read the whole thing as an overview and pay particular attention to pgs

18-20. It's for a Yank Beckett burner, but is pretty much the same as ones this side of the ditch; the procedures and safety precautions especially.
Reply to
Grimly Curmudgeon

Thanks for all your help. Do you recommend a particular book?

Reply to
Fred

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