My Camray Boulter is about 15 years old and never had any problems until now,
The boiler starts up and then fires up, after about 30 seconds the boiler returns to start up mode then fires up AGAIN,!! this carries on and repeats the same 30 seconds fires up again and this carries on till the timer reaches the off time.
Had it checked by engineer and NO joy there, HELP!!!
ps, it certainly heats the water
aga
Is there power to the boiler all the time or is the power going off and on?
If the boiler is continually powered I would be suspicious of the control box.
If the power is going off and on then then see if there are any changes that you can make to the programmer that stop it happening
Slightly worrying - it should lock out permanently if the flame sensor isn't seeing the flame. 30s is about the time when the ignition stops. You will likely burn out the coil by cycling it to add to your woes.
Find a better engineer then!
Hi Michael,
Thanks for your reply, yes, the power is on,
The timer is set to start 3 times a day at 06-30 to 09-30, 12-00 to 1.00 and 4.30 to 9.00 depending on the weather.
The 'flame' stops but the boiler is still running and then fires up,30/40 seconds, flame stops again and the boiler is still in running mode and then repeats again.
I'm not sure if the right word for the 'flame' is right as I know nothing about this stuff but when the 'flame' stops the boiler is still in running mode!!
Hope this makes sense to you
Regards Allan
My 18 year old Quartet failed to ignite the one time the sensor was dirty, but it did repeatedly try and start up. The OP is getting hot water, which we weren't.
+1. It's relatively easy to dismantle and clean the sensor and nozzle, but the OP may not feel comfortable with that. If you're anywhere near the Lincs/Cams/Norfolk borders, SS Motors do a cheap service contract and I've not had any problems in the 10 years I've been using them
If the motor keeps running all the time then I would suggest getting the boiler technician back as clearly the boiler is not working correctly.
When the boiler starts it purges the air, then it starts the spark and sends a big voltage to the coil on the oil pump to open the valve.
It then stops the spark, reduces the voltage to the coil, and checks for a flame using the photocell. If there is no flame the boiler should lock out after about 5 secs. The burner should then keep running until the power to the boiler is cut by a programmer/ thermostat or the boiler thermostat opens because the boiler has reached its max operating temperature.
If you have the Rielli RDB burner, then you can get a new burner on ebay for just over £200. You can also buy the spare parts. I would suspect the control box.
Um, perhaps not THE technician as he's already failed once.
Tim
problems
Has it ever been serviced in those 15 years? The jet does wear and after that sort of time the spray pattern and droplet size could well be way out of spec...
Must have been a very duff engineer. Pressure jet oil boilers are not exactly complex beasts and have very simple systems. Don't pay them ...
Our oil boiler doesn't have a dual voltage on the oil solenoid as far as I'm aware it's only on/open or off/closed.
And the lock out light will come on and the reset needing to be pressed to get it to do anything else. The only sign of life being the lockout light, the blower/pump will have stopped.
Assuming the boiler hasn't gone into lockout or the photocell flame detector is covered in soot and is marginal in detecting the flame.
It appears that the flame is going out and the ignition sequence entered which suceeds. After a while the flame goes out again, rinse and repeat. This sort of indicates that the flame detection and ignition system is working correctly. That leaves fuel, is there any oil in the tank? Is the line clear? Both in flow of oil and clear of water, water doesn't burn... No clogged filters or fire valves?
Check the live and neutral are right way round to the sequence control box. A couple of models didn't lock out when wired with the wrong polarity. Otherwise I'd suspect a defective sequence control box.
Mine is open or closed, but once open it does not need as much current to keep it open as it does to open it.
If it was a fuel supply problem, I would expect the flame to go out and then the boiler to lock out with the motor stopped - as you described.
Hard to persuade a solenoid not to draw more current from a constant voltage supply in the steady state. They often have some arrangement to put a series resistor in once the thing has been opened. The holding current required is less than that needed to change the state.
One other possibility is that hot exhaust gasses are escaping somehow out of a gap that should not be there. This can cause intermittent flame dropouts without a full lockout (although most times it does lockout often enough to alert the owner to something not being right). The boiler sort of works but there is scope for serious failure!
A power relay in the controller going dodgy is another possibility. But any half decent service engineer ought to be able to fault find it...
It isn't rocket science!
Indeed. This explains how the RDB burner that I have works:
That depends on how restricted the fuel supply is and how it is happening. The flow rates are quite low and it's not unknown for a lump of crude to be drawn up to an orfice and block it enough for the flame to fail. Boiler goes into it's igntion sequence, closing oil valve to purge the chamber, no flow, lump of grud falls away and burner relights.
TBH I think ours just sets off the spark ignition once it up and running and has a flame failure rather than going through the full ignition sequence. It'll be in the book BICBA'd.
We really need more info from the OP, like has it run 15 years without a service...
Thanks for your input to the problem I am having, some one asked I f the boiler had been serviced since it was commissioned some 15 years ago, ,yes the boiler has been serviced yearly, this only started in January this year. Will start looking for another engineer.
Regards
Allan
boiler had been serviced since it was commissioned some 15 years ago, ,yes the boiler has been serviced yearly, this only started in January this year.
Did you fix your problem in the end? I am having exactly the same problem with my camray- 15 years old and no problems, serviced every year - I have now had two engineers out and mine has now got worse (black smoke)
Thanks
George
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