Waste Oil Heater Forum - Your definitive source for burning waste oil for heat.
Waste Oil Heater => Waste Motor Oil => Topic started by: acarter on November 08, 2017, 07:28:25 am
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Hi,
My wife and I just recently moved to Maine from Pennsylvania and just bought our first house a few months ago. I'm always looking for ways to save money somehow I came across the idea of burning WMO. I've been doing my best to find answers to my questions online, but I'm hoping this forum will help answer a few more and give me some input from others with experience.
So, everything I read about heating from WMO is for garages/ shops, and it only seems that the people who are burning it to heat their home are doing so with home-made units. So if it is really as clean as these companies claim, why can't it be used to heat your home? I read on one site that the EPA says you can't use WMO to heat your home, but then a few others said it depends on your state. I don't mind being in the "grey area", but don't want to cause legal problems if somebody finds out what we are doing.
Our home has a 2 year old forced air oil furnace with a Beckett burner. I realize there are several companies that make kits to convert the burners to run off of WMO, but I'm more interested in ready to go bolt on replacement that would let me use my current furnace. I'm looking for something I can buy, install, and not have to mess with (except maintenance and cleaning of course). Does that exist? This company http://www.wasteoilheat.com/waste-oil-burners.shtml seems to be about the only one that I found, but they don't have any contact info and their site leads me to think they aren't legit. I'm away from home for work quite often and I don't want something that is going to quit when I'm gone, I don't mind performing maintenance on a regular basis, but I need to be reliable.
Also, if I was able to find a system that enabled me to use my current furnace, would I be able to use my same tank? I'm read that it will eventually fill up with sludge, is this a real problem? I would love to be able to separate any water, filter it really well, and dump it right in my existing oil tank (which is in the basement).
Thanks in advance,
Austin
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Do you have access to enough waste oil to heat your home?
I would keep your tank for fuel oil. Waste oil burner do have problems and you will need a back up heat source.
Try looking at http://www.kagiburner.com/
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Doug,
Sorry I forgot to mention, yes I do have a source for oil that can provide as much as I need.
Thanks for the link, that seems like a good option. I also found this company that seems to be along the same lines.https://challengerfabrication.com/shop/
Considering that my idea is to use my current furnace to burn the WMO, then leaving the #2 fuel oil in the tank wouldn't do much good because if the WMO system failed I would have to put the old burner back on to use it, which wouldn't be a big deal for me, but if I"m not home then it's about useless. Also, then the heating oil would eventually go bad unless I rotated it out every so many years.
If there isn't a WMO system that is reliable enough to have as a sole heating system then I probably will just stick to paying the fuel man. The few thousand $$$ per year that I would save sure would be nice, but not if I'm constantly stressed about loosing my heating system when I'm not home.
Thanks,
Austin
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I don't mean to talk you out of a waste oil system. Check with these companies and ask them about the reliability of their product. but if you had one installed and did have a problem you more then likely have to send the unit back for repair.
I built mine from a kit and can normally fix in a short time if I have the parts on hand. I did have a relay go bad one time and my burner was down for a day. I was glad I had a back up heat source.
Waste oil burners can be reliable.
Good luck.
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One thing to consider is that waste oil heaters are prohibited from residential use. Even though you're OK with doing it, and I don't see the problem either, the main thing I'd be worried about is if something goes south, even not involving the furnace, it gives your insurance company grounds to deny a claim. That to me is a bigger issue and enough to make the decision all by itself. One option, since you have a source of oil, would be to install a free standing outdoor waste oil boiler and use insulated PEX (the same way they install outdoor wood furnaces) to heat a coil in your furnace ducting. Although this could be pretty spendy, one thing you would gain is reliability and redundancy. It could easily enough be set up to where if the outdoor waste oil boiler went down, the in home hot air furnace would take over at a preset low temperature. And, if both failed, you still have a 'stock' indoor furnace that your wife or whoever could have serviced by any heating and air company that works on oil furnaces. If you had a waste oil burner in the house and it went down in your absence, a regular fuel oil tech would take one look, charge you for the call, and leave. You need to sit down and research options and cost benefit scenarios. It could be, if you're mechanically inclined, you could source a good boiler yourself and make the conversion on the existing gun, place it in a shed on your property along with a dedicated waste oil tank, and be up and running for fairly cheap. If you have to pay to have everything done, then it's going to get spendy, but with the cost of fuel oil going up and down the payback might be as little as a year or two.
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Thanks for the replies, After doing a little more research on local and state code I'm decided to go with a Boiler system as olscout because of the reason mentioned. I will install it in my detached garage, which will enable me to heat the garage as a bonus. There is already a wood stove in the garage so I have the stove pipe already there. I think I may go with a combination wood/ oil boiler that will give me the option to use up some wood scrap from the garage and supplement with wood if I ever loose my oil source.
So I guess now I'll focus on converting a regular burner, since reliability won't be as much of a concern and if it takes a little while to get it perfect it won't matter.
Austin
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I do like my boiler system. The boiler and tank are in a shed away from the house. Any spills and smells are away from the house. Been using a ckburner kit for six years reliability been very good. There has been some problem and not all have been do to the kit. There is also a learning curve.
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Doug,
How much oil do you burn in the peak of winter (and where are you located)? Trying to figure out how big of a tank I need. Was hoping to use a 55 gallon drum, because I can get them for free, but I'm concerned that 50 gallons won't last a week when I'm gone. I will have a backup furnace, but I don't want the reason the boiler quits to be because it ran out of fuel.
Also, with your boiler being in a shed, do you run the circulation pump 24/7, or do you have it set to kick on when your thermostat calls for heat? I've already buried 1" PEX (the 5 wrap insulated stuff), I'm just wondering how much oil I'm going to use just heating those lines even when my house doesn't need heat.
I just picked up a 6 year old Triad boiler that is set up with a Clean Burn 4000 burner and all the accessories. Hoping to get it going in the next few weeks.
Thanks,
Austin
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South central Michigan. I start using the boiler in the fall when temps start dropping below freezing and stop using it in the spring when temps stay above freezing. I normally use around on average 50 gallons a week. So during the dead of winter probably over 50 gallons a week. Yes the circulation pumps do run 24/7.
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Burning waste motor creates ash build up in the burn chamber. I clean mine about every three week for efficiency. I suggest raising the boiler up for convenience when cleaning,
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Doug,
Thanks for the info and tips. What is your primary heating system in your house? Do you have a boiler or a forced air furnace with heat exchanger like me? If so, what do you have your water temp set to? Just trying to figure out a good starting point once I get it fired up..
Austin
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Forced air furnace with heat exchanger also a heat exchanger for domestic hot water. Most of the time 180f. Early fall late spring 170f just to save a little fuel.
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Thanks, I'll post back in the next week or two when I get it all hooked up with some pics.
Austin
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I am 100% in the same boat(also in Maine and looking to have the home on wmo). What system did you order?
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I just made a new post with some pics of the install, let me know if you have any questions.
Austin
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Hi All,
Quiet a while since I have been on this site. I have been running a waste oil burner for over 10 years here in Ireland and have sorted out all the little problems that can cause your system to shut off etc. To avoid having no heat if and when a problem occurs with my waste oil burner I re-installed my regular diesel boiler as a standby system. Both boilers are plumbed on my house system, however I designed and built a simple circuit which will start the standby boiler if the waste oil burner cuts out and goes into a fault condition. By doing this my house will always have heat. I installed a small neon light in my kitchen which informs my when I am running on the standby system. One frequent problem that happens is the siphon nozzle can get blocked. I discovered that the in-line filter that supplies the burner will not take care of this 100% as some of the blockages occur when fine particles that build up on the pre-heating element become dislodged, and eventually block the nozzle. I fixed this by making a fine sieve from a brass sheet ( 100 micron's ) filter mesh, which is about the size of a shot gun cartridge. I placed this around the pick up pipe in the pre-heat chamber. I chose brass as you can solder this material when you have shaped it to suit your setup. Now I have zero nozzle blockages. Well over the last 4 month or so. Hope this helps others .
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So it is an old thread. However, never run a waste oil burner in an oil furnace!