October 2014

After three years in the making, the boiler epic finally wrapped today. I have a brand new, Williamson 140,000 BTU steam boiler. Granted, it’s not on the epic scale of Lord of the Rings but I think it took even longer to complete it. This story began in 2011 with this tale of woe. I had big plans about extending the house renovation by getting rid of steam heating altogether and replumbing the house for hot water heat instead. It made sense to do this for several reasons. First is that hot water heat is cheaper to run. You’re not […]

Back in 2011, I wrote an article about my failing Weil-McLain steam boiler entitled Got Three Estimates? Get Three More. The article concluded with my finding a plumbing company willing to rebuild my ancient autofeed mechanism for a fair price. Despite most heating contractors swearing that my 42 year-old boiler wouldn’t survive the season, it made it through 2011, 2012 and the brutal, polar vortex winter of 2013 without a burp. Two weeks ago, I relit the pilot light on boiler. The outside temps were in the 60s so I didn’t turn on the boiler. A few days later I