Power Venting an Oil Boiler?

[otsegony]

Probably a moot point here, but I'll throw my 2 cents in for the record. I have a Burnham oil fired boiler that vents through a Field Control power vent that is now in its 10th year of operation. Every thing considered I would recommend the set up for a back up, but not for the primary heat source. For the first four years living in the house (new construction completed in 2003) we did not have a wood stove hooked up and just used the oil boiler. With that set up I find that the boiler with the vent is overly noisy, it contributed to an odor problem caused by the house being so tightly constructed. The only operational problems that I have had with it were once I hit the vent with the stream off the snowblower and plugged it and about 3 years ago it stopped working and I discovered the fan had rusted itself to pieces as described above. I was able to buy a replacement fan and motor unit at the local supply house for about $225 and got it back up the same day. Right now we get most of our heat (90%) from the wood stove, but do run the boiler when it gets in the single digits. Hopefully this will be the year that we get a wood fired boiler going and can stop using oil altogether.
Also, in regular operation the heat coming out of the vent will melt snow, so it isn't really a problem that it is close to the ground and mine has not stained the siding...
Good luck!

 

[velvetfoot]

I might as well chime in again to say that I'm getting an 8" flue after all. March 7th. Nothing else is ready. Still have to move the oil tank to the other side of the basement.

I think it'll be nice, anyway, to have a flue in the basement, especially since I didn't think it was possible. Expensive though.