Weil McLain Ultra Series repair

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John_M52

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Turned on the boiler (slab heat) as the weather cooled and it threw an error code. Called the installer and they looked at it and said it's 17 years old, the controller is discontinued, you need a whole new unit $12,500. There is an upgrade for the control but that will run you $2,300 and it's a lot of work so you don't want to do that. I said do the upgrade. Called them 3 weeks later to check and they still hadn't found the upgrade kit and were working on a price for a new unit. I went online and found the kit including instructions in stock everywhere for $500. I ordered it and spent about 5 hours, including coffee breaks and scratching my head, installing it. Works like a charm. This company used to be great to deal with, now you can't get them to answer the phone. The thing is, I would have paid the $2,300 but their attitude cost them the job.

Guess I saved enough on the repair for a couple new toys!
 
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A buddy has a Weil McClain boiler in his place. It's given him no end of troubles. He's ready to rip it out and put in something else. I'm curious if you've had a history of troubles or if this is the first instance. I'm interested in reliability accounts should I ever have to replace my boiler.

I have a Buderus boiler that was installed when the house was built in 2001. Compared to current technology, it's a less efficient, non-condensing design. Cast iron guts. My service guy said condensing, formed metal boilers fail far sooner than the "old style." Fine with me, this system doesn't cost much to run and comfort is great. Hydronic heat is superb.

As an aside, I sold an old house a couple years ago. It has the original 1940 oil-fired boiler and cast iron radiators. A newer flame-retention burner was installed probably 40 years ago. Still works fine. The new owner is an old friend. He found an old-school service guy - in his 80's - to do a thorough checkout. The system came back with a clean bill of health. Good thing it's healthy because walls went up after its installation. A boat in a basement so to speak. To get it out, he'd have to break it up and probably deal with hazmat. I expect that old boiler will keep on chugging for a long time to come.
 
I have always been one to try and do it myself. Most times I can judge if I can do it or if it is over my head. Just fixed the cold water pipe to the kitchen sink. Nothing to it. Kids these days wouldn't know how to shut the water off much less fix it.
 
Krogen said:
A buddy has a Weil McClain boiler in his place. It's given him no end of troubles. He's ready to rip it out and put in something else. I'm curious if you've had a history of troubles or if this is the first instance. I'm interested in reliability accounts should I ever have to replace my boiler.

I have a Buderus boiler that was installed when the house was built in 2001. Compared to current technology, it's a less efficient, non-condensing design. Cast iron guts. My service guy said condensing, formed metal boilers fail far sooner than the "old style." Fine with me, this system doesn't cost much to run and comfort is great. Hydronic heat is superb.

As an aside, I sold an old house a couple years ago. It has the original 1940 oil-fired boiler and cast iron radiators. A newer flame-retention burner was installed probably 40 years ago. Still works fine. The new owner is an old friend. He found an old-school service guy - in his 80's - to do a thorough checkout. The system came back with a clean bill of health. Good thing it's healthy because walls went up after its installation. A boat in a basement so to speak. To get it out, he'd have to break it up and probably deal with hazmat. I expect that old boiler will keep on chugging for a long time to come.
Click to expand...

Weil-McClain is the most common residential and small commercial ever in my experience. I would run away fast when offered a condensing boiler. Often the return temperatures are high enough that there is little benefit.
 
Krogen said:
A buddy has a Weil McClain boiler in his place. It's given him no end of troubles. He's ready to rip it out and put in something else. I'm curious if you've had a history of troubles or if this is the first instance...

It has the original 1940 oil-fired boiler and cast iron radiators... A boat in a basement so to speak.
Click to expand...

The Weil McLain has been trouble prone. The old controller would randomly throw errors that required you manually press the reset button to remove a lockout condition. You usually noticed it was time to press the button when the house started getting cold or when you returned from a trip to a cold house. Then you'd wait a day or more for it to warm back up. I installed a lamp timer and a relay and wired it to the reset button to automatically hit reset every day at 1 AM. Worked for maybe the past 5 years. Repair guy didn't like that either. But my house never lost heat for more than a day. (It had a Honeywell series Ultra controller if that helps). New controller doesn't have a reset button - it has a menu driven controller - so fingers crossed. IMO the old design with hard lockout was a software design flaw.

My first house had one of those car sized cast iron oil boilers. It had to run year round because it also had a heat exchanger for hot water to the shower and sink. They didn't believe in insulation back then so it was always throwing off a lot of unwanted heat. Yes, they had to smash it to bits with sledge hammers to remove it - house was built around it.
 
MIL has a Weil- McLain installed in her 4 flat. Boiler went in in 1965. Still running fine.

However, I have had to take over cleaning and maintenance since every HVAC shop, save one, has told her she needs a new boiler (with varying levels of hysteria).

Did they flush and put in water treatment? No
Clean the burners and thermocouple? No.
Check the main vents (which had been in there since the 60's and didn't work) No.
Check the pressure relief? No.

But they sure charged her. :mad:

Mains balanced, boiler cleaned, running like a champ a 6 oz of pressure (steam). Tenants happy.

New main vents:
apjvqT7.jpg


Steaming away:
MLuLfJ8.jpg
 
Last edited:
delcrossv said:
MIL has a Weil- McLain installed in her 4 flat. Boiler went in in 1965. Still running fine.

However, I have had to take over cleaning and maintenance since every HVAC shop, save one, has told her she needs a new boiler (with varying levels of hysteria).
Click to expand...

Nice! When can you be here!

Figure I'll have to do all the maintenance from now on as well. Generator folks are just as bad. I have a 40 KW and have been told multiple times I should just get a new unit. Been told by the PM tech - you need a new battery. I say but I replaced it a month before you came out. Or, you need a new alternator belt. I say why, I replaced it a few months ago. Always the same response from the home office - well our tech said is was old/bad, etc.
 
I worked on a customer's mother's boiler, some big mansion over in Squirrel Hill. The old boiler was just left in place and they put another one in beside it. I've heard of times when they couldn't get the old one demolished & removed it was often cheaper to hire a couple laborers to dig a hole and bury the old one. I'd have to see that done though before I could believe it.
 
Another entertaining story:

In another one of my MIL's buildings there's two very small hot water boilers. The larger of the two was replaced by a new Peerless (nice boiler). The peerless kept kicking off on high temp and two different companies told her to just keep hitting the reset on the Hi Temp switch with is located in the integral smoke hood.

Took a look and actually read the installation manual. That boiler does not need a smoke hood in the flue as it's in the boiler. However the installers just re-used the old flue that had a smoke hood as part of it. So, no draft!

Replaced the old flue with a new piece of 6" round (per the installation manual) and voila! Problem solved.

The lack of draft also caused to other boiler to soot up so bad it back flamed and cooked its transformer. Being the middle of winter, I jumped the boiler to the other boiler's transformer until I could get a replacement. All good now.

The service tech charged my MIL $150 for boiler cleaning for that one. Took half a garbage bag of soot out of it. :mad:

Idiots.
 
delcrossv said:
...Took a look and actually read the installation manual....
Click to expand...
LOL. A dying art, it seems.

When I was a kid, we had a boat and a dinghy, for which dad bought a British Seagull outboard motor. I can still remember the simple manual, which was clearly and neatly printed, in just one language, devoid of endless safety warnings and pictograms. On page 2, all by itself, as I recall, it stated, "Read the manual."

I hope you informed the service company and sent them a bill for YOUR services... along with the garbage bag of soot :D
 
I remember those outboards. Yep, no OSHA around in those days! But I saw them on a lot on dinghy's. The one in the link is a beauty.
 
John_M52 said:
... Yep, no OSHA around in those days!...
Click to expand...
Just like my c.1960 Onan diesel genny. They stopped making Seagullls in the 80's (?) because it wasn't practical to bring them up to current emissions standards, but there are still a number of them around and running. I remember reading somewhere that some of the "little ships" that went to bring back soldiers from Dunkirk were powered by Seagulls, and several were recovered from the sand after the war and put back into service.
 
delcrossv said:
Another entertaining story:

In another one of my MIL's buildings there's two very small hot water boilers. The larger of the two was replaced by a new Peerless (nice boiler). The peerless kept kicking off on high temp and two different companies told her to just keep hitting the reset on the Hi Temp switch with is located in the integral smoke hood.

Took a look and actually read the installation manual. That boiler does not need a smoke hood in the flue as it's in the boiler. However the installers just re-used the old flue that had a smoke hood as part of it. So, no draft!

Replaced the old flue with a new piece of 6" round (per the installation manual) and voila! Problem solved.

The lack of draft also caused to other boiler to soot up so bad it back flamed and cooked its transformer. Being the middle of winter, I jumped the boiler to the other boiler's transformer until I could get a replacement. All good now.

The service tech charged my MIL $150 for boiler cleaning for that one. Took half a garbage bag of soot out of it. :mad:

Idiots.
Click to expand...

Any competent inspection should have noticed the double draft diverters. From final to a utility change of equipment.
 
oldbrownhat said:
LOL. A dying art, it seems.

When I was a kid, we had a boat and a dinghy, for which dad bought a British Seagull outboard motor. I can still remember the simple manual, which was clearly and neatly printed, in just one language, devoid of endless safety warnings and pictograms. On page 2, all by itself, as I recall, it stated, "Read the manual."

I hope you informed the service company and sent them a bill for YOUR services... along with the garbage bag of soot :D
Click to expand...

My first day as a gas serviceman was at Intermountain Gas in Soda Springs Idaho. They had a guy come from Boise to fire a machine that melted plastic over motor windings, that had been repaired. I went with him and he told me "watch and learn". He sat down and spent 15 minutes studying the manual before he did anything else.

He had a misshapen ear and had been in a gas fire. I was later told that if he ever was asked what to do in a gas explosion his response was "Run to the right, running to the left will get you hurt". [Forum safe version]
 
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