7 things everyone should know before purchasing
a waste / used oil burning heater!
1. How often will you have to clean waste oil burner in your boiler or heater? Look beyond a ‘clean one time per season’ claim. In some cases, units carrying this claim must be cleaned after every 50 hours of use. Who has the time to do that? The efficiency of the burner and the clean nature of the burn determines just how often you will need to clean your waste oil burning equipment. Ampro waste oil burners we offer (for both: waste oil boilers and waste oil heaters) burn cleanly and efficiently utilizing a balanced air/oil atomization combined with dual stage pre heating.
2. Buying directly - manufacturers love to hide behind the perception that buying directly from them is the best deal for you. Actually, it is the best deal for them! Manufacturers who sell their products on the internet are obligated to sell for list price and list price only. They are bound by legal agreements with distributors. By dealing with our company, a National account master distributor, you can purchase for discounted pricing. You also have the advantage of shopping multiple product lines. The best part is that we have our own line which we manufacture ourselves to better specifications than any of the other manufacturers we represent. Our waste oil heaters and waste oil boilers utilizing Ampro waste oil burners are the very best money can buy and are geared towards providing years and years of reliable service. We have dealt with many dealers who have a philosophy of selling the waste oil burning equipment that require the most service possible. This puts money into their pockets and not into yours. The reliability of your waste oil burner is your best way to save the money - you purchased your waste oil heater or waste oil boiler to save.
3.Stainless steel burner chambers vs. steel burner chambers. Some companies make a big deal about having a stainless steel burner chamber in their waste oil heater or waste oil boiler. Although it is commonly understood that stainless steel will not rot out due to moisture brought on by condensation, it is not moisture that wears out a waste oil burner combustion chamber / heat exchanger. The waste oil burner combustion chamber eventually wears down from air moving across its surface creating friction. That is why a stainless chamber and a steel chamber will last about the same amount of years. The big difference you should consider is how poorly stainless steel conducts heat. This makes a steel burner chamber incredibly more efficient. Also consider that most heaters with a stainless chamber only use a single pass system which further decreases the efficiency of the unit. The best waste oil heater or waste oil boiler units utilize a triple pass steel combustion chamber / heat exchanger which boost the heating efficiency to 87%. Even though the fuel may be free, it doesn’t mean you should waste it!
4.Burning vegetable oil - some manufacturers claim their waste oil burners will do it. Read the fine print! Most units will not burn vegetable oil unless the oil has been processed. The oil must be purified before it can be used as fuel. There is only one manufacturer that builds a product that will burn unprocessed vegetable oil. Don’t be fooled. We have been dealing with these issues for a very long time. Ampro waste oil burners will burn vegetable oil, animal fat, renderings, bio diesel resin and high moisture content fuels. This is accomplished through the down stream Venturi effect of atomization distributed through the 2 burner nozzles. This makes our waste oil burners the most efficient possible.
5.Compressed air - all waste oil burners require it to atomize the fuel. Most of the burners on the market require an air source to be piped into the waste oil burner. On the other hand, there are also waste oil burners with built in air compressors. The cost involved to pipe air into your oil burner is a big consideration when making your purchase. The other consideration is the cost to replace a built in air compressor for a waste oil burner. Some manufacturers charge as much as five hundred dollars for a compressor replacement because they are the only ones you can get it from. With an Ampro waste oil burning equipment you can use a compressor almost as small as you want and we all know how inexpensive they are.
6. Stack temperature - some waste oil burners have it in excess of 900 degrees while others have stack temperatures of less than 500 degrees. Obviously the higher the stack temperature the less efficient the waste oil burner. Also, the higher the stack temperature the greater the potential for fire hazard. Some manufacturers will go as far as trying to convince you that single wall exhaust pipe is acceptable. You need to know that single wall exhaust pipe is 100% legal to purchase and 100% legal to install. However, once you turn that waste oil burner on and start to exhaust fumes you are in violation of almost all local fire codes and risk being dropped by your insurance carrier. Don’t let an overzealous manufacturer sell you something that is a potential fire hazard and will put you in violation of local fire codes. Ampro waste oil burning equipment (heaters and boilers) have triple walls and our very efficient burners. Waste oil boilers and waste oil heaters from Ampro keep stack temperatures well under 500 degrees.
7. Many manufacturers intentionally over rate their waste oil burners to give you a false sense of value and worth. Other manufacturers intentionally under rate their waste oil burners in order to give you what you really need and then some. You have the right to know who truly has the best deal. Here is a rule of thumb for calculating BTU’s for a waste oil burner (for a boiler or a heater). Take the GPH (gallons-per-hour) of the nozzle and multiply that by 140,000. 1 GPH equals approximately 140,000 BTU’s for waste oil burner in your heater or boiler. This also gives you the BTU’s before the burn. The after burn rating of your waste oil heater or waste oil boiler is 80 to 90 percent of the total depending on the unit.
The last and most important piece of information you should know is that at Burns All we have dealt with all of these issues and we want nothing more than to give you good, sound, solid advice about what waste oil burner, waste oil boiler or waste oil heater unit would be best for you. It is never just about price. It is much more than that and money poorly spent is money wasted. You might have waste oil to burn but not money and time to waste.
We would appreciate very much the opportunity to help
you with your purchase, a purchase that you will be living
with for a very long time.
Mike Nees, President
Waste
Oil Fired Equipment |
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Experience And Patented Technology... In order
to accommodate our customers with industry leading, cost-efficient
products, we've devoted a significant amount of time researching
company’s that could deliver such quality. Lanair
and INOV8 qualify under all of these standards.
Why Lanair? As the U.S. pioneer of waste oil heaters since
1976, Lanair leads the industry with 28 years of experience
and product innovation. Advancing with fast-paced markets
and customer needs, from its first-ever manual heaters,
Lanair products offer cutting-edge technology and quality.
Lanair’s proven history in waste oil recycling equips
our products
with the superior design and performance that only 28 years
experience can provide.
Why INOV8? Safe, clean and reliable guarantees your satisfaction
with any of our products. The incomparable safety
features combined with absolutely the cleanest emissions
and nearly fail proof operation are the hallmark of INOV8's
reputation. The ability to burn nearly any type of waste
shop oil including crankcase oils, hydraulic or transmission,
gear box, solvents, vegetable oil as well as fuel oil gives
you the opportunity to save money in heating while eliminating
disposal costs and EPA imposed cradle to grave liability.
When a business considers purchasing a new asset, their
decision is often driven by the calculated return on
investment (ROI). That basically means how long it takes
for the investment to pay for itself. Our customers tell
us they
see such significant savings that they often cover the price
of the INOV8 furnace, boiler or evaporator within the first
year
of operation. After that, it simply contributes to the bottom
line every day it is used.
Hazards & Difficulties of Burning Used Oils
In order to achieve a significant contribution to environmentally clean combustion,
it is necessary to convert through combustion all of the carbon and hydrocarbon
molecules of the base oil and the sludge to the gaseous form of carbon dioxide,
water and heat. There are many substances in waste oil which are not combustible
and which cause substantial environmental and combustion concerns, particularly
when associated with unburned organic residue associated with incomplete combustion.
Automotive engine oil is highly viscous and contains many additives to meet
lubricating requirements. However, this viscosity causes difficulty in heating
the oil to ignition temperature, as well as in obtaining small particle atomization
for proper combustion.
In continuation of this problematic review, it should be noted that chemical
breakdowns occur in the synthetic additive polymers as well as the base oil
molecules. Many different contaminants are generated by the engine itself, such
as: unburned fuel, water, acids, sludge, road dust, antifreeze and many different
wear metals. Due to the high amount of detergents used in automotive oils, the
contaminants are retained in suspension and are thus removed from the engine
at normal oil change and must be considered throughout the preparation for combustion
and combustion itself. In addition, the oils collected from winter driving will
significantly differ from those of summer driving. Preheating is absolutely
necessary and, this in itself, introduces numerous related problems:
- Heating oil at through velocities of less than one foot per second will
cause nucleate boiling with related graphite precipitation into nozzle blocking
nodules.
- The waste oil contains air, water and gasoline in solution that will gas-off
during the heating process. The gas will interrupt the steady flow of oil
to cause erratic and dirty combustion.
- Pressure regulation is required to maintain uniform firing rates. This is
difficult due to the extreme variations in viscosity and the low flow rates
involved. The problems of pressure regulation are magnified with the entrained
vapors to give pulsating pressure and erratic and/or dirty combustion.
Black dirty combustion is prevalent in the waste oil industry, as is an incidence
of explosions. The industry standard is now Underwriter's Laboratory 296A that,
in our opinion, gives rise to the opportunity for misfire and explosion. In
particular, UL296A allows use of a primary combustion control that uses a cadmium
light sensor and includes a safety timing of 45 seconds. In particular, this
type of primary safety control is prevalent in the residential oil furnace industry,
and does a good job in protecting homes. However, the waste oil industry would
more closely relate to an industrial application and should require appropriate
safeguards.
A cadmium light sensor is responsive to daylight, incandescent or fluorescent
light and, as such, can and will pick-up on random lighting to continue to deliver
oil when the flame was struck out by any number of reasons. If spark ignition
or flame could be subsequently re-established, the residual liquid oil in the
combustion chamber could produce dire consequences. A valid list of adverse
conditions could but will not be presented to elaborate the peril of using a
simple residential cadmium sensor for an industrial waste oil application. The
use of a 45 second timing sequence for a trial ignition period and for oil interruption
upon flame interruption provides a quantity of oil that can fuel a substantial
explosion under attainable conditions. The INOV8 sequence is much shorter as
explained later.
General Information on Federal & State Approvals
The manufacture and marketing of waste oil burning equipment is covered by
both federal and state regulations. These are generally separated into environmental
and safety issues, respectively. Although there is a certain amount of overlap
between federal and state, the states usually administer these regulations through
various approval processes. Individual installations are monitored by local
inspectors through the process of reviewing applications, permitting, assessing
fees and follow-up inspections.
As with any heating device waste oil furnaces are expected to meet certain
national codes involving safety, performance, endurance testing, and adherence
to installation and electric codes. States, municipalities and insurance companies
rely on independent third-party approval agencies such as Underwriter's Laboratory
(UL) to regulate equipment design issues. The following information details
the regulations addressed in the first paragraph and discuss the national standards
that are imposed on the design, manufacture, installation and use of waste oil
burning equipment.
Federal Regulation (EPA)
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) establishes the rules that allow for
the burning of used oils for energy recovery and publishes the pertinent regulations
in the Federal Register. The section that pertains to the waste oil burning
industry is covered in 40 CFR, part 279. After several years of debate and uncertainty
regarding listing or not listing used oils as a hazardous waste, the EPA handed
down their final decision explained in this section in September, 1992. It was
a very favorable determination for the manufacturers and users of waste oil
burning equipment.
Rather than monitoring the air emissions, the EPA has written the regulations
from the premise of what is being burned. If the oil is acceptable, they then
believe the emission will be acceptable. They've divided oils into two categories,
those that are relatively benign and create little concern when burned are called
"on-specification oils", and those that contain more than the allowable
limits of heavy metals, halogens, or the presence of low volatile fuels are
called "off-specification oils".
The EPA regulations allow the burning of "on-specification" used
oils in equipment designed for energy recovery, generally without limitation.
"Off-specification" used oils are also allowed to be burned, but are
limited to devices that are 500,000 BTUs or less, the devices are vented to
the outside, and they burn only oils generated on-site. People often misinterpret
these regulations and apply the above limitations to the "on-specification"
oils, so there is some confusion. There are few restrictions if the oil is burned
in boilers by small generators, or when burning oils that were originally intended
as a fuel (such as jet fuels). There are no permits or licensing requirements
on the federal level for the burning of used oils by small generators.
National Standards & Approval Agencies
States, municipalities and insurance companies require that a third-party agency
certify that they have tested the equipment to ensure that the construction
standard has been met and is maintained in the assembly and operation of the
equipment. Underwriter's Laboratory is recognized as the industry leader in
testing agencies though there are several other smaller national laboratories
capable of doing the same. PFS Corporation in Madison, Wisconsin provides INOV8
International with a "listing" for our furnaces and our waste oil
storage tank. We are familiar with two other laboratories performing similar
testing, Environmental Test Laboratory (ETL) and Environmental Test Laboratory
of Maine (ETLM). These four agencies worked together over six years ago to establish
the standards for waste oil burning equipment, now known as UL 296A. This standard
requires end-user compliance with other national codes, such as :
1. The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) - for heating system installation
requirements,
2. The National Fire Protection Associations (NFPA) section 31-1987 - for the
storage, handling and burning of used oils, and
3. The National Fire Protection Associations (NFPA) section 70-1990 - for the
national electric code.
These codes are enforced by local authorities, usually by representatives of
Building Inspection Departments or Fire Departments.
Competing manufacturers of waste oil burning equipment have obtained listings
from UL creating a marketing challenge for INOV8 International because of the
strong name recognition of Underwriter's Laboratory. It is desirable that INOV8
International also obtain a UL listing to ease marketing efforts, but it is
not required. Selling efforts would be eased with a UL approval particularly
if combined with an effort to educate city and state authorities on the significance
of the industrial safety control that INOV8 International uses versus the residential
control used by all other competitors. INOV8 International has already obtained
a listing from Underwriter's of Canada, an affiliate of UL INOV8 International
provides documentation to installers to ensure that the equipment meets the
relative standards and the Instruction Manual details a proper installation
referencing the above national codes.
State Approvals
Most states have generally adopted the federal EPA regulations regarding the
burning of used oils. We've seen additional, but varying requirements on the
storage, handling and transportation of those oils. We have written to each
state seeking their approval to sell our product and to obtain their permitting
and installation requirements. Some have returned one-half page authorizations,
while others have sent sizable documents. Although sometimes challenging to
sort through the administrative layers to identify the proper authority and
code, we've generally found most administrators to be supportive of the prospects
of burning used oils. The Minnesota Office of Waste Management published an
extensive study in 1990 for the purpose of determining the best method of disposing
of used oils, anticipating that re-refining oils would be economically and ecologically
preferred. Based on the results of the study, Minnesota concluded that re-refining
was not a viable alternative but recommended the burning of oils for energy
recovery.
Each state has their own administrative agency that is responsible for regulating
various used oil situations. In Minnesota it is the Pollution Control Agency
(MPCA); in Wisconsin it is the Department of Industry, Labor and Human Relations
(DILHR); in Michigan it is the Department of Natural Resources (MDNR).
Some states, such as Maine and Wisconsin, require that companies register their
products and pay fees for selling in their state. Wisconsin requires heating
systems be given "material approval". This involves submitting necessary
documentation to an administrative body who determines if the equipment meets
state requirements for safety and usage. Approved equipment is then placed on
a list and disseminated to state purchasing agents and heating contractors.
The only purpose it serves is as an aid to selling.
City Approvals
Most large cities have departments that monitor the installation of heating
systems in commercial buildings through application, permitting and the inspection
process. Most cities require that a heating contractor licensed with their city
install any heating system. That contractor is responsible for obtaining any
relevant permits by submitting applications, building and heating plans, and
paying appropriate fees. The general purpose of an application and approval
process is for fire protection. The requirements vary from city to city and
are best known by the local heating contractor.
Some administrative agencies of large cities require heating systems be approved
prior to their sale. INOV8 International should be notified as soon as possible
to begin the approval process. In most cases, the process of gaining approval
to sell in a new city is relatively simple and doesn't take but a couple weeks.
Most of our approvals have been obtained via telephone calls, fax and mail correspondence.
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Owner of Watertown
eatery rebels against
fuel costs
By Peter J. Howe, Globe Staff
Like every small business owner, Don Levy was eager to escape crushing increases in the cost of energy this winter.
The owner of Deluxe Town Diner found a way to slash his fuel bill for heating and hot water to $0 during some weeks this winter: a new system that runs on the 30 or 40 gallons of vegetable oil he uses every week for cooking fries, plus oil he collects from a nearby pizzeria and a pair of Chinese restaurants...more
See how used oil
technology can save
you from burning a
hole in your wallet.
By Thom Elmire
Buying waste/used oil heating equipment is a smart move, but it is an investment that requires research and thought.
A steady supply of waste oil is almost as valuable as gold in today's economic and energy-strained environment.
Operators fortunate enough to have either a conjoined quick lube operation or access to a reliable supply of waste oil are in an enviable position considering...more
Motor Service,
Feb, 2001
by Jocelyn Park
It's been a blustery winter. If you don't believe me, ask my car. Along
with the many others out there hit by snowstorms, I couldn't find my car
for a couple days, and when I did, well, let's just say I wasn't happy.
Or, you might also want to ask your technicians, who, no doubt, like
to keep just as warm as you, especially while working. Waste oil heaters
solve many problems: they heat your work space, help the environment by
recycling used oil, and save money on heating costs...more
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Frequently Asked Questions
How much used oil should I generate per year
to make my decision about buying a used-oil furnace or boiler practical?
The average minimum volume of used oil you must generate annually is between...more
Don't used-oil fired appliances (boilers, heaters, evaporators etc.) smoke and pollute the air?
Absolutely not! Waste oil appliances we sell burn as clean as a...more
Will various viscosities of oil affect the combustion efficiency of my used-oil burner (furnace, boiler, evaporator)?
No. The state-of-the-art burners we sell are designed to accommodate the...more
How often will I have to clean the ash from inside
my used oil appliance (furnace, boiler, evaporator)?
The required cleaning intervals on average are approximately...more
Are the appliances you sell backed with a warranty?
Yes. INOV8 and LANAIR burners are covered with a 10 year prorated warranty
which is...more
When can I expect to get any return on my investment to used-oil burner?
Depending on the climate (average annual temperature) of your region,
with our heater you'll receive a...more
"Cradle-to-grave" liability: what is it and how can it affect the way I dispose of used oil?
The federal government directly and irrevocably holds you responsible
for pollution management, cleanup and disposal control of...more
If I am not an owner and just renting, am I still liable?
Yes...more
How long am I liable?
Forever. Even if you sold your business a...more
Is it more convenient to hire a hauler/refiner to transport my used oil?
This is what waste oil haulers would like you to believe. Remember, your
liability extends to...more
Are the used oil appliances you sell ductable?
Yes. All of the used-oil appliances we sell can be ducted, and are...more
Do you follow up the sale with parts and service support?
Yes. For your convenience, when you buy any used-oil appliance from us,
you will be provided a...more
What does the EPA suggest?
Since 1985 the EPA issued a final rule for disposal of used oil by burning...more
Is it possible to get pollution insurance?
Underwriters will charge astronomical amounts and will...more |
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