Managed to work from home today, so spent it at the boat, fitting in some tinkering around the real work!
I was up and there early this morn, in order to have a bit of a tidy up, and try and get the cooker working to get some heat into the place. I'd brought the manual for the BM30B oil control valve, as I had a suspciion I'd been turning the wrong screws. Looks like I had, too!
I took the thing off the cooker and dismantled it completely, which allowed me to clean the debris from the bottom of the float chamber - no idea where all this gunk comes from, as it'd have to get past the screen filter, which was present and not blocked.
Managed to get it all back together, and then cold flow-rated it using measuring cylinders and a stopwatch. I should have managed to get it set for around 5cc/min on low fire, and 20cc/min on high, there or there abouts.
I thought it'd be worth a test fire, so managed to light it using the firelighter method from the Supreme and Bubble conversions manuals for these pot burners.
Whatever I tried I couldn't get it to burn with a blue flame - I just got rolling yellow ones - on low or high. I suspect that this is due to inadequate flue draft, or perhaps air leaking into the flue where I've not sealed it well enough to the top of the cooker. I've borrowed a 28" chimney to see if that improves things and I'll give some extra heatproof silicone a go tomorrow. It was clearly drawing though, a bit at least, when I took the lighting port cover out. I wonder if I cleaned the burner pot out well enough - particularly the little air holes around the rim - might take it apart again tomorrow for another look.
Despite the incomplete combustion, it did get up to a fairly warm temperature after an hour. So much so, that I realised a slight issue with my plumbing... I'd ended up with an air lock at the top of the boiler output, with no way of bleeding it out. The pump was running, but it can't pump air, and hence was failing to shift the water around the system. The boiler eventually generated some steam in the system, which caused a few odd noises and a bit of a drip from my vent arrangement. I turned the cooker off, starting the 30min cool down process, and slackened the top boiler connection to bleed a bit of air out. Eventually, it started pumping water, and the calorifier circuit got hot, despite the cooker being in cool down. I'll have to try and arrange a bleed screw tomorrow!
Anyhow, I got on with more useful stuff afterwards, like building the bed:
The frame was constructed by ben - apart from the dividing timber, which I installed today - a piece of 4x2 to match the rest. The slats are 3x1 planed, supported on CSE studwork battens, screwed into the frame, like so:
Still really happy with my cheapie circular saw, with 'genuine' laser guide...
I remembered to go and collect the under-counter fridge I'd bought, the other day, which hopefully might get installed tomorrow...
Also today, I managed to carefully measure and install the new wall, to replace the one I demolished - it hides the calorifier and header tank, and provides something to screw the TV shelf to! I only had to take it down two or three times to adjust the finished shape - quite impressed given my woodwork is generally useless...
Managed to find a back-nut to screw on over my new basin drain fitting - since the silicone idea is clearly a bad one! All connected and draining properly now!
The final task of the day, before it got too cold, was to fix the bathroom heat-leak towel rad to the wall - this is mounted slightly oddly with three mounts on the right, and one on the left - as the battening behind the oak is along that line of three! Looks okay to me, but symmetry purists may be horrified!
Lots to do tomorrow, including finding some storage boxes for all the junk, getting the cooker working properly with a bleed and generating hot water, plus getting the radiators up and fridge installed. Should be livable on soon, again!
PC
