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lage, seven 25,000-gallon fuel tanks hold enough oil to keep the
residents warm through the brutal winters.
After Mullen, Cevasco and Neil inspected the boiler room,
they explored several other buildings, including the Health
Center, where boilers and water heaters hadn't seen service
in a decade.
FRESH IRON
Rocky's crew quickly cleaned up the mechanical room and
unloaded the new Burnham V8 water boiler and other equip-
ment. While the existing zone valves remained in place,
everything else was discarded. A new Taco circulator and 4900
Series air separator and Watts RBFF were installed, as were a
new fuel line, filter and Tiger Loop de-aerator flow control.
Disconnecting and replacing the old boiler went smoothly, and
Neil had the new unit fired by early evening.
But victory was short lived. The boiler soon shut off. Foam
in the Tiger Loop indicated air in the fuel line. Initially, they
dismissed an empty fuel tank as the culprit, because the nearby
water heater—which drew from the same oil tank—continued
to run without issue.
After replacing an old ball valve that they thought might be
leaking air, Cevasco went outside in the cold to check the fuel
level. With over a foot left in the underground tank, they figured
that the supply line to the water heater must be lower than the
boiler's. They weren't able to find someone to fill the tank that
evening, but the boiler needed to run overnight, or risk freezing
the building.
So they used the water heater to bleed fuel into a five-gallon
can to feed the new boiler overnight. In the morning, the
underground tank was filled by a rusty old Mobil oil truck
that—by a stroke of good fortune for the installers—found
itself living out its final days in the Alaskan bush. Thus the
boiler retrofit concluded.
The installation crew learned from the driver of the old tanker
that, during the winter, the 1,200 square-foot building typically
consumed one gallon of oil per hour overnight. The first night the
new boiler was in place, it had burned about 4 gallons in 9 hours,
meaning that the Burnham cut the building's fuel use in half.
Top: John Neil, Jason Cevasco, and Sam Mullen, of Rocky's
Heating Service, with the Yukon River in the background. Middle:
The old boiler leaked rapidly because of re-used push nipples.
Above left: Service Tech "Super Sam" Mullen unpacks the boiler
from the snowmobile trailer. Above right: Fred Nicholia hired
Rocky's Heating Service to replace one boiler, and service several
other units in the village.
"OIL IS THE ONLY FUEL SOURCE OUT HERE.
IT'S BARGED UP THE RIVER IN THE SUMMER,
AND COSTS ABOUT $8 PER GALLON."
—JON NEIL, LEAD INSTALLER
YUKON BOILERMEN
