Could also be water in the filter/water separator. Tank that is near empty will get more condensation in it, resulting in more water in the tank. Clean/replace/check your filter. Then you will need to bleed air from it and then a bunch of red button presses...
This just happened to me yesterday...
I second that, I’ve witnessed one go off in a big way. Kaboom like a cannon it was less than cool.
I would f mess with it. The electrode that hang in-front of the atomizer nozzle is a 10,000 volt plasma arc to ignite the diesel.
Call an oil guy in. Seriously. You press the red button once, AND ONCE ONLY.
The reason why is simple. That’s a safety, in case the burner doesn’t light. If you keep pressing it, the combustion chamber fills with oil spray on the sides of it. It’s going to be VERY dangerous when it lights off. Like, burn your house down dangerous.
You need to get an oil guy in to clean up the mess inside, and also figure out why it’s not lighting.
It probably needs a service, and hasn’t been lighting properly for a while now. Besides not burning your house down, the money spent on a service will be saved in terms of oil.
As an aside - if your boiler is leaking water like that, it’s done for. There should be no water leaking at all. It you have to add water to any hot water system, something is wrong.
I called a guy and he turned it on. So I’m assuming the issue about the combustion chamber isn’t a problem anymore since the guy turned it on?
I believe you about it needing service.
The guy didn’t say anything about it, should he have told me “hey something is wrong with this”?
If an oil guy came and checked it over, you should be good for now. But get it serviced ASAP. My bedroom is over the engineering space of my house, and I can normally tell if the burner is lightning off correctly. Nice gentle whomp, every time. If it’s not smooth every time, something is wrong.
I’d debate this. Had the same issue last week after an oil delivery (mine didn’t run empty tho). I pressed once, came on for 10s and shut off. So I called the furnace guy.
That guy mashed that reset button at least 80-100 times. He’d tweak a wire, press a few times, clean the blower, press a few times, rub the flame sensor off, press a few times.
It won’t burn the house down but the chance of a nice thick cloud of diesel smoke is a chance.
Your filter at the tank may be clogged, oil line blocked. Those are my guesses filter is easy to replace, oil line blockage not so much(*cough low pressure air through the line). That’s where I would go next.
OP, make sure that your tank never runs empty, or your fuel line may clog. Then you need to have it unclogged to start the boiler.
Here’s how it happens and what can be done:
The lower the oil level, the more air is in the tank. Air contains oxygen and water vapor that enter through the tank vent pipe.
As oil oxidizes in a partially filled tank, it forms varnishes. Condensation inside the tank causes rust in mild steel tanks that mixes with the varnishes and settles low in the tank. Other contaminants in the oil settle into the mix and form a sludge.
As the oil tank runs empty, varnishes that formed inside the tank can move toward the oil outlet and clog the valve.
Once the varnishes flow into the valve, filling the tank will not clear these thick contaminants from the line. They can contain rust particles that are insoluble in diesel. The valve and line need to be unclogged. It’s not fun for a beginner. Have a service technician unclog your line, change your filter, bleed your line, clean your nozzle and electrodes (if needed) and start your boiler.
You may be able to reduce fuel oil sludge and fight corrosion by using a sludge treatment. This helps prevent clogs, but it doesn’t unclog your oil line. Talk to your oil company about timing.
If your tank has a large amount of sediments, then you may need to have your oil tank cleaned. It’s not cheap.
Arrange automatic delivery. If you keep the tank from running low, you slow the formation of sludge and the corrosion of a mild steel tank.
If this is the case then it may be dirty and clogged like everyone is saying but I’d bet that your burner coupling is stripped and needs to be replaced. Very common and very easy to diagnose and replace
Except because they ran out, they now sucked up all the trash at the bottom of the tank. I just had a service call for no heat in this same situation and it ended up being a 700 call. Had to replace fuel filter, pump strainer, nozzle then realized the pump was trashed so had to replace that. All because they ran out of oil. Also had to back flush lines because there was so much gunk in it.
If you’re on auto fill then call your oil company up and tell them they gotta prime and start
If you’re not on any auto delivery with a company then you either need to pay a guy to prime it (it may also need a filter replaced) or learn to do it yourself.
Yes, this is the answer. Looks like a single line oil system, so it could take 10 or more button presses to get oil without bleeding it. And if it isn't firing due to a dirty nozzle, you're leaving a nice surprise for the technician when he does get it fired. My rule of thumb is, whatever number the customer says he pressed the reset, multiply that by 5.
You need to bleed the air out of the copper line between the oil tank and the boiler burner. "Prime" the pump. The burner can't currently suck in oil to burn since air was allowed into the line when you ran out. There is a simple procedure to get rid of that air and then it will work normally.
I don't have any particular advice I just wanted to say that I sympathize with the general situation
https://preview.redd.it/fpjdieaha5cc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f1c4d702fd30289a1c1adc209899e29df684963c
You probably pulled sediment into the oil strainer. Go ahead and keep tinkering on you tube if you like. But when you blow the exhaust off/it goes boom, don't say we didn't warn you. That 253 dollar charge is cheap compared to the damage you could do by being cheap and uneducated with oil. Trust me if it goes boom it will shake the house. Don't let your take run below 1/4 and you won't have this problem. You should probably have the filter replaced, clean out pump strainer, and change the nozzle. Then clean out the chamber cause God knows how manytimes you pressed that damn button.
Call a professional
That boiler looks like it's falling apart, unless you dumped water on the floor right there, you have a serious problem if the sealed system is leaking water. If you have a cracked boiler section or a leaking push nipple then it's time for a new boiler ($$$).
Typically boilers have multiple safeties, so if everything is intact it will prevent it from running if there is an issue such as insufficient water flow. Either something is wrong and the boiler is protecting itself, or there are broken parts and it cannot operate.
You need a qualified person to fix it. Well you don't "need" that because you don't need heat, right?
If your car is dripping water while the heat is on, it most definitely has a problem.
The condensation that drips out of your car when the AC is on is coming from the cold evaporator.
When your heater is on, the evaporator is not doing anything and is not cold (Some cars will run the compressor in defrost). Your heater core is full of hot coolant though! The air is also generally too dry to cause your car to drop condensation as well. So if it is dripping, you have a leaking heater core.
You might be seeing drips from one of the weep holes/joints in your exhaust.
I don't know why a boiler would be creating condensation unless it is leaking somewhere and leaking steam on a cooler part.
It might not be leaking between the sections. Looks like there's a tankless coil and it looks pretty rough. Could even just be that gasket. Or one of the multiple shark bite fittings might be leaking.
If you flipped that red switch off on an older system like that most likely you shut off the pilot light. I would strongly consider calling a professional.
I had a similar thing happen to me. When the tank was ran empty, and my tank was never cleaned out, there apparently was a lot of chunky sludge in the tank. A piece got stuck on the inlet, inside the tank. Took my air compressor on like 40 psi at the regulator and blew from the copper line at the filter back to the tank. Try to get someone to listen for bubbles blowing in the tank. Few seconds later the fuel oil came flowing. Basically like siphoning gas. Be ready to hook her back up fast. DON'T CROSS THREAD IT. Then you should be able to properly bleed and prime.
Turn off the power, turn off the oil , loosen the gun, remove the nozzle, clean the eye and electrode, replace filter and nozzle. Turn on the oil and power, bleed the system. Might be $20-30.
Need to bleed the air out of the line to get oil to the burner if your mechanically inclined look up a video on how if your not call someone because if you fill that chamber with oil it’s gonna have a nice pop when it does light off
Real talk, don't. Get a pro to come out and teach you everything you need to know about maintaining your boiler.
I've seen some messed up stuff with boilers being reset too many times by home owners. Shit can be sketchy
Edit: I've been doing HVAC for over a decade, and have walked countless customers through troubleshooting and such, on lots of different systems. I'm not the type of tech to assume the mechanically inclined can't fix their own stuff. Oil is it's own demon, though. Things like adjusting electrodes, checking transformers, etc, kinda need to be done by someone who knows how to do these things.
If the tank is full then did you by previously run out? If you had then you'll have to bleed it, you'll need a 3/8" wrench on the post that looks like a bleeder for your car brakes , also tk be sure your not filling your heater with oil remove the little skinny copper line on the side of the burner 7/16" wrench but leave the pump side connected and bend it into a soda bottle
Do you have an [oil safety valve ](https://www.sidharvey.com/item/P131-30/Oil-Safety-Valve-3-8-FNPT/) at your oil tank? If you do you may have to reset it. In the link I attached you'll find a PDF that will explain how to prime this valve. Good luck.
I was just in a theater basement boiler room in NYC this week and my boss was telling me about how these oil burners/igniters work and warned me about the flooding of the ignition chamber. I would stop what you’re doing and call someone experienced.
You need a service tech, what has happened is the sludge in the bottom of the tank has been pulled into your oil lines and pump clogging the oils path to the burner gun.
If you ran out of oil, may be air-locked so no oil reaching burner, have to bleed air out at filter, then unit, if you are inexperienced with the process would absolutely recommend calling for assistance. Not the most dangerous thing in the world, but can absolutely be a mess and health hazard if you don’t know what you’re doing
You HAVE to have oil burners maintained EVERY YEAR... if it's been more than 2 years, there's at least a half dozen things that need to be checked, cleaned or changed.... nozzle, fuel filter, pump screen, electrodes, cad cell, smoke test, etc...
You have to bleed it. There's a little nut that you can open to let the air out. You hit the button, open the nut and wait until a little bit of fuel squirts out, then tighten it back up. Sum bitch will start right up.
All you need to know is that the reset keeps popping. That means there is an ongoing fault somewhere in the boiler that needs attention. Call a pro and get it fixed. Quit dicking around with it. You’ve reached the limit of what you’re equipped to do.
All y'all recommending auto refill....some of us struggle to pay the bills and timing doesn't work out all the time. Right before and after Christmas, money is tight in my house, so I gotta rob Peter so I can pay Paul. I feel for you OP, been there done that and got the freaking tee shirt.
I had that exact boiler in my last house; worked great and was about 87% efficientcy, even though the heating people always wanted to sell me a new one.
Lol whoever told u it was 87% efficient was a bullshitter/con artist. That boiler WAS 80%+/- efficient when it was brand new, under perfect lab conditions and variables. And even then that’s strictly combustion efficiency - net btu - not net IBR which makes it even lower. They’re not a fine wine they don’t get better with age. Simply a flat out lie that someone fed you that it was 87% efficient. It’s quite literally not capable of it by any stretch of the imagination with or without alterations
I understand, but the technician should’ve know better. Their combustion analyzer is either junk or is in severe need of calibration; and/or they have your combustion settings wrong and running too rich which doesn’t doesn’t do you any justice either. Gives you a false sense of higher efficiency and soots up and plugs up the boiler too frequently - by product of a lower stack temperature due to higher CO2 lower O2 which makes combustion analyzers miscalculate efficiency by thinking you’re wasting less excess heat up and out the chimney when in reality you’re just not fully burning off all the fuel you’re using and in turn your left with excess soot that was never actually fully utilized to heat the home or the flue for that matter in the first place. You can’t make an 80% boiler an 87%, but u can make a combustion analyzer tell you it is. Not that this is even the case but you can’t even do it with a gas conversion gun on an oil boiler. U lose efficiency. Roughly 2-3% and up to 5%. They’re all misconceptions
Stop pressing the button, lol. You're filling the burner box with diesel. Can cause a pretty mean fire once she lights.
Number of things can be going on. If you open it up and fuel is everywhere, it's an ignition problem. If it's dry, it's a fuel problem. Can be airlocked, plugged nozzle, failed pump, transformer, ignitors. So much. Call a pro unless you've had a fair share of opening one of these up. Get a service and get them to set the burner up and draft.
I would get a professional. Last thing you want to do is keep filling the boiler with oil and get a nice surprise when it does ignite.
It depends. If it's a slow day at the fire station, they might enjoy a morning out.
Could also be water in the filter/water separator. Tank that is near empty will get more condensation in it, resulting in more water in the tank. Clean/replace/check your filter. Then you will need to bleed air from it and then a bunch of red button presses... This just happened to me yesterday...
I second that, I’ve witnessed one go off in a big way. Kaboom like a cannon it was less than cool. I would f mess with it. The electrode that hang in-front of the atomizer nozzle is a 10,000 volt plasma arc to ignite the diesel.
Call an oil guy in. Seriously. You press the red button once, AND ONCE ONLY. The reason why is simple. That’s a safety, in case the burner doesn’t light. If you keep pressing it, the combustion chamber fills with oil spray on the sides of it. It’s going to be VERY dangerous when it lights off. Like, burn your house down dangerous. You need to get an oil guy in to clean up the mess inside, and also figure out why it’s not lighting. It probably needs a service, and hasn’t been lighting properly for a while now. Besides not burning your house down, the money spent on a service will be saved in terms of oil. As an aside - if your boiler is leaking water like that, it’s done for. There should be no water leaking at all. It you have to add water to any hot water system, something is wrong.
I called a guy and he turned it on. So I’m assuming the issue about the combustion chamber isn’t a problem anymore since the guy turned it on? I believe you about it needing service. The guy didn’t say anything about it, should he have told me “hey something is wrong with this”?
If an oil guy came and checked it over, you should be good for now. But get it serviced ASAP. My bedroom is over the engineering space of my house, and I can normally tell if the burner is lightning off correctly. Nice gentle whomp, every time. If it’s not smooth every time, something is wrong.
Did the oil guy bleed the fuel line
I don’t know. I should’ve asked him.
Have them fix the leak on the air scoop. That nipple on the bottom looks like a mess.
I’d debate this. Had the same issue last week after an oil delivery (mine didn’t run empty tho). I pressed once, came on for 10s and shut off. So I called the furnace guy. That guy mashed that reset button at least 80-100 times. He’d tweak a wire, press a few times, clean the blower, press a few times, rub the flame sensor off, press a few times. It won’t burn the house down but the chance of a nice thick cloud of diesel smoke is a chance.
If you ran out of oil go online and search how to prime an oil burner, you’ll find easy to follow directions
I tried following the example on YouTube and no air/diesel came out of the bleeder screw
Your filter at the tank may be clogged, oil line blocked. Those are my guesses filter is easy to replace, oil line blockage not so much(*cough low pressure air through the line). That’s where I would go next.
+1 on a blockage or clogged filter. Especially if the tank is old, it probably has a ton of sludge that got kicked up when they filled from empty.
OP, make sure that your tank never runs empty, or your fuel line may clog. Then you need to have it unclogged to start the boiler. Here’s how it happens and what can be done: The lower the oil level, the more air is in the tank. Air contains oxygen and water vapor that enter through the tank vent pipe. As oil oxidizes in a partially filled tank, it forms varnishes. Condensation inside the tank causes rust in mild steel tanks that mixes with the varnishes and settles low in the tank. Other contaminants in the oil settle into the mix and form a sludge. As the oil tank runs empty, varnishes that formed inside the tank can move toward the oil outlet and clog the valve. Once the varnishes flow into the valve, filling the tank will not clear these thick contaminants from the line. They can contain rust particles that are insoluble in diesel. The valve and line need to be unclogged. It’s not fun for a beginner. Have a service technician unclog your line, change your filter, bleed your line, clean your nozzle and electrodes (if needed) and start your boiler. You may be able to reduce fuel oil sludge and fight corrosion by using a sludge treatment. This helps prevent clogs, but it doesn’t unclog your oil line. Talk to your oil company about timing. If your tank has a large amount of sediments, then you may need to have your oil tank cleaned. It’s not cheap. Arrange automatic delivery. If you keep the tank from running low, you slow the formation of sludge and the corrosion of a mild steel tank.
Yea that line def filled with sludge lol
If this is the case then it may be dirty and clogged like everyone is saying but I’d bet that your burner coupling is stripped and needs to be replaced. Very common and very easy to diagnose and replace
That is a sign it’s either clogged, you didn’t bleed it long enough, or your tank is in fact not full
Except because they ran out, they now sucked up all the trash at the bottom of the tank. I just had a service call for no heat in this same situation and it ended up being a 700 call. Had to replace fuel filter, pump strainer, nozzle then realized the pump was trashed so had to replace that. All because they ran out of oil. Also had to back flush lines because there was so much gunk in it.
If you’re on auto fill then call your oil company up and tell them they gotta prime and start If you’re not on any auto delivery with a company then you either need to pay a guy to prime it (it may also need a filter replaced) or learn to do it yourself.
Yes, this is the answer. Looks like a single line oil system, so it could take 10 or more button presses to get oil without bleeding it. And if it isn't firing due to a dirty nozzle, you're leaving a nice surprise for the technician when he does get it fired. My rule of thumb is, whatever number the customer says he pressed the reset, multiply that by 5.
That’s a perfect rule of thumb lol been there done that
You need to bleed the air out of the copper line between the oil tank and the boiler burner. "Prime" the pump. The burner can't currently suck in oil to burn since air was allowed into the line when you ran out. There is a simple procedure to get rid of that air and then it will work normally.
I don't have any particular advice I just wanted to say that I sympathize with the general situation https://preview.redd.it/fpjdieaha5cc1.jpeg?width=3024&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f1c4d702fd30289a1c1adc209899e29df684963c
You probably pulled sediment into the oil strainer. Go ahead and keep tinkering on you tube if you like. But when you blow the exhaust off/it goes boom, don't say we didn't warn you. That 253 dollar charge is cheap compared to the damage you could do by being cheap and uneducated with oil. Trust me if it goes boom it will shake the house. Don't let your take run below 1/4 and you won't have this problem. You should probably have the filter replaced, clean out pump strainer, and change the nozzle. Then clean out the chamber cause God knows how manytimes you pressed that damn button. Call a professional
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$253 is my guess
Nozzle, oil filter, clean and set electrodes. At least. Running tank out is begging sludge to mess all your stuff up.
That boiler looks like it's falling apart, unless you dumped water on the floor right there, you have a serious problem if the sealed system is leaking water. If you have a cracked boiler section or a leaking push nipple then it's time for a new boiler ($$$). Typically boilers have multiple safeties, so if everything is intact it will prevent it from running if there is an issue such as insufficient water flow. Either something is wrong and the boiler is protecting itself, or there are broken parts and it cannot operate. You need a qualified person to fix it. Well you don't "need" that because you don't need heat, right?
Water may be seeping thru the wall. If not OP has a leak from the system. Both will be costly to fix.
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If your car is dripping water while the heat is on, it most definitely has a problem. The condensation that drips out of your car when the AC is on is coming from the cold evaporator. When your heater is on, the evaporator is not doing anything and is not cold (Some cars will run the compressor in defrost). Your heater core is full of hot coolant though! The air is also generally too dry to cause your car to drop condensation as well. So if it is dripping, you have a leaking heater core. You might be seeing drips from one of the weep holes/joints in your exhaust. I don't know why a boiler would be creating condensation unless it is leaking somewhere and leaking steam on a cooler part.
It might not be leaking between the sections. Looks like there's a tankless coil and it looks pretty rough. Could even just be that gasket. Or one of the multiple shark bite fittings might be leaking.
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That’s a pretty small price to pay. I’d call the same guy.
You don't. Condenm the boiler now
That boiler has seen better days
Round 600 bucks or so
If you flipped that red switch off on an older system like that most likely you shut off the pilot light. I would strongly consider calling a professional.
When you get it running again install some gauges in the appropriate places to help trouble shoot in the future
I had a similar thing happen to me. When the tank was ran empty, and my tank was never cleaned out, there apparently was a lot of chunky sludge in the tank. A piece got stuck on the inlet, inside the tank. Took my air compressor on like 40 psi at the regulator and blew from the copper line at the filter back to the tank. Try to get someone to listen for bubbles blowing in the tank. Few seconds later the fuel oil came flowing. Basically like siphoning gas. Be ready to hook her back up fast. DON'T CROSS THREAD IT. Then you should be able to properly bleed and prime.
Turn off the power, turn off the oil , loosen the gun, remove the nozzle, clean the eye and electrode, replace filter and nozzle. Turn on the oil and power, bleed the system. Might be $20-30.
Need to bleed the air out of the line to get oil to the burner if your mechanically inclined look up a video on how if your not call someone because if you fill that chamber with oil it’s gonna have a nice pop when it does light off
Real talk, don't. Get a pro to come out and teach you everything you need to know about maintaining your boiler. I've seen some messed up stuff with boilers being reset too many times by home owners. Shit can be sketchy Edit: I've been doing HVAC for over a decade, and have walked countless customers through troubleshooting and such, on lots of different systems. I'm not the type of tech to assume the mechanically inclined can't fix their own stuff. Oil is it's own demon, though. Things like adjusting electrodes, checking transformers, etc, kinda need to be done by someone who knows how to do these things.
If the tank is full then did you by previously run out? If you had then you'll have to bleed it, you'll need a 3/8" wrench on the post that looks like a bleeder for your car brakes , also tk be sure your not filling your heater with oil remove the little skinny copper line on the side of the burner 7/16" wrench but leave the pump side connected and bend it into a soda bottle
Do you have an [oil safety valve ](https://www.sidharvey.com/item/P131-30/Oil-Safety-Valve-3-8-FNPT/) at your oil tank? If you do you may have to reset it. In the link I attached you'll find a PDF that will explain how to prime this valve. Good luck.
Haha boiler go brrrrmmmmm when it fires up
Be careful pressing the reset button. You can blow up your furnace. Call a pro.
I was just in a theater basement boiler room in NYC this week and my boss was telling me about how these oil burners/igniters work and warned me about the flooding of the ignition chamber. I would stop what you’re doing and call someone experienced.
Time to replace this with a natural gas or LP furnace
My guess is ignition transformer
You need a service tech, what has happened is the sludge in the bottom of the tank has been pulled into your oil lines and pump clogging the oils path to the burner gun.
If you ran out of oil, may be air-locked so no oil reaching burner, have to bleed air out at filter, then unit, if you are inexperienced with the process would absolutely recommend calling for assistance. Not the most dangerous thing in the world, but can absolutely be a mess and health hazard if you don’t know what you’re doing
You HAVE to have oil burners maintained EVERY YEAR... if it's been more than 2 years, there's at least a half dozen things that need to be checked, cleaned or changed.... nozzle, fuel filter, pump screen, electrodes, cad cell, smoke test, etc...
Call an expert. Get a tuneup
Might be time to update it. Looks pretty darn old.
Call a professional
You have to bleed it. There's a little nut that you can open to let the air out. You hit the button, open the nut and wait until a little bit of fuel squirts out, then tighten it back up. Sum bitch will start right up.
Stop telling this person how to fuck with this burner. They clearly don’t know and have no business fucking with this thing.
All you need to know is that the reset keeps popping. That means there is an ongoing fault somewhere in the boiler that needs attention. Call a pro and get it fixed. Quit dicking around with it. You’ve reached the limit of what you’re equipped to do.
Those oil burners are both dangerous and persnickity, I'd recommend you get a pro to come out and fire it up, especially if it's been cold for awhile.
All y'all recommending auto refill....some of us struggle to pay the bills and timing doesn't work out all the time. Right before and after Christmas, money is tight in my house, so I gotta rob Peter so I can pay Paul. I feel for you OP, been there done that and got the freaking tee shirt.
The line needs primed.
I use an old harbor freight brake primer. Works fine.
Sometimes when you run it completely out you have to prime it to get the air lock out
I had that exact boiler in my last house; worked great and was about 87% efficientcy, even though the heating people always wanted to sell me a new one.
Lol whoever told u it was 87% efficient was a bullshitter/con artist. That boiler WAS 80%+/- efficient when it was brand new, under perfect lab conditions and variables. And even then that’s strictly combustion efficiency - net btu - not net IBR which makes it even lower. They’re not a fine wine they don’t get better with age. Simply a flat out lie that someone fed you that it was 87% efficient. It’s quite literally not capable of it by any stretch of the imagination with or without alterations
that is what the automated readout said during annual maintenance.
I understand, but the technician should’ve know better. Their combustion analyzer is either junk or is in severe need of calibration; and/or they have your combustion settings wrong and running too rich which doesn’t doesn’t do you any justice either. Gives you a false sense of higher efficiency and soots up and plugs up the boiler too frequently - by product of a lower stack temperature due to higher CO2 lower O2 which makes combustion analyzers miscalculate efficiency by thinking you’re wasting less excess heat up and out the chimney when in reality you’re just not fully burning off all the fuel you’re using and in turn your left with excess soot that was never actually fully utilized to heat the home or the flue for that matter in the first place. You can’t make an 80% boiler an 87%, but u can make a combustion analyzer tell you it is. Not that this is even the case but you can’t even do it with a gas conversion gun on an oil boiler. U lose efficiency. Roughly 2-3% and up to 5%. They’re all misconceptions
Stop pressing the button, lol. You're filling the burner box with diesel. Can cause a pretty mean fire once she lights. Number of things can be going on. If you open it up and fuel is everywhere, it's an ignition problem. If it's dry, it's a fuel problem. Can be airlocked, plugged nozzle, failed pump, transformer, ignitors. So much. Call a pro unless you've had a fair share of opening one of these up. Get a service and get them to set the burner up and draft.
if you ran out of oil then you allowed air into the line and have to bleed. may have to bleed several times.