Baker Burner Howl
Posted by:
SSsssteamer (IP Logged)
Date: August 27, 2009 02:51AM
For the last 20 years, rather than the Stanley burners, I have been running Baker Burners in my Stanleys. The Bakers are supposed to give you more heat than a Stanley burner. But, the Bakers also give you more of a howl. My burner pan on my 1916 Stanley Mt Wagon burned out in the back where the super heater passes through. I shortend the 30 hp Baker burner pan up by about two inches. The wall above the grate went from about 4.5", down to about 2.5 inches high. The critter howls so bad now that I can hardly stand it. Before, once it got hot, it hardly howled at all. On my 1914 Stanley, after about 20 years of rust and heat, the burner pan wasn't worth trying to fix it for the extra holes that had rusted and burned through its pan. I made a new burner pan out of 20 gauge 310 Stainless steel that is good up to about 2100 degrees F and it is also rust proof. I raised the burner wall by 1/2" inch. It went from about 4" to about 4 1/2" tall above the burner grate. Before the burner howled more than it should. Now it doesn't howl except only when firing up. No one has ever mentioned that a deeper burner pan reduces burner howl. Apparently the depth of the burner pan is directly related to the amount of howl that the Baker burner will make. I also lengthened my super heater from 6 feet to about 10 feet and it made a lot of difference too. Now it has noticably more power on the hard hills. My super heater is made out of 1/2" schedule 40 stainless steel pipe. I found that I got a smoother bend by bending the pipe cold than by putting heat to it. I used a re-bar bender to do my bending. My pattern is a zig-zag with 4 runs. It fit just right in my 23" diameter burner. I have followed the Stanley directions by finally mounting the super heater firmly to the boiler retaining ring. By leaving it unsecured to rattle about, that is what runined both of my burner pans.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/06/2009 04:29AM by SSsssteamer.