Age of heating equipment & Systems:
How to determine the age of your heating system and components. Here we provide several excellent sources for de-coding the data tag information on heating equipment.
This article provides documents that explain and translate all of the data found on information tags and stickers used on heating & heat pump equipment, including equipment age, heating capacity, electrical requirements, and operating characteristics.
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If you don't know whether your heat is provided by a furnace (hot air) or boiler (hot water), or whether your fuel is oil, gas, or electric,
and whether your heat is hot water, steam, or warm air,
see HEATING SYSTEM TYPES.
Then return to this page for help finding the equipment's age or date of manufacture.
Our photo shows data tags on a Weil McLain gas fired heating boiler that was manufactured on 10/10/1996. [Click to enlarge any image]
We found the boiler age by de-coding the boiler's CP/serial number code on the white sticker just above the data tag. Below we explain how we did that.
For help in decoding air conditioner, boiler, furnace, heat pump, water heater data tags and determining the age, model, or specifications of that equipment, we provide five different research methods listed below.
MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC Brands A-E - & Master Index to All Brand Names, HVAC Age, manuals, wiring diagrams, installation and repair guides
MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC Brands F-I - Brand Names beginning with F - I HVAC Age, manuals, wiring diagrams, installation and repair guides
MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC Brands J-O - Brand Names beginning with J - O HVAC Age, manuals, wiring diagrams, installation and repair guides
MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC Brands P-S - Brand Names beginning with P - S HVAC Age, manuals, wiring diagrams, installation and repair guides
MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC Brands T-Z - Brand Names beginning with T - Z HVAC Age, manuals, wiring diagrams, installation and repair guides
We provide links to individual manufacturer's data tag decoding guides (Lennox, below), and to two excellent equipment data tag decoding books, by Scott LeMarr (online at this website) and the Carson Dunlop & Associates Ltd. Technical reference - the most extensive such document we've found.
For many heating or cooling equipment manufacturers, especially after 2000, decoding the equipment tag to obtain the age of the device is sometimes pretty easy.
But equipment age, capacity, specifications are not always so easy to recognize on the data tag. Here we explain how to dig out that information.
[Click to enlarge any image]
1. Lennox HVAC products Age:
see our LENNOX Heater & Air Conditioner Model & Serial Number Decoding Guide [PDF] at this website. Also see
2. FURNACE AGE DECODING CHART [PDF]
provided by home inspector Scott LeMarr has generously shared his document that decodes both furnace age for many brands of water heater, including hot water systems produced by the following manufacturers.
[PDF linked to return here. You can also use the "BACK" button on your browser to return to this page at InspectAPedia.com.]
LeMarr's document provides decoding data for the following manufacturers:
Ambassador water heaters, American water heaters, ACE water heaters, A.O.Smith water heaters, Apollo, Aqua Temp, Aqua Therm, Best water heaters, Bosch water heaters, Bradford White, Cafos, Champion, Crosley, Energy Saver, Envirotemp water heaters, GE water heaters, Glascote water heaters, Golden Knight water heaters, GSW, Hotpoint water heaters, JC Penny, Jetglas, JW or John Wood, Kenmore water heaters (Sears Brand), Lochinvar, Lowes, Mainstream, Maytag water heaters, Montgomery Wards, Knight, PermGlas, Reliance water heaters, Revere, Rheem water heaters, Rheem/Rudd/Richmond water heaters, Rinnai, Security, Shamrock water heaters, Standard water heaters, State/Reliance/Sears brand water heaters, Thermo-King, Vanguard water heaters, US Craftsmaster, US Water Heaters, and Whirlpool water heaters..
Carson Dunlop Associates' Technical Reference Guide (below) provides the most extensive HVAC equipment data tag decoder & other information to determine the age of boilers, furnaces, water heaters, air conditioners, and heat pumps by decoding the product serial number.
For the most complete and very detailed HVAC equipment data tag and age decoding information anywhere (about 128 manufacturers & brands)
Carson Dunlop, Associates, Toronto, have provided us with (and we recommend) Carson Dunlop Weldon & Associates'Technical Reference Guide to manufacturer's model and serial number information for heating and cooling equipment
Special Offer: Carson Dunlop Associates offers InspectAPedia readers in the U.S.A. a 5% discount on any number of copies of the Technical Reference Guide purchased as a single order. Just enter INSPECTATRG in the order payment page "Promo/Redemption" space.
The Carson Dunlop Technical Reference Guide provides both equipment data tag decoding data and also manufacturer contact information as well as historical dates for many brands of heating and cooling equipment. Included in the manufacturers listed are also makers of ancillary equipment such as controls, circulator pumps, etc., not just boilers, furnaces, and heat pumps themselves.
The age of a heating boiler, furnace, or heat pump can be determined by identifying its year of manufacture that is encoded in the unit's serial number (not the model number). The guides above give heater serial number decoding for each manufacturer and type of heating appliance.
For example, when decoding the age of an H.B. Smith heating boiler one of our readers provided the following from his boiler's data tag:
H.B. Smith, Westfield MA
Series G200
Boiler Model # G200-W-5CON
Serial # J80-2747
For an HB Smith boiler the age is typically the two digits following the letter at the beginning of the serial number. In this case the "80" following the "J" tells us that the boiler was manufactured in 1980.
Later H.B. Smith boiler serial numbers use the format XXyyyy-nnnn where yyyy will be the four-digit year of manufacture.
Indoor heating methods by historic periods or years: (adding date ranges is continuing for the list below - Contact Us to contribute).
Our photo (left) shows a gravity warm-air "octopus" furnace; in its earliest version these furnaces, installed in the late 1800's in the U.S. were coal fired; many were later converted to oil.
Gravity furnaces rely on natural convection (warm air rises) to deliver heat to the occupied space.
There is no blower fan in the system. In their simplest design, the gravity furnace system included no ductwork whatsoever. Rather a large grate was provided in the building floor just above the furnace itself. In a multi-story house, heat rose to upper floors by passing up the stairwell or through open registers in first floor ceilings.
The gravity furnace we show at left was a more advanced design in which an "octopus" of duct work "arms" delivered heat directly to individual areas of the building.
The furnace in our photo is taking much of its "return air" from the basement - a very expensive way to heat a home. Earlier models eschewed ductwork and instead fed heat into the first floor of the building through a large central grate in the floor immediately above the furnace.
If you don't know what kind of heat your building uses, we explain how to figure out the answer
at HEATING SYSTEM TYPES.
If your heating system is not working properly,
see NO HEAT - BOILER or NO HEAT - FURNACE.
Beginning at HEATING SYSTEMS - home we discuss different types of heating systems such as
We also discuss various heating appliance fuel types (coal, oil, gas) as an aid in determining the age of a home or other building.
I just bought a home in California. It has a dual sided, vent less, gas floor heater.
[Click to enlarge any image]
The only name I see is " Royal Heater". there are 2 valves; one for burner, one for pilot.
You need a key to turn them. On top of the unit is a view finder cap. Inside it looks like a 3 burner pilot
. I have attached photos of it. I'm trying to find any information on it. thank you.
[This particular heater] works beautifully and has been inspected. I want to find a operator's manual so I can maintain it.
- G.L., 16 Jan 2015
G.L.
The Royal brand in-floor gas heaters were originally designed in California in the late 1920's - we have a patent (Publication No. US1666367 A) by Louis Clausing (Burlingame CA) assigned to the Royal Metal Works (his own company held in partnership with Max Schwartz describing an earlier version of the product dated 1928: "Heating device." U.S. Patent 1,666,367, issued April 17, 1928.
Your photos below illustrate the internals of this floor-wall gas heater.
That that company was Royal Metal Works, 238 Van Ness Ave, in San Francisco, CA. That patent was cited by other product patents between 1943 and 1982.
Below your photo shows the gas controls including main valve (left) and pilot valve (right-hand stem).
And in the next photo, below, you've shown the pilot flame (I think).
The company filed just three patents, two for heaters and one for metal bending:
and
There is presently a [different] California Royal Metal Company (in fact several of them) who might be able to give you more historical data, is a sheet metal fabricator whose business was established in 1981 but who may have known of the older Royal Metal Works who made your heater:
Royal Metal, Ted Rieck Enterprises Inc, 1228 South Wright St., Santa Ana, CA 92705 USA Phone: (714) 542-4763 Web: Royalmetal.com
Unless you object, I'll add your photos to data we have at InspectApedia and will leave you anonymous (our default) unless you let me know that you want to be identified. That may attract comment from other readers who have similar products.
I'll attach the documents of interest to this article.
Watch out: I would not assume that the heater you have is safe to use without both a thorough visual inspection and testing for gas leaks as burning LP or natural gas in a defective appliance can produce fatal carbon monoxide gas.
I would suspect that your device may also lack safety features of modern gas heaters. If you are going to ignore my timid warnings then at least be sure you have working CO and smoke detectors properly located and installed.
Other antique wall heating convectors are shown at WALL CONVECTORS HVAC
This discussion explains where to find the data tag on air heating equipment.
To see specific details for your heater (boiler, furnace, heat pump, etc) you will need to know the brand and hopefully the model, then see
AIR CONDITIONER BOILER FURNACE AGE, MANUALS & PARTS GUIDES - HVAC
Heating equipment data tags are usually found on the exterior of the heater, usually on its top, front, or sides.
On occasion you may find the data tag information inside of the heating device, accessed by opening a removable front cover.
Often by removing the front cover of a forced warm air furnace, the equipment data tag is found inside the furnace jacket on the left, right, or directly on the exposed face of the furnace itself.
In our first photo shows gas fired heating boiler located in a garage.
The yellow arrow points to the common location of the equipment data tag on the upper left side of a Weil McLain heating boiler.
Some gas furnaces sport a data information tag on the furnace interior left or right side, visible only after removing the front cover.
Below is the data tag for a rusty old Holland gas furnace, visible on the front of the furnace above the gas burner tubes, accessible only when the furnace front cover door has been removed.
Watch out: not all of the information labels, tags, stickers seen on and in heating appliances are data tags. Don't get confused and don't think that because you cannot find the model and serial number on a label that the equipment has no data tag.
Look further on the outside and inside of the device. A true "data tag" includes brand, model name, and serial number, often along with other information.
Other labels on heating equipment may give warnings or usage instructions, like the label I show below. This sticker gives model and oil burner nozzle guide information for System 2000 boilers by Energy Kinetcs - a boiler I installed in a New York home nearly 20 years ago) but this is not the unit's data tag.
Taking a further look around this same System 2000 Energy Kinetics boiler we spot the actual boiler "data tag" giving its model and serial number on a smaller sticker that I show below.
Also see DATA TAGS on AIR CONDITIONERS
If the heating equipment in your building is original - which may be determined by visual inspection, by knowing the building age, or knowing the heating system age, then each of these can inform us about the probable age of the other.
For example, an original Flamemaster (or Climatemaster) gas fired heating furnace is probably 40 or more years old even if you cannot find the date code in the furnace serial number.
Watch out: Names and who is using them can change over time: for example the name "Flamemaster" appears on other products such as sealants, coatings and packaging produced by Flamemaster in Pacoima California, US - not a heating equipment manufacturer.
The product line Flamemaster gas furnaces shared product designs with ClimateMater. ClimateMaster continues in business (in 2015) as a manufacturer of geothermal heat pump systems.
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