Eric Johnson (00:00)
Welcome back to boiler wild. My name is Eric Johnson. Thank you for listening to the boiler wild podcast. You may be asking yourself, that's a unique name. What is boiler wild stand for is a name I came up with, but wild as an acronym stands for work hard, invest in yourself, lead others and develop yourself into a person of excellence. I believe that you should always strive to be better. And while I dropped the ball,
all the time in striving to be better. I have goals and aspirations for my life. And I always try to want to get better and you break down the goals and you work towards them. And this podcast is just something I'm doing that is, helping me learn to communicate better. And, ⁓ I have gotten great feedback from it. And this episode is about the.
AHR Expo, a little bit of recap and some thoughts. First of all, I'd like to thank everybody that came up to me or was at a booth that told me that they had listened to the podcast and how much they enjoyed the episode they listened to. Or if you have emailed me,
I don't have a list of people, if you've emailed me or messaged me on LinkedIn, that is also much appreciated, but I also greatly appreciated the in-person people telling me about the podcast and how much they loved it. I did get the comment that, ⁓
They did, someone did notice the difference between the first couple episodes and the later episodes and how much I've improved that, that actually meant a lot to me because I suck at communication and talking and the first 20 or so episodes, no idea what I'm doing. I've never done podcasts before, but just figuring it out and not somebody who just loves to talk into a microphone.
But definitely all my favorite episodes are the ones that have a guest because I love learning from other people and their insights. And I struggle to express myself and my insights and what I knew. But if you are listening to this, thank you. I just have one ask. If you are listening to this and you like any episode of the Boiler Wild Podcast,
please on your podcast app, rate it five stars. That does me a huge solid. Trying to get a couple more five star reviews. The five stars help other people find the podcasts when they search for it. So what is AHR? AHR is an expo. It's called AHR Expo.
And it is a trade show that right now travels between three cities, Chicago, Orlando, and Las Vegas. Next year it'll be in Chicago, and it'll be in Orlando, and then back to Chicago. It used to go to a lot more cities. It's been to Atlanta.
used to be in New York, but they've kind of narrowed down the cities. ⁓ But the Expos is HVAC manufacturers and companies, anybody in the HVAC space of anything. So whether you manufacture equipment, whether you manufacture controls on the boiler side, boiler manufacturers, burner manufacturers, tanks.
And anything that you could find in a boiler room or anything for like built environment from the residential and commercial and industrial industries you can find at AHR and.
You can walk around for three days and see all the booths. A lot of the booths, I only pay attention to the boiler ones. ⁓ Some companies outside of the boiler space, but even in the boiler space, some companies spend some decent coin on these booths. They are...
$46 something a square foot and then you have to spend money on all the display stuff and then you have to obviously staff the booth and it is a investment so hopefully on the investment side they are hoping to talk to new people and talk to existing relationships and maintain a presence and
⁓ The whole expo format, it started originally to my understanding of, hey, we have a company and we have a product and we want to show other people our product in person and meet them, which makes sense. But then this big thing comes around called the internet.
And now all manufacturers for the most part roll out products on the internet and you can pick up a phone and talk to somebody immediately. And everything is kind of instant and you get all the press releases and all the brochures and everything. You can get it all over the internet and everything's on the website. So what is the role of a expo?
at this point. And that's something I kind of thought about and talked about with people in some booths as well. So it really, the only value it really only boils down to unless you really have a business, you're going after business as like a company of saying, Hey, we're trying to pick up a new product line or we're trying to meet this person. ⁓ you know, it can be good for that because sometimes you can get an introduction to a company.
that you normally couldn't talk to or haven't been able to connect with the right person, because a lot of ⁓ decent employees are at these booths and you can make some great introductions. But that just leads right up to, it is basically about meeting people and whether you already know people, there are a lot of people at the boiler companies or boiler related companies, boiler industry companies that
I know that I've met on LinkedIn and then I see in person, meet in person. I've also known from going to the AHR Expos previous years and that's really the only value for me right now is just relationships. Business is relationships. But as far as product wise, I kind of went through my list of what I looked at.
And everything's really the same, You know, every everybody has a heat pump now, which is trendy decarbonization and the whole hybrid.
Hydronic systems and all that stuff That's fine. Heat pumps have been out for a while heat pump technology is changing a little bit They're getting ⁓ They can work to lower outdoor air temperatures and all that stuff. I'm not super familiar with heat pump projects. I've not worked a ton or basically at all with commercial sized heat pumps
but the projects can get expensive. But there are building owners and or states in areas that heat pumps can make sense, especially if there are government incentives and rebates, stuff like that. The one big new thing that I did see is preferred utilities.
is making boilers again. So that was basically really the only new new. And they have built, they didn't have a picture of a boiler. ⁓ had a 3D printed model, but they have built a boiler and the boiler has its own burner as well. It's a brand new burner.
and they said that the boiler is built really to...
Go for the specification for the VA hospitals. And if you're unfamiliar, the VA hospitals have a very unique specification that is a lot of times overkill for what a boiler needs to be in the application. You can always know a VA job when you look at the boiler and you're like, wow.
It looks like they checked every single box of what they wanted for accessories and gauges and valves. Those are typically VA jobs.
But there's another boiler manufacturer that has a control system and a burner and a boiler all packaged together that they market as manufactured by one company. So it must be better than using a...
boiler manufacturer with a separate burner manufacturer with a separate controls manufacturer, like a superior boiler with a power flame burner with Siemens, like LMV5. That package works together great, but a lot of times this other manufacturer will.
market as their entire system is proven to work together and it's better. And it's like, well, not really, but preferred is making boilers again. And I say again, by they used to make them, I believe they stopped making them in the sixties or seventies, but they are making them again. If you're unfamiliar, preferred manufacturing is really known for their fuel oil systems, but they also have burners and they really do specialize in larger burners.
400-500 horsepower and up. They do have a smaller burner out now. I believe it's called the comet burner and it does come in smaller sizes.
but they are really known for their fuel oil systems. They are based out of Connecticut and they also recently bought Hayes Cleveland, which is a draft control company and have brought that product line in house under the preferred name.
Preferred owns a lot of different other companies under the preferred name. They also do a lot of nuclear work. ⁓ Really great company, but that was really the only thing like brand brand new. I know Cleaver rolled out a heat pump, but I doubt they make it ⁓ like everybody else. They just repackage a heat pump.
⁓ Typically boiler manufacturers not going to look to get into the heat pump manufacturing industry. They just want to be able to offer a heat pump so that the reps can bid heat pump jobs or like hybrid jobs with their boilers and You know, that's the angle there
California I'm sure is a big heat pump market anywhere where green energy and decarbonization once again I don't know a ton about it all the all the rest of the booths I went to everything's pretty much same same and I did have a conversation with somebody that's basically like you know it seems like the Scotch Marine fire tube boiler market has kind of
stopped innovating and I'm not saying that
there needs to be any more innovation and I don't really know what the innovation would be. I do look at Europe and look at their boilers and it's like, well, why do you build your boiler like that? And obviously it comes down to regulations. Their regulations are different than our regulations, but it's like, well, why do you build your boiler like that? But at the same time, the Scotch Marine boiler design is really up against the laws of physics as far as efficiency and
The only way to get better efficiency is to have a better burner and to look and to run a lower O2 percentage on your combustion, which typically right now there's burners out there that do a flat 3 % O2 across the whole curve. You really don't want to go much lower than that or any lower than that because you're running.
up against not having enough excess O2 for safety. So 3 % is probably the limit, but there's also a lot of burners and burner manufacturers out there now that are coming out with low nox burners. So a low nox burner is gonna be typically anything under 30 ppm for gas.
but there are burners coming out that are sub 9 and sub 5 that also will not have FGR.
So that's interesting. FGR is flu gas recirculation. It is essentially a pipe from the stack that you have another actuator and you end up pulling air and exhaust gas from your stack back through your combustion air intake and recycling it through the burner. It lowers your NOx numbers. And that is traditionally how people lower NOx. It is still a thing. People still sell FGR burners.
and FGR systems, but it is an added cost. And I did talk to a couple burner manufacturers, and they said that their FGR burners are just at a lower price point than the non-FGR ones right now. So that's why.
you could buy a FGR burner and why everybody is not buying a no FGR low NOx burner, because they are just 25 to 50 % more expensive. But it all just comes down to the regulations and what you need in your area. If you are in a state that has no
nox regulations, you basically just want to burn clean and burn as efficient as possible. If you are in a state like California, you do have nox requirements and you have to meet those requirements. However, the requirements are always changing. They're always lowering the number, always trying to improve. And by improve, that means go to zero and then outlaw gas.
Which they are trying to do to my understanding from talking to California boiler manufacturers trying to outlaw gas That is on the docket for like 2032 I believe But well, we will see but really Looking at other me other manufacturers or outside the industry You can look at Apple the iPhone
Every year in the past couple years, Apple kind of rolls out a new iPhone and they say it's slightly thinner, it's slightly faster, it's sleeker, and it has this new chip and new features, yada yada yada. But really the phone hasn't really changed. If you look at how phone technology changed from 2005 to 2010,
I think that the iPhone came out in 2007, 2008, but like the early editions of the iPhone, or any smartphone for that matter, and you know, through 2015 and the probably 2018, maybe 2020.
like huge changes every year, the screens got bigger, phones got thinner, lighter, big design changes, and now on the phone market, like there still is innovation, but it's not as drastic, and a two-year-old phone doesn't feel like it's two years old as more. However, we are going towards...
Flexible screens are available right now. They're just not super popular. They're a little bit more expensive and I don't think most people know how to use them.
maybe they don't even want them. But flexible screens is a thing and excited to see where that goes. But essentially, people have looked at Apple and like.
you know, what are you going to innovate? They killed it with the iPhone. Like the iPhone made Apple as the company that they are today. And they've done a very good job of building their products around the Apple system. And you know, they came out with the iPad and everything, but like every, every new iPad, when they do come out with them.
They're slightly thinner, slightly faster, better color screen. But right now, the existing iPads and the slightly older ones, they're good enough. Can somebody really tell the difference? That's kinda how I feel about Boilers is everything's kinda good enough at this point. And I'm not saying the innovation has stopped. There was somebody...
believe in the 1900s or maybe late 1800s, has said that we should close the US Patent Office because everything that can be invented has been invented. Obviously they were very wrong. But for Boilers, what's really new, we had a lot of innovation in the past 50 years, but really,
you get through 2000 to 2010. And really the only thing that's really changing is the burners and the control systems. Controls have gotten cheaper as far as electronics in general, but basically everybody has a touchscreen now for their boilers. Everybody has their own program and...
especially on hydronic boilers on the package. Hydronic boilers, every manufacturer has their own kind of system. I will say, except Parker Boiler, shout out Parker Boiler, great boiler manufacturer out of Los Angeles, they have chosen to stay with the tried and true off the shelf packages like a...
Honeywell 7800 or FireEye flame safeguard along with a standard off the shelf temperature controller. They have not made a touch screen for their condensing boilers or any of steam boilers. They don't have a special burner system that is like a PLC light which
A lot of manufacturers have done outside of Parker. I'm sure there's other smaller boiler manufacturers as well that haven't made their own PLC touchscreen systems. I know Parker has a touchscreen. I think it's a boiler plant, but if you just look at their boilers, Parker boilers are one of the simplest boilers as far as the wiring diagram. And they have
Mostly if not everything is for the electronics is off the shelf parts that you can just get at the supply house Which makes service very very easy. It also makes it very easy when your boiler is 20 years old
in order to get new parts because they use common parts instead of using a custom printed circuit board for 10 years and then obsolete it. And now you have to do an upgrade or convert it or something because they don't make that anymore. However, going back to AHR, ⁓ should you go? Yes and no. Why I go is mostly just to meet people. I really don't have any...
business relationships or business buying right now for like equipment. I look at equipment, I look at what manufacturers are doing, but I'm not in the market to purchase, rep or sell any equipment. I...
Mostly know what's going on out there in the market. So when I go to AHR there's no surprise It's really just the people meeting people seeing them every year the Expo most people go for Sunday Monday Tuesday a lot of people skip the Wednesday The Expo is a Monday Tuesday Wednesday But a lot of people flying in on a Sunday
But manufacturers will have dinners and parties where they'll invite all their reps and stuff, which are good to go to. You get to meet people from other parts of the country. And once again, it just goes back to business and relationships. ⁓ But I would also say that you can be cultivating those outside of AHR or other expos and conferences through social media. And...
Some people do, but a lot of people could do more. I definitely could do it more as well. But the whole AHR Expo is definitely worth it. would say to take or to take somebody there or to go if you've never been there, a lot of companies will just take some salespeople or hire leadership.
But really if you're a technician or if you've just kind of stayed in your lane and you really haven't expanded outside the expo, is, you will never see more equipment in a space than you will at the AHR Expo. And even if you're not in the market for like a chiller or refrigeration equipment and stuff like that.
walking past booths and seeing what's out there and just, it just kind of expands your world. And can you really put it into dollars of, well, this is how much value I'm going to get out of you for going to AHR? No, but it provides a unique perspective that I think is valuable to an employee who shows that they actually want to be part of a company and they're driven. So I would say,
if you do make a decision to go to AHR Expo and you're the person that signs people up or, hey, we're gonna go, like, think about somebody that you could bring along that you typically wouldn't bring along. And bring them along and, you know, you can maybe have some goals for them. ⁓ Hey, talk to this person, talk to this, you know, maybe you do rep some equipment, but other than that, go look at the show and...
expand your horizons and really see what's out there as far as HVAC because a lot of times people can pigeonhole themselves you know I will do this as well and you build up four walls and you can't see beyond the four walls and you think the world is a lot smaller than you think but then you can go to to one of these expos and
there's just so many companies that are, some of these companies spending huge coin on some of these booths that I've never even heard of. And it's like, well, if you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a booth, and I've never even heard of you, how small is my world? And that's the whole point. Just because...
A company is large doesn't mean everybody's heard of them. And while I am not in like the HVAC industry is giant. I only focus on the boiler combustion side of it. It is good to have a sense and idea of how large the HVAC market is.
and to look at other equipment and to look at other manufacturers and to kind of just see what's out there at expand your Horizons and be reminded of how big HVAC is. And also you may come across a project where you walk into a mechanic room, you got boilers, you got air handlers, and knowing...
in a general sense of, that's an air handler, that's a heat pump, whatever, what the other equipment in the room is and having a general familiarity with a brand and the major brands and what they do, that is valuable, especially if you are a tech, a boiler system in a commercial building is only one part of the HVAC system.
and you should know on a general level of how that boiler system connects to the rest of the HVAC system and how they are influenced. Like, the boiler system.
this is actually connected to the building control system, which connects to the other equipment. And we get the call for heat from the building control system, which also controls this. So while the problem may be showing up in the boilers, it's really this because we can't get the heat out. ⁓ Your pumps are on VFDs and they don't have the control signal to run from the...
building control system so you need to call your controls company and you know talk it over with them but your hydronic boilers may be going off on low flow or something like that and so it's not necessarily a boiler problem but AHR Expo if you guys have any thoughts let me know about it or if you have any new things in the boiler space combustion space that you saw
I the expo is just a very, very expensive way for all the manufacturers to show what their equipment is. And I think if they invaded a little bit or maybe tried out social media beyond the very, very safe corporate post, they maybe I'll get some.
reach that is a lot farther than the typical reach of the people who go to AHR because typically the same people go to AHR year over year and you're not gonna get a brand new audience every single year and you'll get some familiarity with
who's going and also you may have business relationships with people, but it's always good at a manufacturer level to show up, but ⁓ how do you determine the impact? And maybe some of them just go to the AHR Expo just because they've always done it and they've never really questioned why are we at this Expo? Do we have any business?
Is there a business payback of going to the expo? What if we didn't go to the expo? Would business go down? If it goes down, then obviously you would want to go to the expo, but is the expo a good return on investment for their time and money? And I would say that social media and the internet and other opportunities, I see a lot of manufacturers under utilizing them.
And even in 2026, it seems like everybody's using social media. I think a lot of manufacturers are scared to not just post the normal corporate stuff and go outside the box. The same thing I would say with the booths at AHR Expo. A lot of them are very uninspiring and it's.
how do you change it up? Like if you're gonna spend all that money, change it up and make something unique, something different that gets people to actually stop and say like, wow, that's unique. Also, I have noticed this. you...
look at a booth, and I think a lot of manufacturers, know their product too well. If you look at a booth and within five to 10 seconds, you don't know what the manufacturer does, I think it's a failure because the product messaging is not great or the signage is not great.
you should know what somebody does within five to 10 seconds of looking at a booth or like in the general industry. I think a lot of booths assume that people already know about the manufacturer or that they're gonna come talk to them and learn all the details. But it is my belief that you should walk along, able to look at a booth, especially the larger ones.
and say, that company does that, and then you can make a decision if you wanna go talk to them or not. But that is something I have noticed that a lot of signage doesn't seem to attract somebody who is unfamiliar with the manufacturer, and there are people unfamiliar with some very large manufacturers. ⁓
don't assume that everybody knows who you are, especially if you work at a company because you build your four walls and you end up knowing, you end up thinking that everybody knows who you are. But if you go ask the general public of people who working in the HVAC space, you'd be surprised at who. ⁓
people don't know like Johnson Controls is one of the largest companies out there for HVAC and I've met technicians who have no idea who Johnson Controls is or that they're manufacturer and all this stuff. So those are my thoughts on AHR. Hopefully that wasn't too much of a ramble. Will I be at the next one? Absolutely, of course. Chicago. Chicago is always great.
Chicago in February. It's nice and cold, the windy city. ⁓ But McCormick Center, I believe, is the largest expo or conference center. And ⁓ yeah, it's always a good time walking around. get your steps in, get your 10,000 steps in, get fit. ⁓ But yeah, relationships are still king in
2026. ⁓ But I think the big picture takeaway from the expos and these trade shows are I think a lot of companies really need to ask themselves, why are we going? Not that going is bad. think they are a net positive, but I think the messaging could be improved. And also I think some companies could take some risk as far as
changing things up with how they set up their booth or what they bring. A lot of times it's the same thing over and over and they're very, very safe with what they do as far as their booth. And if you really want to make a statement or if you want to really get people's attention, you got to be different somehow. ⁓ But yeah, that's that's what I have.
I know a lot of people that went to AHR. Yeah, so if you went to AHR and you had some other takeaways or some thoughts about it, I'd love to know. You can email me, eric.johnson at boilearn.com or you can DM me on LinkedIn. Both of those are great. Thank you for listening. If you got this far, I appreciate you, and stay wild.
