Preferred Utilities Manufacturing Corporation was founded in 1920 and has been in continuous operation since that time. Originally Preferred was an installer and distributor of combustion equipment for industrial, commercial and institutional applications.

In 1940, Preferred Utilities began manufacturing # 2, # 6 oil and gas burners and combustion systems. That burner`s descendants continue to be manufactured today. Over 16,000 burners have been manufactured and installed since 1940.

In 1941, Preferred Utilities designed and produced the first factory packaged four pass down draft firetube boiler with integral burner, controls, and accessories. Production of the "Unit Steam Generator" continued for 30 years, with over 3,000 boilers shipped.

In 1944-1945, Preferred Utilities went Public with a stock offering that raised money to build a new boiler manufacturing facility in Danbury, CT. The Factory building was completed and operational in 1946.

In 1963, Preferred Instruments started manufacturing combustion instrumentation and controls, including: draft controls, draft indicators, damper actuators, flue gas temperature indicators, smoke opacity indicators, and others.

In 1964, Preferred Utilities purchased the instruments division of General Controls, Inc., adding draft, flue gas temperature, and the boiler lead/lag control product lines to the company’s offering. This event also initiated the formation of the Preferred Instruments division of the company.

In 1965, Preferred Utilities moved its sales and Engineering office out of New York City into a newly constructed office building added on to the Factory in Danbury, CT. In 1972, W.N. Best Combustion was purchased adding the line of heavy industrial register burners and specialty waste burners.

In 1972, Preferred installed its first digital combustion control system. These controls were part of a series of retrofit projects wherein Preferred engineered, designed, and manufactured a complete and integrated package of burners, flame safety systems, pump and heater sets, sensors, and controls.

In 1978, Preferred purchased Rimcor Instruments and their line of analog combustion and oxygen trim controllers. Preferred - Rimcor Instruments then began design and production of microprocessor based boiler efficiency controls indicating instruments and digital oil tank gauges.

In 1980, the Preferred Engineering division (nuclear power plant products and services) was formed.

In 1982, Preferred Instruments initiated the design of its own general purpose digital lop controller, the PCC II. PCC II was designed, and is manufactured by Preferred Instruments personnel. The PCC II has been in full production since 1985 and is used extensively in all combustion and related process applications.

In 1987, Preferred Instruments introduced its new PCC2000 Data Acquisition System which enabled Preferred Instruments to link all the PCCII’s in a boiler plant, remotely operate those controllers, down load field data and use that data to produce meaningful cost saving information to the plant operators. Intuitive boiler overview, alarm and historical trend displays on large computer monitors greatly aid in efficient plant operation, alarm response and maintenance.

In 1989, Preferred Utilities packaged together it’s pump sets, tank gauge and leak detection system with a sophisticated fuel transfer and monitoring control package to provide the industry with its first integrated Emergency Generator Fuel Supply System. Along with the Fuel Handling Components in the “Catalog 19”, this system proved to be a powerful and effective offering to the consulting engineering community and standby power end users. Over 2,000 of these systems have been sold and installed to date.

In 1990, Day Tanks were added to the Emergency Fuel Supply System to complete the scope of our Fuel System offering to Boiler and Emergency Generator applications. Since 1991 Preferred has sold over 500 Day Tanks with Fuel Handling equipment, controls and tank gauging.

In 1995, Preferred Utilities designed and marketing the “Standard Pump Set”, reducing the cost of
manufacturing pump sets by more than 25%.

In 1996, Preferred Instruments initiated the design of an advanced multiple loop controller, the PCCIII. The PCCIII boasts at least twice the power of the PCCII and occupies half the space. It is currently in full production with over 3000 units sold.

In 1997, Preferred Instruments introduced the BMS Logic+ Burner Management System allowing the company to add Burner Management to our Control System offering on watertube boilers.

In 1998, Preferred Instruments introduced the D4 Multi-Tank tank gauge. The PCC2000 Data Acquisition System was also redesigned and renamed as the SCADA / Flex Distributed Control System.

In 1999, Preferred Instruments packages the PCCIII Controller with state of the art sensing optics to create the PCC300 EPA Certifiable Opacity Monitor for large boiler applications, further adding to the watertube combustion controls offering.

In 2000, Preferred Utilities redesigns the “Standard Pump Set” and created the EPS Pump set,
Which further reduces the manufacturing cost by 30%. This is accomplished through control technology, standard wiring harness and the use of new materials on the pump set skid.

In 2001, W.N. Best retrofits its first Xplus low Nox dual fuel burner to a 20,000pph water tube boiler. This reinforces our position as boiler plant combustion system engineers and manufacturers.

In 2002, Preferred Instruments introduced the UtilitySaver by combining the PCCIII
fuel and air firing rate control with both oxygen trim and variable speed fan combustion airflow control. UtilitySaver fuel and electrical savings can pay for the installed system in two years or less.

In 2003, Preferred shipped the first Plant Wide Controller (PWC). The PWC provides PCCIII
loop and PLC logic control in one box at a much lower cost. The PWC is aimed at the commercial and light industrial boiler market.

In 2004, Preferred introduced a completely redesigned line of combustion instrumentation and controls, including: draft controls, draft indication, flue gas temperature, boil lead/lag and smoke opacity indicators.

In 2005, Preferred completed the introduction of the redesigned line of the Model JC combustion instrumentation and controls, including: boiler lead/lag and draft controls, as well as boiler. The JC 10 bar graph indicator and JC22 draft controller have already been introduced and/or applied at the time of this writing. Draft, flue gas temperature, and smoke opacity indicators.

In 2007, the BurnerMate Universal was released to market as the leading combustion control / flame safeguard package. With the acquisition of GN Electronics, Preferred added a line of flame scanners and process combustion control products to its offering. Preferred continues to apply the latest microprocessor based techniques to integrated combustion control and data acquisition systems. A fully staffed engineering department, which uses CAD drafting and engineering tools, provide our clients with complete and detailed combustion system designs. Most importantly, the extensive combustion experience of all of Preferred`s personnel provides our customers with the highest quality combustion systems and support available.

PWC Training - Select a Lead Pump Video