Boiler has packed in

[Wedg1e]

Watch out for those fault-finding flowcharts, they sometimes miss stuff (goes for all sorts of gear, not just boilers)... when my current Wickes (rebadged Halstead Ace High) combi went on the fritz after 5 years I checked all the things it suggested and then lobbed nearly 200 sheets on the only thing left it proposed could be faulty: the PCB.
No bloody difference
Turned out the flow switch for the hot water is a rubber diaphragm which pushes a small brass plunger to trip the flow switch. Although the switch measured OK on test, the brass plunger had a build-up of what can best be described as 'cack' that meant it couldn't travel far enough to depress the switch.
A rebuild kit was six quid which included a new diaphragm and nut with rubber seal, but in all likelihood I could have just polished the cack off with a bit of Brasso and it would have gone another 5 years.
Apart from that it's now done 11 years without issue... and if the PCB ever does fail I have a spare

I met a guy a few weeks back who was having a mobile demonstrator van built for a range of Korean (EDIT: Navien I think) boilers. He was showing me the boilers (the van was impressive enough!), they have all-stainless internals, Grundfos pumps, five year warranty IIRC, full wireless control, yadda yadda. The difference between his demonstrator and others is that he can actually fire the boilers up in the van (flues exit the back door) - big battery, mains inverter and lots of concealed piping. Very nice, I hope he does well, and if the boilers are as good as he reckons there'll be a few frowny faces at Baxi, Potterton, Halstead... even, dare I say it, Worcester...

 

[gaz1]

swapping out a boiler isnt the thing you need to count in as you need to know the size of your rooms / outside walls before a new boiler is fitted as ive found many a system below the rated rooms radiator btus and also the rads have also been under powered on there btus

as goes for its bust yeah right heard that comment so often when they cant be bothered finding the parts for it BG is renowned for that one all they say is replace the boiler with a new one

changing a system over to a sealed system is easy within reason but still needs a reasonable amount of work to do so

however the system above can be refitted with a new central heating system as only the pipes need to be changed to the new boilers repiped back up again

query here how old is her dad ? as might be able to get the warm front grant still

 

[Wedg1e]

The Worcester oil boiler at Nursy's place struggles to get any real heat into the place, hardly surprising as the pipework runs resemble a map of the London Underground and (without doing any sums) I'd say most of the radiators are undersized for their spaces.
Here at Wedg1e Villas I just said 'sodit' and bought a boiler 25% more powerful than the figures suggested (I had a bit of a lotto win): the bungalow's only 25 feet by 20 so 102,000 btu is more than enough

 

[gaz1]

try these btus sizing but you need size of your rooms and other information for them

http://www.bestheating.com/btu-calculator

https://www.mrcentralheating.co.uk/btu-calculator

https://www.plumbnation.co.uk/heating-calculator/

and see what you get from them all always remember if your not close to a radiators btu always go over the btu to the size of a room many cheapskates buy a lower btu radiator than what they should do

another point to remember is what can be classed as a bedroom isnt always the case by the size of the room involved

the last one to be aware of is your boilers btu rating as you must be under its value

 

[Robotstar5]

We had a Vaillant boiler fitted a few years ago and kept the separate hot water tank so it's gas heated in winter and immersion heated in summer so we can still have hot water if either fails. As a bonus, the Vaillant is about 30% more efficient than our previous boiler, although I should imagine anything is more efficient than a 30 year old Baxi Bermuda back boiler

 

[rockweasel]

Our Worcester oil combi boiler was installed new 16 years ago and has been a constant pain even though it's serviced every year. There's an engineer due to come out tomorrow to fix the latest fault (I'm guessing solenoid by reading through the forums, but I'm not a heating engineer and don't have the confidence to tackle it myself.) I'll be hovering over him to see what I can learn.

 

[Kayos]

Can't really tell from the pics but it may actually be a C plan, so quite a lot of work to upgrade to a Y or an S plan

Where I currently work we are Worcester accredited so offer a 10 year warranty, parts and labour, just needs to be fitted correctly, with a filter and serviced every year

 

[baconbarm]

Cheers for the replies all. I've found a site that sells all the spares for that particular model (sime superior 50)
Hopefully the plan is to find out what the bloke said was wrong with it.....Wether he is prepared to tell me remains to be seen.

Re- electrical experience I have virtually none so if it's anything other than pull out and replace I'm stumped. hopefully it'll just be a pcb which are only 40ish quid

 

[Seadog]

Listen for the fan starting up, if it does then stops within a few seconds the problem is the pressure switch, which is an easy swap. This is the first stage of the ignition sequence. If it starts and runs continuously but fails to start up then the problem is elsewhere.

 

[baconbarm]

Listen for the fan starting up, if it does then stops within a few seconds the problem is the pressure switch, which is an easy swap. This is the first stage of the ignition sequence. If it starts and runs continuously but fails to start up then the problem is elsewhere.

Will try that tonight cheers

 

[baconbarm]

The missus just text she said 1700 to replace with same style boiler or 2100 for new combi

 

[normspanners]

I'm sticking with my 'Inefficient' glow worm hide away,-------- one thermo couple £10 in 25 yrs !! oh and a gas valve when one year old ( done under warranty ) but that was the plumbers fault for not purging the line before commissioning,
it just keeps working, then if it does go, I have the immersion too, at least we can keep having hot water. oh and the oil boiler at the other end of the house!

Not having a plumber do anything again, "I've done thousands you dont need to purge" !! HUM

Literally fill a bath in 3-5 mins have 4-5 showers one after the other when we all need to go out , lots of hot water for the washing machine A lot to be said for the older designs sometimes.

 

[Kayos]

I'm sticking with my 'Inefficient' glow worm hide away,-------- one thermo couple £10 in 25 yrs !! oh and a gas valve when one year old but that was the plumbers fault for not purging the line before commissioning, it just keeps working, then if it does go, I have the immersion too, at least we can keep having hot water. oh and the oil boiler at the other end of the house!

Not having a plumber do anything again, "I've done thousands you dont need to purge" !! HUM

A lot to be said for the older designs sometimes.

I understand and respect that argument completely

However, a pilot light can cost £100 a year, 50-60% efficiency plus the losses from the cylinder

Or a 97.8% efficient combi with a 10 year warranty, put it this way, 8 weeks ago I didn't fit a G/W hideaway.....

Recently serviced a boiler I fitted 12 months ago, she had a bbu and I fitted a combi, said her gas bills were half what they were with the bbu

 

[normspanners]

Or a 97.8% efficient combi with a 10 year warranty,

That is only if they are set up correctly with the lockshields adjusted , from what I have seen most aren't, just thrown in with the return water too hot and the condensing not occuring etc etc

plus the losses from the cylinder

yep nice warm airing cupboard ------lovely, but then that heat is still in the house!

 

[Nick67GT]

Ours was playing up (22 years old) and threatened to throw its toys out the pram, so I got Brish Gas in for a like-for-like replacement (retaining h/w tank and controls)

The guy turns up with his lap top with various heat loss calculating gizmos and worked out the size we needed. 24Kw IIRC - same as the existing one. Price was £3300 .

They then had an offer on a few months later with all sorts of extras included and I went for the next one up and was quoted just under £2500, with their top level Homecare as well. That was 2 years or so back and it's been faultless + latest design & efficiency means it's also pretty low gas consumption compared to the old one.

It's made by Worcester Bosch for BG apparently.

No doubt it could have been installed cheaper by an independent, but their cover is 24/7, next day résponse, which is peace of mind for Mrs GT when I'm not around.

 

[Kayos]

All my installs are set up correctly, I even advise people how to make sure it condenses as much as possible

 

[the snooper]

Well a bloke came today when the missus was at work , her dad let him in. he said it's knackd and can't be fixed

I don't yet know what he said was wrong.

Does this mean it'll need replacing with a combi boiler ? I'm guessing it ain't gonna be ch
eap

ring another guy up, state from the off you wont be replacing the boiler as you don't have the cash, then you'll find out if it can be fixed

 

[wookie]

However, a pilot light can cost £100 a year, 50-60% efficiency plus the losses from the cylinder

Or a 97.8% efficient combi with a 10 year warranty, put it this way, 8 weeks ago I didn't fit a G/W hideaway.....

That pilot light might cost £100 a year but if the new boiler costs more than that in repairs each year you aren't saving any money.

I used to have a "efficient" combi that usually cost me more than £100 per year in repairs when it went wrong. I ripped it out and fitted an old "in-efficient" system boiler and hot water cylinder, Okay my gas bill went up but it was still cheaper overall than repairing the combi.

yep nice warm airing cupboard ------lovely, but then that heat is still in the house!

Exactly, just because the heat doesn't stay in the cylinder or boiler doesn't mean that it's lost. It's like the argument against old fashioned light bulbs being in-efficient, they are only in-efficient if you don't want the heat they produce as a byproduct of making light.

 

[normspanners]

All my installs are set up correctly,

I'm sure they are ! but you have to admit there are many many more that are not, sister in law had external insulation and new boiler fitted as a power saving incentive I went to move a rad in the extension nephews bedroom for them , and he said will the rad work better now cause it takes age's and is only luke warm. Well Luke (his name) wasnt warm, so I did a quick tour round, every lockshield wide open and his rad was the last in the line so did some quick adjustments and he was then too warm----- no pleasing some.
I have spoken with many 'modern' plumbers that havnt got much of a clue about general plumbing they only know new style systems, working with plastic pipe etc etc ask them a question about designing / working on an old system or adding in other boilers pumps etc and they look dumbfounded.

 

[gaz1]

The missus just text she said 1700 to replace with same style boiler or 2100 for new combi

those prices are a little steep for replacing like for like or same style boiler in my eyes

not much actually goes wrong with most boilers its either pump or fan at worst its the pcb mainboard to replace

vailiant systems are the dearest we happen to have the top of the range boiler here running a large bungalow fitted by warm front grant