EVER HAD AN INTERMITTENT BOILER FAULT ? - THIS MIGHT BE WHY

[jameshere]

Hi folks,

Just thought I'd throw this in for future reference, it might come in useful to someone someday.

You know the sort of fault I mean ?, the boiler is working, then it cuts out, so you switch it off, then later on you switch it on again, and it probably works OK, then it goes off again.

So you call a heating engineer, and he arrives, and the boiler works just fine, he pretends to have a look, shrugs his shoulders, and states the obvious, which is, that it's working OK now, that the cause of the,
" fault ", is a mystery to him, and that you're an idiot for calling an engineer who has a callout charge.

So he goes away, and you call another engineer, who doesn't have a callout charge, and who, amazingly, conducts what appears to be a proper inspection, ( perhaps this fact is not unconnected with the absence of a callout charge ? ), and who also, again amazingly, actually seems to know something about fixing boilers.

He eventually concludes that there is a fault within the main gas valve mechanism, which in this case, ( a large floor standing boiler ), is a rather large chunk of metal which is doubtless full of tiny valves and various components.

He takes it out, and fetches and fits a new one, and it works, problem solved !.

The old unit goes back to the manufacturers for refurbishment and future re-use.

So what was the cause of the fault, and why was it intermittent ?.

Well, he says, no one will ever know for sure, until the unit gets stripped down for refurbishment, but one possibility is a broken spring that operates a valve inside the unit, apparently it can sometimes happen that a spring will break, causing the valve to shut, so you switch the unit off, and the spring cools down.

When it cools down, it contracts, just enough so that it again is able to operate correctly, so you relight the boiler, the spring heats up and eventually it expands to the point where it again ceases to work, and the boiler fails again.

So,.....if your boiler ever trys to drive you crazy, this might be the reason why.

 

[gas4you]

And?

 

[DP]

James, where do these gas valves go. I could do with sending them back to the makers (for some cash). I have maybe a dozen such gas valves.

 

[fatplumber]

James, where do these gas valves go. I could do with sending them back to the makers (for some cash). I have maybe a dozen such gas valves.

Yeah me too. I can't even get spare gaskets for them.

 

[Agile]

I have never heard of gas valves being repaired or refurbished!

Nor do I think that anyone ever would because of the demanding safety requirements that they never pass gas unless energised.

Tony

 

[fatplumber]

We had a local company, Russell and Harris, who fixed them up until the late seventies but they were licenced meter calibrators as well. I guess that they had the kit.

 

[Corgigrouch]

I wish that all intermittant problems could be cured by a simple gas valve replacement..... Nothing else to a boiler really, is there..?

Guys.. for precisely twice the price of a new gas valve, I can refubish an old one for you... They look brand new and even come in a box.... There are some gas valves that I cant get parts for, but they are the obsolete ones...

 

[Slugbabydotcom]

The gas valves I take out get recycled as 'irony aluminium' at the scrappy.
Gas valves have moving parts in them that get old, wear and stick sometimes.
I too wish this was a cure all for intermittent faults but I find most of these tend to be electrical or electronic and occasionally temperature or environment sensitive.

 

[roguetrader]

i fix all intermitant faults by fitting a new boiler, i dont charge a call out either. old boilers will be reconditioned thoroughly, certainly not just stripped for useful parts.

 

[jameshere]

Sorry chaps, I don't know where these things get sent to, and it was the heating engineer who told me about this procedure.

What happened was, he took out the old unit, went to wherever it is that heating engineers go to buy their spares, and came back an hour later with a new, or presumably a refurbished unit.

This was about six years ago on a ten year old Worcester floor standing combi, which had an enormous pilot light, the main gas valve thingy was a sizeable thing, about the same volume as a medium to large saucepan, and my replacement unit cost around £200, and I know that price was correct, because the engineer showed me the suppliers receipt.

So I suppose that it was economically viable for the manufacturer or specialist refurbisher to rebuild the units and offer them for reuse.

I don't know why Agile finds that so strange, I mean we are talking about a specialist refurbisher and not about some bloke in his garden shed with a hammer and a screwdriver.

Also, if you have the misfortune to need a new car engine, you may well be offered a factory refurbished second hand engine, so the practice isn't that unusual.

As to that particular fault cause, well I wasn't suggesting that it is a universal cause of all intermittent faults, I was merely offering a suggestion/clue from one boiler owner to other boiler owners who might be equally puzzled about the possible cause of an intermittent fault.

Electrics and electronic faults could certainly also be culprits, as suggested, I have certainly experienced such intermittent faults with a TV which was caused by a solder joint drying out and cracking, which caused a heat/expansion/contraction intermittent fault.

Can't find spares, join the club, I've just discovered how difficult it is to find a simple thing like the innards for a bath tap, everybody offers replacement tap units, trouble is they don't fit, sigh, what ever happened to those good old two quid brass tap barrels ?.

Actually though, I just did a quick Google, and came up with a firm that supplies domestic boiler spares, probably just the big bits rather than washers and gaskets, but a look in a business directory such as Kelly's can often throw up a lot of specialist suppliers, there are a number of such directories, most main librarys should have a selection.

http://www.e-gas-boiler-spare-parts.co.uk/?gclid=CPC3-uPU1poCFQcTzAodl2czrg

 

[Paul Barker]

Although OP is trying to be helpful and we heating engineers find some of it naiively amusing and .
(whether that is our naiivity or his you attach your own weighting to and he shall attach his)

Oddly enough when there is an intermitent fault in a gas valve it does play tricks with our diagnostic skills. Sometimes they don't just totally fail once and for all but lurk there all sweet and inocent hiding behind an ignition lockout, but only when the heating engineer is not present..

As regards small large and/or capable firms able to recondition them, and Kelly's etc.

UK manufacturing inc shut down about 6 months ago because the chinease copied everything which sells in the uk and sold it to us at less cost than our manufacturers can buy the raw materials. And they take no consideration of patents or copyrights. My friend was driven out of business and so have a host of other inovative skilled businesses. The loss of protection has caused them to give up being inovative.

So you think the banking crisis is the end of it? Dream on.