Hi, hope someone can help me as i've had this problem now since new years day !
just before christmas my central heating started playing up, cold downstairs, hot upstairs. bled the system, including the valve by the water pump (read it elsewhere on here) no joy.
i had hot water although the boiler (potterton netaheat) occasionally seemed to go into shutdown mode (pardon my non plumbing jargon!) and had to be reset by pressing the little button underneath
having had same problem before when the water pump broke down i called out a plumber via a heating insurance contract that i have and within five minutes he had had diagnosed the diverter valve as the problem
after fitting the new valve i now have hot radiators up and down (albeit that down are not as hot as up) however i no longer have hot water. the water comes out lukewarm despite turning the temp controls up.
now when i switch the hot water and central heating on, the boiler lights
goes for a random amount of time (has been as long as a couple of hours) during which i get hot CH but lukewarm HW. It will then go into shutdown mode again and will light back up after a while once i'm able to press the reset button.
i asked the plumber about it and i quote roughly "you're getting air in the system that is going back into the boiler and sending the system into shutdown mode. this is because your radiators are blocked. its complicated to explain (warning bells sounded at this point) but the expansion tank up in the loft should fill up with water and is taking in air instead (he never went into the loft). the only way to resolve this really is to powerflush the system."
my query is this - is this a viable solution or should he check other things first ? i ask because as you can guess "BLOCKED ANYTHING / POWERFLUSHING" is not covered by my insurance policy which means i'll have to shell out 200 quid plus from what he said and having just had christmas and my sons first birthday to contend with, money is a bit tight right now if its something that i dont actually need to fix the problem.
no slight intended and total apologies if he's right but something in the term "its going to need powerflushing" suggested to me a scam similar to the blocked drain solution of "oh we'll stick a fibre optic camera down your manhole cover to find out what the blockage is.....oooh yeah, its gonna need a high powered waterjet down there...that's gonna cost ya" that watchdog and the likes featured not too long ago when really it could have been fixed in about ten minutes
cheers
just before christmas my central heating started playing up, cold downstairs, hot upstairs. bled the system, including the valve by the water pump (read it elsewhere on here) no joy.
i had hot water although the boiler (potterton netaheat) occasionally seemed to go into shutdown mode (pardon my non plumbing jargon!) and had to be reset by pressing the little button underneath
having had same problem before when the water pump broke down i called out a plumber via a heating insurance contract that i have and within five minutes he had had diagnosed the diverter valve as the problem
after fitting the new valve i now have hot radiators up and down (albeit that down are not as hot as up) however i no longer have hot water. the water comes out lukewarm despite turning the temp controls up.
now when i switch the hot water and central heating on, the boiler lights
goes for a random amount of time (has been as long as a couple of hours) during which i get hot CH but lukewarm HW. It will then go into shutdown mode again and will light back up after a while once i'm able to press the reset button.
i asked the plumber about it and i quote roughly "you're getting air in the system that is going back into the boiler and sending the system into shutdown mode. this is because your radiators are blocked. its complicated to explain (warning bells sounded at this point) but the expansion tank up in the loft should fill up with water and is taking in air instead (he never went into the loft). the only way to resolve this really is to powerflush the system."
my query is this - is this a viable solution or should he check other things first ? i ask because as you can guess "BLOCKED ANYTHING / POWERFLUSHING" is not covered by my insurance policy which means i'll have to shell out 200 quid plus from what he said and having just had christmas and my sons first birthday to contend with, money is a bit tight right now if its something that i dont actually need to fix the problem.
no slight intended and total apologies if he's right but something in the term "its going to need powerflushing" suggested to me a scam similar to the blocked drain solution of "oh we'll stick a fibre optic camera down your manhole cover to find out what the blockage is.....oooh yeah, its gonna need a high powered waterjet down there...that's gonna cost ya" that watchdog and the likes featured not too long ago when really it could have been fixed in about ten minutes
cheers