Radiator Flushing

[emericklaw]

I have had a British Gas engineer round today because the heat was not building up in our radiators. He has suggested a 'power flush' which should clean out all the dirt and get the radiators heating up properly again.

He has quoted me £695+VAT to have this done. I got a second quote which was £350-£400+VAT and finally another company who does not do power flushing but does take every radiator off, cleans inside and replaces who only charges £150+VAT.

Is the last more hands on approach better than power flushing? In my head it would be rather than just 'diluting' the dirty water in the system with the power flushing the last method would actually completely drain the system.

Is there any advantage of paying more 2-3 times the price of the manual job?

Thanks in advance for your advice.

 

[gas4you]

£350-£400 + VAT is about average for up to about 8 rads.

BG are more as you get a lifetime warranty with their flush.

The 3rd one won't get all the muck out of the pipe work and boiler etc and probably won't be chemically cleaned.

Don't know how they can do it this cheap as this is really labour intensive way of doing it

 

[bengasman]

Second option is most reasonable, as long as it is done properly, a thorough powerflush will usually take a whole day.
Third option is pointless.
Lifetime guarantee sounds impressive but has 2 catches. If you get the system serviced every year by someone who also checks the inhibitor level, it is very unlikely you will ever have a problem with sludge again.
Conversely, if that is not done, I can not imagine anyone coming back every 5 years and repeat the flush for free as it would be lack of maintenance.

 

[nickso]

bg will reflush as long as you dont go off contract and have proof that you have put a reasonable effort into maintaining the inhibitor level.

i dont know what reasonable is but i would suggest a bottle every year would more than suffice.