Worcester 9.24 Electronic-BF boiler - Pilot Light?

Hi,

I wonder if anyone can help us?

We're house-sitting and decorating my sister's home, so we are only partly familiar with her appliances.

We had to take-off one of her radiator's in her bedroom so that we could decorate behind it. So we proceeded to stop the water at the mains, switch off the central heating etc.., before the radiator was removed and drained. However, after replacing the radiator back onto the wall and switching the CH system back on, we have found out that the pilot light has now gone out in her boiler. It is a Worcester 9.24 Electronic-BF boiler. We could not find the manual, but after taking off the grey front panel cover of the boiler (located in the attic) we could read the instructions for reigniting the pilot light. However, after following them, we are having trouble receiving any kind of spark to reignite the pilot light. We have been trying for ages, by holding the grey button in and, repeatedly pushing-in and releasing the red ignite button on the boiler. We have tried doing this as instructed on the panel, by first of all making sure that everything was switched off even at the mains and, we have also tried to ignite it by switching everything on (at the mains and the wall thermostat control switches), but it is still not lighting. Also, after reading around on the internet, we have tried to run the hot water tap and ignite the pilot light at the same time, but still nothing is working. Please, please, can anyone help us. We don't want to have to tell my sister that she has no hot water when she returns from her hols, which is this coming Saturday.

I also read somewhere about pressing a reset button? I am not totally sure where this is though. We would really appreciate anyone's help out there.

Thank you for reading.

Kind regards,


Didi63

(Didi63 is my partner by the way, we have joined this site under his username and details, as he is the one who is more aware of trade and DIY talk than me. He is a very well experienced joiner/carpenter by the way, if anyone needs to know anything about carpentry from him).

I thought that the "electronic" model did not have a permament pilot but the instructions and what you have found indicate that it apparently does!

The overheat stat may well have tripped but I dont think that it would prevent the pilot from lighting.

On one of those models its lind of facing you towards the right of the lower bits areas. However I dont recommend touching it unless you are sure that it has tripped.

I suspect you will need a gas registered engineer and be aware that many parts for that model are now obselete.

Hopefully this will act as a warning to those who feel like working on their heating systems without understanding all the possibilities of what may result. Doing anything to an outdated system is a recipe for possible disaster.

Tony

Twist the grey knob & leave it 3 mins.

Then try it again, you need to hold the grey knob in fully for at least 20 seconds after getting the spark generator (red button) to light the pilot.

This boiler is ancient & was made obsolete in the 90's

I had to stand on a chair to be able to see through to the pilot light on mine so it was a pain doing it.

As Tony says, might be time to get an RGI in, if its sparking but not staying alight then the thermocouple is likely going to need replacing.



(I'm no RGI - I just had one of these boilers until a few months ago)

Dear Agile,

Thank you for your reply. I see what you mean by 'electronic' and permanent pilot light. Sorry to have sounded a little dull, I/we just don't
know much about these types of boilers. All we have done really is read the instructions from the back of the panel on how to reignite the pilot, but because it is not lighting up, we don't understand why and what is the problem. However, don't worry, we are not irresponsible and we do know the dangers of gas, so we will not touch anything more until we are a bit more informed of what to do. If it is something that does need to be fixed by a qualified engineer though, we would rather get someone in than risk doing anythiing ourselves. However, if you can give us any more advice on our situation we would really appreciate it.

Should we first of all, touch any reset button?

Also, as the model states that it is a Worcester 9.24 'electronic'-BF boiler, how would it normally work? I mean, if it is electronic as you say, should the pilot light come on automatically without having to ignite it? I don't understand though, as the instructions do tell you to switch everything off before trying to reignite the pilot light, by holding in the grey button to the full and repeatedly pushing-in and releasing the red ignite button. Then, when it is supposed to re-light, we are to keep holding the grey button for a further 15 seconds before releasing it and it should light up.

Sorry, for the lengthy message, but we are just at a loss on what to do next.

Thanks for your help.

Kind regards,


Didi63

By the way Agile, we'll keep the overstat trip switch thingy in mind, but before we touch anything there or inform an engineer on this suggestion, we will give Mattylad's suggestion a try.

Thanks for this.

Didi63

Thanks Mattylad, for your suggestion. We will give it a try and come back to you later to let you know if it has worked or not.

All we know so far, is that it has been a real pain trying to light this thing. I don't think my sister has had any trouble with the boiler before as I am sure she would have mentioned it before she went on hols. However, we have to try and re-light this, so here goes another round of trying to ignite the pilot light!

Thanks for your help.

Kind regards,


Didi63

You have drained the system so took the water out , does it have a pressure gauge on it or is it filled from a header tank.

reset button is a little red one and has very likely popped out. some worcester had an auto reset overheat with no reset button.

if reset is activated This will not stop pilot lighting but will stop it staying on..

press the ignition button rapidly as fast as you can not just every couple of seconds while trying to light

Despite the name being "Electronic" this boiler does not electronically ignite, it does use a permanent pilot light & the overheat trip is self resetting (no red button for it).

Mine was a pain to reignite, initially tightening up the thermocouple sorted it.
Later replacing the thermocouple was called for (they are less than a fiver) although these guys will rightly tell you that you need an RGI to do that.

Hi Namsag, and hi again to the others that have responded previously.

Thanks for your message.

There is a pressure gauge on the front of the boiler. It is presently at '0', it doesn't seem to be moving up any further than that at the moment, while we are still trying to get the pilot to light.

We have not yet pressed any reset button as we wanted to continue trying to ignite the pilot by the usual method of holding in the grey button and pushing-in and releasing the red button. We have worked on this for a while now and have even tried turning the grey button clockwise, waiting for 3 minutes and more, releasing it and then, trying again to hold in the grey button while continuing to press the red ignite button.

However, we have progressed on to another development in the procedure, by finally obtaining a light from the pilot, but every time we continued to hold the grey button down for a further 3 mins or so, before releasing it, the pilot light kept on going out at the point of releasing this grey button. We first of all got excited about this when we initially had the first light, because at last we thought that we could have a bath/shower, but to no avail. The funny thing was though, to get the pilot to light in the first place, my partner took off the main front guard, so that he could actually see what was wrong with the pilot light. As soon as he took the guard off, he noticed that there was a lose wire that should have been attached to the point of achieving the spark. So, he replaced this and, as soon as he did so, the pilot light came on, but unfortunately, as I said earlier, we are now having the problem of keeping the pilot on when we try and release the grey button.

We are having a break for the moment, but I expect soon that we will be back up the attic again to try again.

If you do have any further suggestions on top of our update here, on how we may keep the pilot alight, then please could you let us know. In the meantime, we will continue to achieve a light from the pilot in the usual manner. We will this time, try to press the red button a little more rapidly than before.

Thanks in the meantime, for your help.

Kind regards,


Didi63

Overheat has tripped because boiler is short of water (gauge at zero) find the filling loop usually a braided hose with 1 or 2 taps on it fill boiler so gauge reads 1.
But you may have knackesed the overheat stat , dont think they are avialable anymore

Hi again Namsag and Mattylad,

First, I should have added in my last message to Namsag about the suggestion of 'Draining the System and taking the water out'? Please could you enlighten me on this, what do you mean exactly?

Also, I would like to ask Mattylad, what is a thermocouple? Sorry it this sounds to be a stupid question, but I don't know what this is exactly. What does it look like and where will I find it?

Thanks again for your help.

Kind regards,


Didi63

I went to an old one of these which had a domed black manual reset over heat stat towards the right. The same type as used on one of the wall mounted Servowarm and well obsolete.

I think that was actually in series with the TC and if that had tripped then it woulkd prevent the pilot staying on.

But on that one the contact resistance was high and causing nuisence tripping.

It may well be the problem in your case but without a photo I cannot say.

Now, the important bit ! Never drain a boiler system again if you are unable to refill it and particularly never try to start a boiler without adequate pressure ( set to 1.5 Bar but 1 Bar will still work. )

If you were an independent decorator and did what you have done you could find yourself on the end of a law claim for a replacement boiler as the parts for that one are obsolete.

Tony

Dear Namsag,

Thanks for your last message about the tripping the overstat switch. We will have a look to see if we can find the filling loop and refill the boiler etc. If we have any problems, please can we come back to you?

Thanks again.

Kind regards,


Didi63

Hi Agile, Namsag and others,

Sorry, but please could you let me know how we may have drained the boiler of water? When we started to decorate, we only took off one radiator and drained that of water so that we could decorate behind it. We put the water back on after it was re-fixed to the wall? I am sorry if I am sounding confused, but I am. How do we know if we have drained the boiler? Ok, obviously the reading on the gauge, which we know now, but we had no idea about this when we started to try and re-light the pilot. All we wanted to do, and still want to do, is to get some hot water, so when we checked the boiler and found that the pilot was out, we knew we had to try and re-light it. That is as far as we know, we didn't know that we had drained the boiler of water etc... Please can anyone explain how we may have done this?

Sorry if I sound a little fraught but it is worrying.

Regards,


Didi63

if you do not know the difference between an open vented system

and a pressurised system, stop what you are doing and call in a rgi

who will have it fixed in an hour....or two.