I have an Ideal mexico (aged at a guess 30), a Buderus 500 24c (aged 1), a Glowworm Hideaway (aged >10), and an Ariston Eurofighter a23 mffi (aged 9).
I never touch the mexico and can't reach the balanced flue outlet without a ladder so haven't wasted my time sticking a probe inside. The flame picture is perfect. Hasn't needed a part in my ownership (7 years).
Buderus problem free, but young.
Glowworm perfect flame picture fga OK, never touch it, not needed a part.
Eurofighter I fitted from new, hasn't needed a thing, but I did notice dhw performance not up to standard, however tenant hasn't noticed so I haven't done anything about that. I am actually quite pleasantly surprised at the reliability of the eurofighter. I would have a very low threshold for doing much with it, prefering to not meddle with boilers in my spare time I'd probably stick a new one in if much more than a cleanse and a diaphragm were called for.
What would I replace the Eurofighter with? It;s a tough call between a Buderus 500-24c (tenants don't have to have a 28kw) and a Sabre 25HE (which is a Vokera Compact 25). Though the Buderus is best quality available I couldn't be certain as a failed cost accountant in a previous life whether the net present value calculation of the extra initial capital cost over a Sabre would lead to a purchase decision by the budget supervisor. I don't expect much trouble from the sabre judging from the reliability of the old vokera models it was based upon..
The Ideal Response heat ex is timed to leak at 5 years on the nail. You would never face this problem with a Buderus no part takes longer than 15 minutes to change or costs more than £120. I have changed the coil inside the main heat exchanger and it took exactly 15 minutes from arriving at the job to having the outer case back on and starting to drink the cup of tea, but it was the first one I had done. I recon I could get that down to 5 minutes. The only downside of a Buderus is that they are looked after by Worcester engineers who amongst the trade are known to be up themselves a bit, but the ones who are trained on Buderus are the more progressive thinkers. It is far superior to anything ever made in the UK. If Ideal do the decent thing and offer you a new boiler because the response wasn't ever of merchantable quality I would accept it, sell it on eBay and purchase a Buderus.
