We recently bought our house and have a bit of money set aside to make improvements to the central heating. I have an idea of what I'm after but I thought I'd see if anyone could offer some tips/advice on what would be most effective?
It's a 4 bed detached over two floors, 2 adults 2 children, two showers running off the mains, one (stupidly large) bath. 1920s, stone/brick walls, insulation in the roof, but otherwise a fairly old cold house to heat. Multifuel stove in the living room. 4kW Solar PV system on the roof.
Oil fired central heating via a combi boiler, a variety of different rads, single zone, thermostat is currently in a stupid location. A few rads are blocked somewhere so that needs fixed. The combi is a 35kW Rhino, only 4 years old, but I'm a bit suspicious. I get the impression the previous owner cut corners (based on a few other jobs done in the last 5 years). The installation looks untidy, and there's clearly been a leak at some point, when you take the cover off you can see a layer of (dried) rust at the bottom of the boiler.
I don't really understand how it's currently setup. I had a plumber out for an emergency a few months ago, he seemed a bit confused by it. Forgive my lack of understanding here, but he said something about the boiler being gravity fed from a tank in the attic, so it isn't a pressurised system (I had attempted to increase the pressure as I am used to with other combis but that wasn't achieving anything here).
I had a go at a BTU calculator online, total demand for the house came out at 48,000.
--
Things I want to do:
Zoning the system - upstairs (bedrooms) and downstairs. Separate thermostats and programmers for each, preferably wireless thermostats.
Adding a hot water cylinder, was thinking 250L.
Replacing/unblocking a few rads.
What I'm not sure about:
- Whether I should keep the existing combi for the rads only or replace.
- Whether I should make changes to the current setup (bit above about it being gravity fed).
- Whether it's worth putting a cylinder in with an immersion heater specifically the solar PV. I've read a few posts on here that sounds like it's not worth it for solar PV (extra £s for the cylinder, about £500 for an immersun or similar device, not very environmentally friendly). I might consider solar thermal in the future though, if that was worth it?
More ambitious plans:
- We've got enough room for an external biomass boiler. RHI is still pretty good for these and there's a £10k interest free loan available in Scotland to go towards the install. If I go with that, I'd still want the new cylinder, but obviously the oil combi can go.
It's a 4 bed detached over two floors, 2 adults 2 children, two showers running off the mains, one (stupidly large) bath. 1920s, stone/brick walls, insulation in the roof, but otherwise a fairly old cold house to heat. Multifuel stove in the living room. 4kW Solar PV system on the roof.
Oil fired central heating via a combi boiler, a variety of different rads, single zone, thermostat is currently in a stupid location. A few rads are blocked somewhere so that needs fixed. The combi is a 35kW Rhino, only 4 years old, but I'm a bit suspicious. I get the impression the previous owner cut corners (based on a few other jobs done in the last 5 years). The installation looks untidy, and there's clearly been a leak at some point, when you take the cover off you can see a layer of (dried) rust at the bottom of the boiler.
I don't really understand how it's currently setup. I had a plumber out for an emergency a few months ago, he seemed a bit confused by it. Forgive my lack of understanding here, but he said something about the boiler being gravity fed from a tank in the attic, so it isn't a pressurised system (I had attempted to increase the pressure as I am used to with other combis but that wasn't achieving anything here).
I had a go at a BTU calculator online, total demand for the house came out at 48,000.
--
Things I want to do:
Zoning the system - upstairs (bedrooms) and downstairs. Separate thermostats and programmers for each, preferably wireless thermostats.
Adding a hot water cylinder, was thinking 250L.
Replacing/unblocking a few rads.
What I'm not sure about:
- Whether I should keep the existing combi for the rads only or replace.
- Whether I should make changes to the current setup (bit above about it being gravity fed).
- Whether it's worth putting a cylinder in with an immersion heater specifically the solar PV. I've read a few posts on here that sounds like it's not worth it for solar PV (extra £s for the cylinder, about £500 for an immersun or similar device, not very environmentally friendly). I might consider solar thermal in the future though, if that was worth it?
More ambitious plans:
- We've got enough room for an external biomass boiler. RHI is still pretty good for these and there's a £10k interest free loan available in Scotland to go towards the install. If I go with that, I'd still want the new cylinder, but obviously the oil combi can go.
