Combi and Y plan

[chapeau]

Hi all,

Current house has a vented Y plan heating system with two bathrooms both with pumped power showers coming off a single tank. This works for now when only one shower is in use which is most of the time.

We now plan to move (or as seems to be the law, replace) the existing perfectly good boiler so are looking at options. One option is a combi which might not be the best solution for two bathrooms - so can we put a combi but still keep the tank?

So is this feasible?

1) The combi would drive the ensuite shower and all sink taps in the house. This pipework would be isolated from the existing tank and vented header system pipework.

2) The combi heating circuit would go via the existing Y plan motorised valve which would circulate the water via existing tank/radiators/both depending on the instructions of the existing programmer/thermostats. The heating circuit would lose the pump and be disconnected from the header tank so a closed loop driven by the combi pump. The bath taps and pumped shower in the second bathroom would keep the existing header tanks and get the hot water from the existing vented tank.

So the combi drives the taps and the ensuite. If we have vistors, we can set the programmer/boost to heat the tank using the combi heating circuit. All the combi will see is a call for heat which could come from the tank thermostat or the hall thermostat, it really doesn't know so doesn't matter.

Would that work? Thanks....

 

[dcawkwell]

A system boiler can heat the house and the tank and everything
stays as it is.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Can think of worse ways of doing it. Although the boiler will only do one thing at a time - no tank/heating reheats while the combi is doing its own taps/shower.

 

[ChrisR]

1) The combi would drive the ensuite shower and all sink taps in the house.

This is giving you the least desirable feature of a combi - if someone is in the shower and another hot tap is turned on, the showerer is likely to squeal.
If the combi ONLY fed the ensuite shower, then you'd avoid the problem and keep the best combi feature - never-ending showers, at least for that one.
If you don't need that benefit, I'd go with the system boiler.

 

[chapeau]

ChrisR/Dan_Robinson/dcawkwell,

Thanks for your answers. I suppose it is a viable option then and I agree not optimal. But has to be better than driving both showers off a single combi. Heating a tank of water every morning isn't ideal either. Got a heating engineer coming round this evening to take a look so will decide what to do then.

 

[chapeau]

So to update...

He came in yesterday and shifted the existing boiler to new position. I had prepared by exposing gas pipe, bringing in new feed/return for central heating to within two metres of the new position, and moving electrics to new location.

He did all the rest of the work including moving a magnathingy and also took a look at plumping bodge jobs by previous builders and told us how to sort it all out.

Took him 6 hours, he asked for 3/4 his daily rate, I said don't be stupid and paid him for the whole day.

All in all job well done.

He is going to keep an eye out for deals on megaflo type tanks and when he sees one will let us know and come and fit it.

 

[Agile]

It seems you got a very cheap deal from someone who was short of work.

But I would see it as having the existing system retained without taking advantage of a new condensing combi and endless second showers.

Tony

 

[chapeau]

LOL.

Didn't take long..........

1) You have no idea how much his day rate is so cannot tell me whether it's cheap or not.
2) If he was short of work then he would have done it a month ago, as it happens this was the first day he had free.

And that's because he's a bloody good engineer with no chip on his shoulder who charges a fair rate for a fair days work and is always busy from repeat business.

Now I'm waiting to be jumped on in the Electrics forum (well already have been but Banal and Sad hasn't shown up yet, not that I would notice, he's on my ignore list).

Toodle Pip