Flexicom 18hx ignition problem

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My 7yr old Flexicom 18hx condensing boiler started giving me problems earlier this year.Basically it wouldn't ignite.My gas engineer couldn't find any problems except that the combustion reading was slighlty out.He re-set it and all was fine for a few months but it's started playing up again.
This is what happens.When I turn the boiler on....either manually or by the timer....after it has been off overnight,it takes 3 goes to light.That is I have to press the reset button twice and on the 3rd attempt it usually fires up and then works fine for the rest of the day.It goes off and on during the day as it's supposed to,controlled by the room stat.
Then come the next day I have to repeat the reset procedure and so on.
The fault codes that are coming up are F1 and F22.
Any thoughts before I call the engineer back in ?
 
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My first thought is that you may not have had the boiler properly serviced during that 7 years of operation.

Every year the boiler should be examined and certain parts checked and the flue gas measured. The makers say every year, but in practice every 3-4 years is usually adequate, the combustion area should be opened and checked/cleaned inside and a new seal may need to be fitted.

I doubt that yours has ever been opened at all. Even so, I suspect that the problem may just lie with a part which is accessed without opening that area.

Your boiler is surprisingly reliable and an engineer's main gripe is with some of the circuit boards on similar models can fail while an engineer is servicing the boiler. I would have said unexpectably fail, but more experienced engineers are aware of the risk and often warn the customer of the possibility of significant expense.

We don't give DIY advice on gas/combustion issues here, so don't be surprised if you were hoping for us to tell you what to do as a DIYer.

Tony
 
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My first thought is that you may not have had the boiler properly serviced during that 7 years of operation.

Every year the boiler should be examined and certain parts checked and the flue gas measured. But every 3-4 years the combustion area should be opened and checked/cleaned inside and a new seal fitted.

I doubt that yours has ever been opened at all. Even so, I suspect that the problem may lie with a part which is accessed without opening that area.

Your boiler is surprisingly reliable and an engineer's main gripe is with some of the circuit boards which can fail while an engineer is servicing the boiler. I would have said unexpectably fail, but more experienced engineers are aware of the risk and often warn the customer of the possibility of significant expense.

We don't give DIY advice on gas/combustion issues here, so don't be surprised if you were hoping for us to tell you what to do as a DIYer.

Tony
Hi Tony,when the engineer reset the combustion mixture he did indeed open it up and cleaned a lot of debris out,what looked like carbon dust I think he said.He didn't fit a new seal mind.
Oh just to add,I had a mains gas pipe leak outside my property 3 years ago and a new length of pipe was fitted up to the meter and he thought this was why there was so much debris
 
That sounds like black dust at the inlet to the gas valve. It used to collect in gas pipes, particularly old iron ones. Seems to be an iron sulphide.

Unless very severe is unlikely to be the cause.

It could also be a fault at your gas meter.

If you wanted a little fun the get up BEFORE the boiler is timed to start in the morning and turn on two burners on your gas hob and then start the boiler. Watch the hob flame size as the boiler starts, it should remain constant. See if it still does the fault. [ To avoid getting up early of course you untime the boiler from starting automatically ]

Well I don't know what he did there and its possible that he did pay attention to what I suspect may be the problem but we simply don't know and could not discuss it here even if we did.

Tony
 
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I'll give that a try tomorrow.
What I can't get my head around is once it's kicked in it will work fine for the rest of the day.It's that initial starting that's the problem
 

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