Heating does not stay on in evening every day

[goonbreath]

Hi all,

Have an 80FF boiler, about 8 or 10 years old. Works brilliant every morning. In the evening it will not stay on for more than 10 minutes, then the reset light comes on. Good old British Gas tells me that it is sludge and offered to take £700 and give me a magnet thing and a powerflush. I have seen the water come out of my pipes before when a radiator pipe broke and fludded a room. It was dull, but no sludge at all. When the reset light comes on the pump is still going upstairs. When I turn the knob to off, wait 10 seconds then put it on, while the boiler is warm it will go to fire up then stop just before igition and reset will light up. If it cools, it will start.

Not trusting the hard sell approach of BG calling me 3 times per day for nearly a week to get me to purchase the powerflush, I think it may be something else. We had them come out for electrical issues and they did a rewire and replaced the programmer. This is not the cause as we have had reset issues for about 3 months.

I do not want to waste money, but am fine with spending money if it needs it and we will see a benifit. Does anyone have an idea of why it will work in the morning and not the evening, every day?

Thx

 

[bengasman]

Could be a number of things, including sludge, but also poor pump or a combination of things including something silly like an airlock.
Is there any way that you can get the boiler going for a bit?

 

[goonbreath]

Could be a number of things, including sludge, but also poor pump or a combination of things including something silly like an airlock.
Is there any way that you can get the boiler going for a bit?

it will stay on for 2 hours most mornings. So to confirm, it could be sludge even though the pump stays on?

 

[bengasman]

When it is on in the morning, feel every rad and compare temperature ( don't hurt yourself ) right, middle, left bottom and right, middle, left top.
If there is a big cold spot around the bottom middle, it's sludge.
Do you have the dhw going in the morning as well as ch, but not at night by any chance?

 

[goonbreath]

When it is on in the morning, feel every rad and compare temperature ( don't hurt yourself ) right, middle, left bottom and right, middle, left top.
If there is a big cold spot around the bottom middle, it's sludge.
Do you have the dhw going in the morning as well as ch, but not at night by any chance?

We have only used hot water for about 6 months now. Heating has not been used for some time. I can do it now and update this thread.

 

[picasso]

what 80ff boiler do you have ?

 

[Agile]

Set the hot water timing to the evening and see if the heating then works in the evening.

A lot of boilers were called 80FF. All that means is its 24 kW and a fanned flue! We need the makers name. Not that it will make much difference though.

Tony

 

[goonbreath]

I have a glowworm Micron 80FF.

I put the heating on, radiator 1 which is small heated up within about 3 minutes, number 2 went hot on the sides (big double one) cold on the whole middle section. Number 3 had no heat. I left it on for about 20 minutes.

Does that sound like sludge?

 

[Agile]

You initially said it works fine in the mornings but not in the evenings.

We asked you to retime the hot water heating to the evenings and see what happens.

If we are going to be able to help you we need you to do the tests which we ask for and explain to us exactly what you have done.

What you have just said leaves me wondering what time that was and if the hot water was being heated as well.

Tony

 

[bengasman]

Does that sound like sludge?

Unclear, could be wonky pump.
Try again, but now with all radiators of bar one. Let the boiler run for 10 minutes with just one rad on, and then check the rad. After that, turn the next rad on, first off, and leave that going for 10 minutes. Repeat for all rads.