Help! No heat, but do have hot water.

[diyfromusa]

Help! No heat, but do have hot water. Reply with quote Edit/Delete this post
I didnt know where to put this.
There was a leak so our gas was shut off. No heat.
In the meantime, we are using a backup electric system to heat the water.
The boiler coil is working on electricity and the water is being heated.
So, now we are getting hot WATER, but the hot water is somehow not making it into our radiators. We are basically freezing and I dont know why? Please give me some tips?

A blue device called switchmaster is connected to the boiler. One setting says
hot water and the other says central heating. Is this somehow related to our problem? we just changed the setting to central heating so maybe that will work but if it does is there a way to still get hot water? Please help!

 

[MANDATE]

I don't fully understand your situation.
Sounds like you're using an immersion heater in place of your boiler.
If so, all you will get is hot water.
To get heating your boiler and pump will be needed.
Is your boiler and pump in working order. If you get HW with a working boiler but don't get CH, you may have problem with a motorised valve if you have one or the pump or the room stat .
Think you'll have to be more specific.

 

[diyfromusa]

The boiler is working, but instead of it being heated by gas which was shut off,
it is using electricity. We have hot water. But only one copper pipe is hot, the rest are cold which doesnt make sense if water is supposed to get to the radiators.

Hubbie just checked and we have the blue box set to hot water and central heating. There is no hot water flowing into the radiators, so the radiators dont seem to be working. This system had been working previously, I believe, until I blew a fuse whilst running 2 washing machines and a dryer and an electric 3000watt heater on the same circuit. The washing machines are fine now, but dont know how to get the hot water running through the radiators. Is the blue box the motorized valve? I dont see any other bits to twist and turn on the pipes comming out of the boiler. I dont know what a room stat is, - there is a box on the wall with a timer and some buttons which are set to continuous heat and hot water, but the thermostat is downstairs and is set to 30 degrees celsius.

I don't fully understand your situation.
Sounds like you're using an immersion heater in place of your boiler.
If so, all you will get is hot water.
To get heating your boiler and pump will be needed.
Is your boiler and pump in working order. If you get HW with a working boiler but don't get CH, you may have problem with a motorised valve if you have one or the pump or the room stat .
Think you'll have to be more specific.

 

[ChrisR]

As Mandate said, you are using a backup electric hot (TAP) water heater which is not intended to try to heat the radiators, which require several times the power of the 3kW electric water heater.

You need to get your gas boiler fixed!

 

[diyfromusa]

I think there is a misunderstanding- the 3kw heater I mentioned was just a freestanding hot air heater for the house that I plugged in it is not involved with the boiler. But, just to clarify- what you are saying is that it is unusual and unlikely that I can get the hot water from the boiler to flow into the radiators becuase it was never intended to work that way? It just seems silly since I have a tankful of hot water waiting in the boiler to feed the radiators.

I cant get the gas fixed, I put in a complaint to ofgem and energywatch and it would entail installing a gas pipe to my house from scratch because the current gas pipe is under the control of network rail and they have shut off the gas due to leak at the station. My hands are tied!

As Mandate said, you are using a backup electric hot (TAP) water heater which is not intended to try to heat the radiators, which require several times the power of the 3kW electric water heater.

You need to get your gas boiler fixed!

 

[Softus]

Let's get one thing straight...

The thing you call a boiler, that you think is being heated by electricity, is NOT a boiler - it's a copper tank of water (aka cylinder) that can be heated and kept stored for use in washing. There's no mechanism, or plumbing, for conveying that stored hot water around your radiators, nor would it be hot enough anyway (as has been mentioned).

If your cylinder is being heated electrically, then you're using an immersion heater.

A boiler is a fuel-burning appliance that provides about 10 times the power, in heat form, of an immersion heater.

If you want central heating then you need to get your gas supply reinstated, or an oil boiler installed, or storage heaters installed. Other than that, unless you tow your house somewhere nearer the equator, you're going to have a cold and damp winter.

Edited to correct the formatting mess.

 

[blondey]

You are going to need a warm coat until you can get the gas back on.
It could be worse...you could have night storage heaters!! Or no hot water as well... so at least you have a working immersion heater. Personally I'd go out and buy some little plug in electric heaters. Anyway why does national rail own the gas pipes?