Ideal Response 80 - Intermittent working of central heating

[alext05]

My 11-year old Ideal Response 80 has developed a strange habit recently where the central heating stops working for several hours (4-5 hours) without any apparent reason, while at the same time the room thermostat is calling for heat. Then it comes back as nothing has happened, works for another two-three hours and then again takes a nap for another three-four hours and so on.

Initially I thought that due to recent cold weather the boiler was overheating because of working harder. But it does not appear to be the case any more, as the weather is milder and is boiler is actually quite cold on touch after an hour or so.

What is interesting is that the gap between working periods seems to be slowly increasing, let's say it was one-two hours a couple of weeks ago.

The boiler pressure is at 1.4 which rises to about 2.7 when hot.

It was serviced the last time about year and a half ago and last week I decided to get a BG annual CH cover (for 12 months of peace of mind) and so the boiler can be inspected and perhaps fixed at additional to cover cost. However, when BG enginner turned up the boiler was working fine so no fauls were found and he said that the British Gas will not cover the boiler as it is too old.

Can anyone give me any pointers as to what the problem might be and if I need now to get an independent engineer to have a closer look at the boiler.

 

[Agile]

Its not too old! They cover some very old boilers but its very unreliable and the heat exchangers leak which is a very expensive repair.

There is no obvious cause of your fault but its quite likely to be the temperature sensor going open circuit when it gets hot. As they are only about £12 its a part which an enginneer could replace on a try it and see basis.

Tony

 

[alext05]

Thanks Tony for your advice, I'll get an engineer in today or tomorrow to have a look and do a service at the same time.

The boiler had its fair share of problems in the first two-three years and fortunately I was cover at that time for all repairs and replacements, but lately it behaved well. Clearly the recent cold snap put it under severe strain and it started to misbehave again.

Re British Gas: I an afraid that is what the engineer said. I paid for the visit by credit card (one-off fee for fixing) and set up a direct debit for annual cover over the phone before the visit, but he said that the credit card fee will be refunded and the direct debit will be cancelled as they will not cover the boiler. How odd!