Not enough hot water to fill a bath

[Kezzabeth]

We've recently moved into a Victorian property which we intend on renovating, hopefully 90% ourselves. We're starting this in the bathroom and have hit a small snag - the hot water tank isn't big enough to fill a bath. We have a very old back-boiler, however we haven't tested this property as the two times we turned it on, it quickly turned off. I was afraid of a big fault and haven't used it since. But to my understanding, is this just another way to heat the water tank? It won't provide us with additional hot water?

Our hot water tank is 98Ltr, what is my best option for more hot water?

 

[mcmoby69]

could be a few things air lock, duff pump, rads need bleeding, mid position valve not moving, blah blah blah. needs someone to look at it ideally with experience.

if you look at your surveyors report I'm failry sue there will be a line that says ' we recommend an independent survey is carried out by a qualified plumber/gas engineer' or something similar

depends on your survey level. but the basic wont even get your carpets lifted.

 

[JohnD]

98 litres is about enough for a bath.

However, you say you have not been using the back-boiler. If you have been heating the cylinder with an electric immersion heater (energy from electricity costs about three times as much as energy from gas) it is unlikely that the element heats the whole cylinder. When heated by a boiler, more of the cylinder gets hot, and it heats faster.

What colour is the cylinder (this is not a joke); how tall is it; and does the immersion element go in through the top or the side?

 

[Kezzabeth]

pictured below

Untitled

• Kezzabeth
• 17 Oct 2014
• 1

Untitled

• Kezzabeth
• 17 Oct 2014
• 1

 

[JohnD]

I can't read that. How tall is it?

Have you been heating it with the electric immersion heater? It would take about two hours

 

[Kezzabeth]

900mm tall, 400mm diameter.
Heating with electric, (I know it's silly expensive, but I don't trust our back-boiler) had it on for about 3 hours, still didn't fill a bath.

 

[JohnD]

the maximum length of immersion heater element for it is 700mm, so it can only ever heat 7/9ths of the tank, but as the thermostat is shorter, it will probably be less than that.

I suppose you could try part-filling the bath, then wait a bit and top it up. Adding bath foam will put a layer of insulating bubbles on top and reduce heat loss.
It will take slightly more than a minute to heat each litre of water.

If you decide you need to heat water electrically, look for a cylinder with one or two immersion elements going in through the side. The bottom one will heat all the water that is above it. The cylinder you have is a fairly typical size, but for a good bath, a bigger one would be better.

A yellow cylinder is about 20 years old. Newer ones have better insulation, and also heat faster if done by a boiler. It sounds like your house is quite old, so I expect you will be wanting to do a lot of renovating. See if your old back-boiler can be repaired. For a start, please tell me: If you bleed the highest radiator in the house, does water squirt out forcefully, and without dying away?