Vaillant Boiler 'flatlined'

[Notaclueanddesperate]

Dear all,

I am desperate for any help because as usual these things only ever seem to happen on a saturday!
We have a Vaillant Boiler and as I can not seem to find any boiler make, I have spent ages looking at the Vaillant website, looking through all user manuals and the one that looks like ours and comes up with similar errors is the Ecotec plus 937.
Our woes started with a freezing flat, having returned from holiday and turning the heating on, we found that it was having little impact in our old, draughty flat (though heating has worked in the past) - the rad in the bathroom is boiling hot and actually making a difference to the room temperature, the ones in the livingroom and 1 bedroom are warm but not really having much impact and the one downstairs by the front door (only rad downstairs) is hot at intervals. The last 2 are ice cold (1 in hallway and 1 in 2nd bedroom).

The pressure on the pressure indicator is 0. Having had an engineer out once before who showed us how to adjust the valves using a screwdriver, my husband tried that. So far the 2 error messages received have been F.20 and F.22 and we have no idea how to fix it. Now if we turn the boiler on the temperature shoots up to 120 and then cuts out to F.22.

So now we have a freezing flat and no hot water.

Before I call the engineers, anything anyone can suggest (possibly how to exactly determine the model number as a start??) to help...

 

[tomy]

you need to get the pressure guage up to between 1 bar and 1.5 bar and bleed all the rads to get any air out . then see if you get any error messages

 

[Notaclueanddesperate]

Thanks for the quick response, how do I increase pressure? (Notaclueanddesperate is not just a funny name!)

 

[tomy]

It depends if it has an integrated filling loop or a silver braided hose under the boiler see page 35/36 on this valiant . http://www.vaillant.co.uk/stepone2/data/downloads/f8/42/00/ecoTEC_plus_937_installation_manual.pdf

 

[simond]

There are two screws on the underside of the boiler that need to be opened (eg: turned 90 degrees) to let mains water into the radiator circuit.

If you look underneath, the ones you are looking for will usually be a bit knurled up due to use. By the sould of it, it is a 937 or if it looks a bit like a 937, it's an aquaPLUS, which is really a turboMAX. If it is an aquaPLUS it may have a removeable white grille covering the pipes, if it has, remove this and you will see two brass blocks with screws linked by a braided flex chromey pipe. These are your fill valves.

New Vaillants have these clearly marked and are fitted with handles.

 

[Notaclueanddesperate]

Thanks all for replies, my husband has been following suggestions/manual and found the model number - Vaillant turbo max 824E. Same questions as before (but now we know the model! - can't find exact match user guide on vaillant website - is it the ecotec plus combi?)

Thanks again....

 

[bengasman]

just up the pressure as advised above. turn boiler off for 1 minute and back on.

 

[David937]

Dear all,

I am desperate for any help because as usual these things only ever seem to happen on a saturday!
We have a Vaillant Boiler and as I can not seem to find any boiler make, I have spent ages looking at the Vaillant website, looking through all user manuals and the one that looks like ours and comes up with similar errors is the Ecotec plus 937.
Our woes started with a freezing flat, having returned from holiday and turning the heating on, we found that it was having little impact in our old, draughty flat (though heating has worked in the past) - the rad in the bathroom is boiling hot and actually making a difference to the room temperature, the ones in the livingroom and 1 bedroom are warm but not really having much impact and the one downstairs by the front door (only rad downstairs) is hot at intervals. The last 2 are ice cold (1 in hallway and 1 in 2nd bedroom).

The pressure on the pressure indicator is 0. Having had an engineer out once before who showed us how to adjust the valves using a screwdriver, my husband tried that. So far the 2 error messages received have been F.20 and F.22 and we have no idea how to fix it. Now if we turn the boiler on the temperature shoots up to 120 and then cuts out to F.22.

So now we have a freezing flat and no hot water.

Before I call the engineers, anything anyone can suggest (possibly how to exactly determine the model number as a start??) to help...

When was the boiler installed?

 

[Notaclueanddesperate]

Roughly 6 years. To Bengasman, monkeyboy followed your advice, now we have water coming out of the top bit. Shut all off again, used the release valve or whatever it is called to drop pressure back down, then finally the holiday hat came off and I remembered that my fab homeinsureance policy contains an emergency cover - I am now awaiting their engineer and now my concern is that the engineer takes one look and says ohh, you need a new boiler. Any ideas why the top section of this unit started leaking water as soon as the pressure increased?

Must say we were extremely excited when things looked like it was sorted, pressure was climbing, no warnings, and then water leak! So thank you kindly to all for amazing responses.

 

[David937]

Roughly 6 years. To Bengasman, monkeyboy followed your advice, now we have water coming out of the top bit. Shut all off again, used the release valve or whatever it is called to drop pressure back down, then finally the holiday hat came off and I remembered that my fab homeinsureance policy contains an emergency cover - I am now awaiting their engineer and now my concern is that the engineer takes one look and says ohh, you need a new boiler. Any ideas why the top section of this unit started leaking water as soon as the pressure increased?

Must say we were extremely excited when things looked like it was sorted, pressure was climbing, no warnings, and then water leak! So thank you kindly to all for amazing responses.

It cant be a 937 then, it must be an aquaPLUS as suggested before.