Viessmann or Worcester ?

[dartengine]

Can anyone tell me the likely annual service costs for both the Viessmann Vitodens 100WB-1 and the Worcester Greenstar 15ri.

Can a frost stat be used with both these boilers or is the climate control system best for setting up when away in the winter ?

How does the climate control work ? somewhere I read it seemed complex to operate.

Many thanks for any advice.

Pete D

 

[JohnD]

I have a Vitodens 100 Compact (open vented regular) and am perfectly happy with it. It has a long manufacturer's warranty on the heat exchanger (but as it is stainless steel I don't suppose it will corrode anyway). Unlike the combi it has far fewer working parts so IMO much less to go wrong.

One thing I would emphasise, make sure you use a Viessmann approved installer (to get the long warranty) and quiz him carefully to see how many of this particular model he has personally installed.

In my case I used a small local company, the boss was Viessmann trained but his fitters weren't and made several mistakes. I found out later they had installed larger Viessmanns, but never done the 100 Compact before.

 

[roguetrader]

in all fairness to above poster, if you get the 100 compact wrong youd probably get any of the others wrong, they really arent that complex. i fit viessmanns because although ive had a few issues with them in the past they have tryed hard to rectify the faults and the 5 year warantee is a big plus. for open vented systems i still like the 400 series vaillants and i think id pick one over and above either the viessmann or WB.

 

[Corgigrouch]

I would suspect that they are all "such a muchness" (I fit vaillants and worcesters) never having even seen a Viessman in a home... What I would be more concerned about is in the event of your boiler having a problem round about this time of year, how quickly could you get an engineer out who knows what he is looking at and how quickly can he get the spares.. If you have to search hard to find a guy to fit a particular boiler, then you will have to search even harder to find one to fix it

 

[dartengine]

Thanks for all your replies, kind of you to spare the time and share your knowledge.

Its a good point re availability and using an approved Viessmann installer / serviceman. I had a bit of a job finding an installer and called Viessmann, the nearest is in Plymouth 30 miles and I guess there may be another or more in Exeter (same distance) guess thats the trouble with living in a very small place.

I worked with German Machine Tool companies for years and sort of got attached to the way they design equipment and work to improve them. An old colleague has a Viessmann and swears by it, hence my interest.

Having said that the last boiler I bought was a Worcester (pre Bosch) and it too was brilliant. A big combi Heatslave or similar name, it never blinked, big heavy iron heat exchanger and a big water heat store on the side, very solid and simple.

Anyway we have a much much smaller house now and the existing plumbing dictates a regular heat only boiler.

I see Viessmann publish all the installation, spares and service documentation on the internet so any good service technician should never get stuck for the basic documentation.

I guess a frost stat can be used for winter away protection by bridging the timer switch and leaving on all time with a low room stat setting, or am I out of date ?

regards

Pete D

 

[transam]

As a matter of interest are Viessman boilers British Gas service listed ??

 

[nickso]

As a matter of interest are Viessman boilers British Gas service listed ??

yes but many parts are special order....7-10 days.

 

[transam]

nickso what about Johnson & starley spare parts , are they special order , e.g 7 to 10 days , if so why so long I can get J/S spares in 24hrs weekdays ???

 

[Gasman77]

As a matter of interest are Viessman boilers British Gas service listed ??

yes but many parts are special order....7-10 days.

Just been on the Viessmann 100 course and were told that we could order all parts direct on next day delivery... so why would it take BG 7 - 10 days to order them?

 

[transam]

gas man , i cant work it out either , I had a call from a client yesterday , complaining that a B.G enginner who visited , in order to service the boiler , & carry out a survey in order to put the boiler on a service contract (homeserve) advised the customer that it would take 10 days to get spares for a J/S Reno , (current model) .advised them that they should have had a Worcestor or Vaillant , Its caused us some problems , been threatened with legal action !!!!

 

[nickso]

errr, right. i probably should have been a bit clearer.


the 7-10 day thing usually relates to parts that, for some reason, BG have deemed not essential enough to stock in their uber warehouse. in reality it usually takes less than a few days to get most of these unstocked parts but as BG are then at the mercy of the manufacturer, or the manufacturers supplier, the customer is usually given a blanket 7-10 day window for these parts to be sourced.

the parts that are often not stocked are parts for newer models, BG seem incapable of stocking these parts quickly and it often takes months for them to be kept in stock. this is probably whats happened in the case of the "reno" (thats a really **** name for a boiler BTW, a second rate gambling den dying on its arse in the nevada desert ) i'd guess viessmann, atag and all the other obscurities that seem to get good press on here are poorly stocked simply because there arent enough of them to warrant holding them. you would probably find every part ever made by worcester in stock though....the currently available ones that is.

 

[dartengine]

Anyone got any ideas on these then ?

Can anyone tell me the likely annual service costs for both the Viessmann Vitodens 100WB-1 and the Worcester Greenstar 15ri.

Can a frost stat be used with both these boilers or is the climate control system best for setting up when away in the winter ?

How does the climate control function work ?

 

[CMairiD]

Our boys would charge the same amount for servicing either boiler.

Viessmann is currently on my sh*t list. Four weeks and counting for the o-rings for the Vitocrossal, eight days and counting for a PCB and diverter valve.