Water Pressure goes when CH switches off

[Broxbourne]

We've got a Valiant Boiler. For a quite a while now the radiators in our kitchen have not worked and then recently the other two downstairs radiators stopped working or barely gave off any heat.

We called British Gas with whom we have a service contract and without looking at the boiler they ascertained we needed a powerflush which, surprise surprise, is something you have to pay separately for.

Well we called someone else in who knew what they were doing and they looked at the boiler and the radiators and reckoned that we needed a replacement pump and a little bit of flushing out.

We've arranged for them to come and do that. However we had not realised that whatever they did while they were here has got all the radiators working again.

That's great apart from one thing. Everytime the timer switches it off at night we lose the water pressure so that I have to get up in the loft each morning and refill the system.

Now we used to have the problem of losing the water pressure this way, but haven't for a while. I'm guessing that this probably coincided with the kitchen radiators stopping working.

Could it be to do with a leak in the kitchen? There are no obvious signs of one. Whenever we'd call British Gas about it they just used to shrug their shoulders but I'm sure at one stage I saw a similar problem outlined somewhere with the problem identified (only I can't remember where! )

Any help you guys could give would be great. I can't get in touch with the guy coming around till the day he's due to come, and would appreciate having some idea of what might be causing it and how much additional cost it might entail.

Thanks

 

[kevplumb]

check the pipe that goes outside

 

[Broxbourne]

Thanks for the response Kev. Is that the overflow pipe you mean? The heating's already off tonight and I don't want to go up and refill now as it will disturb the kids so I'll check it out tomorrow. hope that's ok and thanks again

 

[kevplumb]

overflow no
pressure relief yes
same pipe

 

[noodlz]

British Gas are such rip-off merchants!!! Makes my blood boil!

They take your money for cover in circumstances such as these, then many a time overcharge for unnecessary work...they have to pay for their scaremongering tv ads somehow! People might want to look at how much they pay over the years and keep that money and use a fraction of it on a good freelance engineer recommended through friends. Then you get generous folk like Kev and loads of others on this forum who give invaluable advice, gratis and quick too! Stick with Kev , Broxbourne, dump BG ! Oh well, sorry for the rant, I just think it's disgusting how this company appears to repeatedly behave.

Hope it gets sorted soon

 

[Broxbourne]

Cheers Kev that's what I meant

Noodlz, cheers for your comment. Please don't get me starting to rant about British Gas, I might never stop Couldn't agree more with you and the cancellation process has already started.

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

I feel another BG rant coming on.

Firtst thing to check on the boiler is the charge pressure in the expansion vessel and replace the pressure release safety valve to rule out the most common presure loss problem.