What boiler chapter 2

[emmacagain]

Well after having two quote (the third company didn't turn up) I'm still in a dilemma.

BG have said that our water pressure is low (11l/min) due to lead piping and don't recomend a combi for our house. They've recomended their own Worcester version called RD430i - condensing boiler. We need to get 28.7 kw from the boiler so apparently there are few option. This means we get to keep out HW tank and the one in the loft (ideally I wanted the space from the HW tank back for the bedroom). Obviously the whole thing is pretty pricy (£3.5k) but I know better than to ask you guys about prices as you can't see our house!!!

The second compant DID recomend a combi. They didn't test our water pressure but ran the taps and looked about, asked lots of questions. In the end recomended a Worcester Combi 35CDi (also called 350). I discuss the BG receomendation with him and he said that he would fit whatever we wanted but really didn't rate the Condenser. He was saying that you are still stuck with your old HW tank and the one in the loft which may causes problems in the future. I don't think he rated them very highly - water always dripping, heating a tank of water you rarely use etc.
He suggest that if our pressure was a problem that we would eventually have to get the lead replaced any way so why not get it done now (he doesn't do this work so I'm sure wasn't trying to sell me something I don't need).

I liked both chaps. the BG gas had around 30 years experience and seemed to be very knowledgable. The other chap was very good seemed to know his stuff and I'm sure would do a good job (and also said that he could fit the BG style one if that's what we end up thinking is the best idea).

The problem is I don't know whose advice to take. I can see both point of view but really know only a small fraction of what these guys (and you guys) do. If anyone can help me in making this decision I would be really grateful for your opinions!!!!

Confused!
Emma

 

[ChrisR]

I would if possible go for
1) Vaillant condensing system boiler, or similar quality. NOt convinced of Worcesters. (Maybe 2000 - 2500 depending)
2) Megaflo mains pressure HW cylinder - some others are now as good. (Maybe £2000)
3) New water main say 32mm. (Maybe £1000 depending)

That way you get
¶Good HW pressure (assuming mains is above about 2.5 bar pressure) so you need no pumps for showers.
¶Electric HW immersion heater backup if the boiler fails
¶Reasonably long-lasting boiler
¶NO tanks in the loft
¶¶Bigger overdraft - maybe 5-6£k

edited to show where I put the £££

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

I am a Worcester fan, particularly the 28 CDi as I rarley have any problems with them and if I have Worcester have never argued about coming and sorting it for me.
I service them year in year out after fitting and they seem to wear well.
I normally talk my customers out of having a condenser as I dont beleive ANY maker has got it fully sorted yet and I dont trust this aluminium heat exchanger business, plus I dont want them field tested on my reputation.

I have been in exactly the same situation, quoting against BG for full central heating, the water pressure was poor but the customer didn't want a boiler on the kitchen wall as BG wanted to do and still keeping the hot tank, so it had to be the combi in the airing cupboard with a vertical flue, after discussing it fully with the customer and expalining that because the mains water pressure was poor there will be a marked effect when any other tap is running, the customer fully understood and decided to live with this.

I was £1000.00 cheaper than BG and I dont work cheap myself prefering to install to all current regs ect.

Customer was well happy, cheaper job, no boiler in kitchen and money to spare and lived with low pressure.
It will be your decision at the end of the day but I think you will pay over the odds using BG, if you go the combi route there is no point in having the 35CDi as you wont get it's 14.2 litres a min@35deg temp rise anyway, if your water pressure is only 11 litres a min, you may as well have the 28CDi at 11.4 litres a min@35deg temp rise unless you are definately going to have the water main replaced.
You dont need pumps for a shower with a combi either.
I dont deal with Vaillant so I wont comment on them as I dont slag off other boiler makes unless I have had dealings with them, however I personally dont like French or Italian makes as they wouldn't buy our Lamb ect and it's furthur to fetch the spares.
Hope you are happy with which ever decision you go for, good luck.

 

[oilman]

So the combi salesman says your tanks will give trouble in the future. Well ours haven't given any trouble in 20 years, I doubt of your combi will LAST that long.

As ChrisR points out, a megaflow will give you hot water with no loft tank, but it will take up a bit more space than a standard HW tank somewhere. They are expensive beasts, and they should be serviced annually, and by a registered operator. You need to take this into account.

 

[COG]

Just to clear things up the flow rates quoted by Pedan...... are the predicted flow at 35C so you can compare one make against another the actual flow rate for the 35cdi is 12 lt per min and the 28cdi is 10 lt per min so you would be better off with the lower flow as with only 11 lt comeing in you will only just get 10 after it has to overcome the restriction in the heat ex etc, if you want good flow then a mega flow or sim would be better just pricy.

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

Never quite seem to understand the logic behind unvented hot water cylinder, , over inflated purchase cost, having to keep a bloody great cylinder full of hot water you never actually use, if the mains to the property isn't fantastic it's no more beneficial than an ordinary (cheaper) cylinder, no flow rate improvment over a combi, extra cost to service and maintain, with either an ordinary cylinder and boiler or combi at least there is only one appliance to service annually.

 

[oilman]

Possibly some advantages of unvented cylinders, but I suspect it has a lot to do with marketing, and that lots of loft spaces nowadays are low pitch and trussed, there's no room to put a tank and allow for servicing space.

Also, something to do with "lifestyle" where you pretend to be environmentally concerned, then put in as many resource-use maximising gadgets as you can think of.

John "loony" Prescott thinks he can build houses everywhere, the architects think everyone can have two multihead powershowers, er.....???? where's the water coming from?

Never mind, everybody has "combi" and "megaflow" on the brain, I must be wrong since I get good money by fixing them. However, I'm going to add a supplement for combi servicing as there's more to check.

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

My servicing prices vary depending on the distance travelled and the particular appliance.
I totally agree with you about where is the water coming from, and at the same time where is all the waste going to as well, I mean at what point will someone actually stand up and say we cant build on any more green fields and keep building roads through countryside, when it's all gone, it will be to late then, we seem to have all these dissused industial sites and old run down estates and yet they keep building on green fields.
We seem to have a situation where private individuals cant move for regulations and yet large firms keep getting planning permissio to ruin the countryside, and now we have traveller types byeing land and building homes WITHOUT planning permission and nothing is done about it.
Where is the water coming from.
Where is the waste going to.
Where is the investing in the infrastructers we keep loading onto.
Where is the gas,oil,electric, water, drainage,all going to miraculously appear from to keep servicing all these new building sites.

 

[ChrisR]

PVM et al - you get loads more HW out of a megaflo than you would from a combi. Stored energy in the air does a lot and you can boost with another pv as an accumulator. And its a lot hotter. And it provides a back-up. ANd you don't get the awful 2-taps-on-so-mine-wont-work problem.

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

When all my kids were still at home and growing up there were six in our household, we never seemed to have a problem with having more than one tap on, we had a 5 year old second hand Worcester Senior floor standing combi, which I took out from an old chaps house to put him in a wall mounted ordinary boiler, it lasted for about 12 years making it 17 years old when I replaced it, it would have gone on for more but I thought that was pretty good for a combi.
I relaced it with an Ideal Isar as an ongoing experiment to see how it performs and how long it lasts and how long it takes to service, before recommending it to any of my customers, well it's had 3 pcbs which out of warranty would have cost me approx £600.00, serviceing will cost about £85.00 for me to do someone elses's if local.
Now what I am thinking is how much is all this super duper setup going to cost if it was say an Icos and an unvented cylinder, and in a basic family property do we really need hot water pressure that is going to blow your tiits/balls off, or are we all being conned into thinking we do, we are supposed to be conserving water not blasting down the plughole.

 

[ChrisR]

Enquirer only has 11litres/min cold flow so I don't think a combi would give much from a second hot tap - especially if a cw one was on too. It is surprising though how people learn to live with situations.

Sounds like quite a big house - needs a 28kW boiler.
Btw megaflo's (etc) don't have to be too big - they recycle v fast.


I do know someone whose large house has had a Worcs hiflow 400 storage combi from new build. She has one huge victorian shower head which empties the store in a few minutes and struggles thereafter on the continuous o/p from the combi. But she takes short showers, and lives alone, so thinks its marvellous and can't understand why all her neighbours have had theirs taken out!

 

[htgeng]

Whatever solution you go for, upgrading the water supply to your house will be money well spent. I'd suggest you get a separate quote for this job and then decide on the choice of heating system.

 

[emmacagain]

Thanks so much for all the views. I think I'm going to start with the last piece of advice and have someone look at the water supply to the house. Hopefully this can be improved (and wont cost me a fortune) - I here there is some government scheme to pay for some of these costs. Unfortunately my initial budget was £2k but i think this is going to end up costs quite a bit more!

Thanks again for the views,

Emma

 

[PEDANTICVINDICTIVEMAN]

Yep different strokes fro different folks, I think your right about the 2K budget, not going to get anything much in the qaulity line for whatever setup done properly you go for.

 

[Slogger]

cant you have a head of water in the loft in the form of a 50 or 100 gallon tank feeding the combi for dhw what rate of water would that give you using a were gauge anyone know