CH Controller Battery

[polygonum]

Mother's CH is controlled by a Potterton EP2000.

For some time she has been complaining about the boiler locking out, etc. (and it does, and I know what to do to get that resolved). Today I had a revelation. The flaming unutterably stupid EP2000 has a battery. Any disconnection from mains, however brief, results in immediate loss of time and program settings. I think you can guess the connection...

Have now ordered battery.

Nothing whatsoever seems to indicate a battery failure to an ordinary user. It is a fairly odd Varta 3/V150H thing so cannot easily drop out to the shops to get one.

What a horrible controller. You need to shove a screwdriver up underneath to release the controller from the wallplate. Then, though you can see the battery, you have to prise it out with a screwdriver. Final insult, even at that point, there is no obvious marking as to which way round to re-fit the damn thing.

[harry]

Battery is usually to keep controller going/from losing settings if there is mains failure & nothing to do with anything else.

[Graham.]

Isn't that a wire-ended NiMH battery that needs soldering? Used to be commonly found on PC motherboards before lithium coin cells became popular.

[polygonum]

Funnily enough I could find the PCB version of the battery at Maplins not too many miles away - and that is, as you say, with wires at the ends. But for the EP2000 it is a flat ended thing like a square cross section C-cell but somewhat shorter.

[polygonum]

That is exactly the problem. Every time there is even a tiny interruption to supply, it loses time and program settings. This is an issue ON TOP OF THE BOILER LOCKOUTS.

What was lost in communication from my mother was that there were two issues. I thought the boiler was not coming on because it had locked out. It was actually not coming on because the programmer didn't know what time it is nor was it retaining any program settings.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

Is there any room in the case to fit a battery holder?

[polygonum]

Nice idea. But no chance. Given that it has recharging circuitry, the controller might be a bit fussy about the battery/ies.

'tis ordered now, and on its way. :-)

It is like this:

But without the pins.

[Grimly Curmudgeon]

The pins add about a tenner, iwt.

[harry]

If you are getting lockouts as an unrelated problem, it's likely a dirty flame sensor. May clean up or may need replacing. Ideally you need to see a lockout occurring to determine the exact cause. Other than that, a good boiler/burner clean out and hope for the best. The intermittent faults are the worst to determine.

[polygonum]

Simply a convenient picture!

I did not pay that much! The ones with pins are available at Maplins - those without are both generally more expensive and, IME, less easily found.