Hi,
House hunting. What joys.
Anyway, we just looked at a property which has a combination boiler in the master bedroom cupboard. This seems a little bit of a strange choice.
My main concern is simply noise. I didn't on this occasion get the agent to fire it up but would be curious to hear your experiences with such boilers and location.
And that's it.
Thanks in advance,
Tris.
In theory they are OK in bedrooms. I would not have one in there in case of leaks of fumes or gas and noise. How about the loft? Can it be fitted there. You could get them to drop the price as you are going to move it to the loft. Noise. Fire it up.
Having a boiler in a bedroom is a price reducer and will be not attractive at all to sell slowing the process.
in article snipped-for-privacy@l12g2000cwl.googlegroups.com, snipped-for-privacy@extricate.org at snipped-for-privacy@extricate.org wrote on 8/12/06 10:24:
My girlfriend rented the second bedroom of a 2-bed flat, and her room had the combi in it. It was pretty noisy- this one wasn't even in a cupboard...
If you are living alone, I guess it would probably be OK, as it would only come on with you in the room/asleep when the heating is on, and it shouldn't be cycling quickly, so wouldn't be too annoying. If, however, you are not living alone, it is very disturbing to have it fire up and down as someone is doing the washing up/washing their hands, etc. when you are trying to have a lie-in/get to sleep/etc.
Ben
Leaks of fumes will be a problem no matter which room it's fitted in. If it were an issue they wouldn't be allowed indoors.
You can drop the price and the vendor will just accept it? Which planet is this on?
It depends what the alternatives are. Which you can't possibly know.
Hi,
I used to rent a house with a combi boiler in the bedroom cupboard and I don't remember it bothering us once, so I wouldn't worry too much about it.
Depending on how much you want the house / owner wants to sell, you could always reduce your offer stating that your worried about the boiler etc. In the house we rented, the boiler looked to have been that way since the house was built so this may not be something which the vendor has ever been bothered about, which might result in them refusing your offer.
Good Luck!
Ross.
Will you please eff off as yo are a total plantpot.
Indeed. Central heating can make other noises too - like creaking pipes or pinging rads when heating up. The boiler may or may not just add to those depending on make and how solid the cupboard it's in is, etc.
Of course. Dribble implied they'd be obliged to accept a lower offer because of this which is nonsense.
I had a Vaillant VCW242 in a bedroom, it wasn't really a problem. I think the diverter valve changing over can make more noise than the combustion, but that tends not to happen when you've gone to bed.
I changed the location of the boiler when I got a new one as it took up a lot of wall space and people can be a bit sniffy about boilers in bedrooms.
Andy
Perhaps I'm too fussy, but I didn't want my combi to be installed in the kitchen for reasons of noise (we sit in there a lot eating, drinking tea etc), and I'm glad now that I stuck to my guns. It's in a little lobby area outside the kitchen in its own cupboard with a tight fitting door, but even then it's sufficiently noisy that I would find it annoying in a habitable room. In a bedroom it would drive me nuts.
Mine is an Ariston Microgenus, don't know if these are unusally noisy. It's the fan for the fanned flue which seems to be the main source of noise.
Having said that as a student I used to rent a room at the top of a house which looked out over four lanes of traffic. You can sleep through anything when you're tired enough or get used to it (or have taken enough strong liquor, which was usually the case in those days).
I think the only way to decide is to go back for a second viewing and to send the agent/wife off to the bathroom to open and close the hot tap a few times while you see how it sounds to you.
It will depend on the model. The only way to find out is to try it, even then it might be hard to know just how silent or noisy it is when you are in bed and it comes on at 6am or when ever.
I've got a Keston Celcuis 25 in the bathroom. I would say it's too noisy for a bedroom, again mainly the fanned flue. (It's not a combi.)
Rather to easy for a fault to kill you, like the children of that family on holiday!
Though you may never know about it.
Mine is in a bedroom, not a problem to me. I usually sleep through it firing up. Within a few seconds of starting it modulates down and then is barely audible above traffic and trains etc.
That shouldn't be a concern with a properly maintained room-sealed boiler. However, CO poisoning can be both rapid and cumulative. My gasfitter told me of someone who keeled over and died whilst getting dressed for work one morning. I agree that being asleep hightens the likelihood of the person not being aware of being poisoned, but it might not make a difference.
Owain
But that boiler wasn't in their bedroom.
The one and only person I know who was effected by fumes from a faulty boiler had the boiler located in the conventional place - the kitchen.
My feeling is that it makes no difference whether you are awake or asleep. Indeed other rooms in the house where a boiler is more conventionally sited might be occupied for longer times when it's actually firing than a bedroom.
We had an incident when I was about 12, IIRC. Boiler flue got partially blocked. None of us had any symptoms that we knew of, but all the house plants threw off all their leaves. It may be that there wasn't much CO, and/or the house plants didn't like one of the other combustion products.
Speaking personally.
If it was my bedroom, it'd get two CO detectors of different makes, one mains and one battery, tested monthly.
Overkill, maybe, and the chances of a fault in a properly installed boiler leading to death are low. But, ...
Thing is you can't smell CO nor are the symptoms obvious. So if you want to be that safe you need to apply your idea no matter where the boiler is in the house.
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