Your guide to combination boilers is excellent and the reference to the high pressure finding potentialial leaks welcome. I am thinking of replacing my gas back boiler but my central heating is a one pipe system and I cannot, as a pensioner, afford a full upgrade any comments please.
First off which 'guide to combination boilers' are you referring to? There's Ed's Boiler Choice FAQ, there's something on the DIY FAQ and something in the DIY wiki.
As for a one-pipe system I assume you mean by "full upgrade" replumbing to a conventional two-pipe system. My mum (also a pension FWIW :-)) has a one-pipe system (actually two one-pipe systems in parallel, the second added when the system was extended) and I've just replaced her boiler, including fitting TRVs to most rads, and the system seems to work as well as it did before (well, better since the rads are TRV controlled).
In article , snipped-for-privacy@btinternet.com writes
If you are in England, a pensioner and in receipt of certain benefits then you may be able to get a grant to fund most of the cost of a full system upgrade.
Take a look at the government site for the basics, simply stated:
If you're not in England then Scotland and Wales have their own schemes with different qualification requirements.
If you're not on any of the required benefits then maybe look at what you would need to do to qualify for one ;-).
In message , fred writes
I was under the impression approval wasn't too difficult, but there was a few years of waiting list for tradesmen to actually do the work...
In article , geoff writes
That's why it's important to start now :-D
I've only seen it done for an elderly relative in Scotland and it was a couple of months but at this time of year that shouldn't be a problem. The system up there is better in some ways as it is not linked to benefits but IIRC there is a higher age limit.
I should have said to the O/P that (in the Scottish system) if you have a heating system that works _at all_, even badly or intermittently (or have storage heaters installed) then you will not qualify for the grant. The time to take a hammer to the system is once your application is approved (after saying you have no working heating), bar the on-site inspection which is at the end.
It's not essential to change the one pipe system. They aren't installed today, probably because they are much more difficult to calculate radiator sizes correctly, but given you already have one installed, you don't need to worry about that.
Lets see.. filled in form online on Sunday, phone call on Monday morning "can we come around and do a survey this afternoon", survey and approval Monday afternoon, waiting for heating engineer to call now, been two weeks.
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