Best combi for small 3bdr house?

[Tim+]

It?s looking like my daughter?s Worcester Bosch boiler needs to be replaced. Recent visit by boiler man resulted in firstly a recommendation for WB care plan as it would probably be cheaper (point in his favour) but apparently the boiler is too old for this. (Haven?t checked the veracity of this).

He suggested a Baxi boiler which I don?t hear much about here. He was also rather scathing about the reliability of WB boilers.

Anyhoo, what are currently regarded as the best or ?better? combis these days?

As an aside, I would be tempted to subsidise an ?upgrade? to a non-combi and pressurised HW tank + immersion. Any ideas how much more this might cost compared to a combi?

Tim

[T i m]

<snip>

As a further aside, aren't we supposed to be moving away from *all* Co2 producing heating solutions and going all renewable's / electric?

Cheers, T i m

[Robin]

Let me know when you find anyone connected with Extinction Rebellion willing to answer questions about what "carbon neutral by 2025" would mean for domestic heating.

[T i m]

As / when I meet one I'll ask. ;-)

But there was something on TV the other day with a new build eco estate where they were all supposed to be carbon neutral now and using blown air electric central heating?

Now, as long as we take 'renewable' energy as carbon neutral ...

Cheers, T i m

[David]

Beware the Baxi recommending plumber IMHO.

Some heating engineers seem to like to install only one type of boiler (presumably familiarity and ease of spares, perhaps bulk buy incentive) so their personal recommendation may have a bit of self interest built in.

We had a WB combi installed around 2006 in a 3 bed semi and AFAIK it has never (or very rarely) been serviced. Still going strong last year again AFAIK.

Our current WB has been in over 5 years, again no service (trend here?) and so far is running fine.

Our daughter had a new Baxi combi in her house on the recommendation of the plumber around 2007/08 and again didn't have it serviced. It failed a few years back and had to be replaced. No service, no warranty so that is a risk.

On purely my personal experience I would prefer WB over Baxi every time.

Received wisdom from this group in the past has been for WB or Vaillant.

Which? Rates WB highest at 86%, followed by Viessman at 83% and Vaillant at 80% (which is also rated as the engineer's favourite). The Baxi brand score is 54%. Which? isn't always 100% accurate but this may at least give an indication of the relative quality.

Recommendation: ask a different heating engineer!

Cheers

Dave R

[John Rumm]

The usual recommendation seems to be Vaillant, WB, and Viessman...

Parts alone are likely to be around £2,500 if you go for quality kit.

I did a complete refit here about six or seven years ago, and did a conventional boiler and cylinder replacement. I went for a system boiler with unvented cylinder, fully upgraded controls, with weather compensation and external temp sensor. Fitted / changed three new rads. Added whole house phosphate dosing scale reducer, whole house blending valve, split the heating into two zones. Total parts for that came in at just under 3K when allowing for a couple of hundred I got back for weighing in scrap and ebaying the old programmer, stats, and a reclaimed gas valve.

Needless to say, if you need to add labour, that will add significantly to the price!

[Andy Burns]

Let me know when you find one that doesn't appear to believe* mankind will be extinct in 11 years unless we do what they demand.

[*] judging by the XR supporters who phoned in to talk radio channels

[Robin]

We're (still) looking at a new boiler so I'm watching with interest but thought I'd flag up the issue of guarantees: they vary enormously but it's hard to judge their value. Eg Vaillant offer on some boilers 10 years if fitted with a "protection kit" and serviced annually.

[Chris Bartram]

The usual reccomendation is WB, which I've just bought, and it seems good. Only ~9 months old, so no idea of reliability. Soempeople like Vailant, but I had one a number of years ago, and never again, and my Mom's house had a Baxi, which really didn't seem to last well enough IMO.

[DerbyBorn]

Is there already an Immersion Heater Power supply?

[Brian Gaff]

Assuming its even legal to fit one these days... Brian

[Brian Gaff]

Everyone has heat pumps in New Zealand it seems. Brian

[Brian Gaff]

Actually to be fair to them, the industry has been peddling very slowly on carbon capture etc for many years now, its a a bit of a scandal. I do however have worries about moving the production of co2 away from the usage point to the power generating sites. If we are unhappy to use Nuclear and have not made cheap power storage for renewable what is the point? Brian

[Robin]

It's still lawful to DIY if you are competent. But I'm not going to do ours as I'm not confident in my soldering and it'll almost certainly need a new pipe from the meter.

What has changed is that a new boiler is now notifiable work, like Part P electrical work. I suspect rarely d> Assuming its even legal to fit one these days...

[Andrew]

As will the retail 'mark up' on that £2,500 figure

[Roger Hayter]

Carbon capture doesn't work, nor is it likely to.

The beauty of transferring CO2 production to a central point is that it can then be used for carbon trading. As I see it, if the ruler of some benighted (but large) third world country is willing to trade his citizens' access to electricity for cash in a Swiss bank account we can 'buy' that country's allocation of CO2 production and take our CO2 production off the books. It no longer counts against us! All for money.

[Tim+]

Okay, I?ve got some more details about my daughter?s boiler. It?s a WB 28i Junior That according to WB is 15 years old.

Currently it?ll only make HW when the thermostat is calling for CH and often not even then. Frequently of start-up you can hear the boiler kettle get and the locking out (almost certainly due to over-heat). I witnessed it do this and couldn?t detect any vibration from the pump whist this was happening so I suspect that sometimes the pump isn?t starting.

Also the HW temperature is hard to control swinging between too hot and too cold.

To me it sounds like a dodgy pump and maybe a dodgy flow switch too but I don?t really have any first hand experience of combis. Given its age, is it worth a piece by price repair or should we cut our losses and just go for a new boiler? (Not a Baxi).

There *does* seem to be some sort of magnetic filter in the system so whilst slugging might be a factor, I?m not sure it?s a major factor.

Tim

[Fredxx]

I would always repair if possible. If it is the pump then often you can change just the pump body.

You can often get parts on eBay as so often boilers are scrapped when fully working, or with a known fault.

[tabbypurr]

Sounds like it'll be more than an order of magnitude cheaper to repair, if you diy anyway. If not still far cheaper. You might start with: Pump not running: monitor electrical feed to pump. HW not firing: monitor cyl stat output etc Water going hot/cold: one cause of this with combis is demand falling below minimum boiler output. Increasing water flow resolves.

NT

[alan_m]

There was someone from one of the "green" organisations on this subject the other day. All our power can be obtained from renewable sources by

2025, no gas, no coal, and no nuclear (I assume no "green" log burning stoves or camp fires to pollute the atmosphere).