Boiler Breakdown

[John]

I am not a plumber or heating engineer.

My sister has a fairly new Combi Boiler, approx 3 years old. It is an Ideal Mini C24 model. Anyway, it appears that the heat exchanger has 'gone'. She has had a 'friend of a friend' look at it and he has diagnosed the fault. He is CORGI registered etc. and is self employed on this basis. He is going to let her know a price in the next day or so for a repair., but has warned her it won't be cheap. He said the unit has to be taken off the wall to do the repair so I am presuming it is the heat exchanger although my sister thought he said "expander" (maybe something got lost in her understanding). My main question is what should she expect to pay for this repair or is it more cost effective to replace the whole boiler? The boiler is in the middle of a wall so axxess and working space is not a problem. Does she have any comeback against Ideal, surely these thing should last more than three years. The plumber who originally installed it emigrated to Australia so he ain't gonna want to come and fix it! Any help and advice greatly appreciated.

Cheers

John

[Phil Anthropist]

Regarding the Sale of Goods Act (SOGA) retailers can be liable for goods for up to six years. The manufacturer is not liable although you have nothing to lose by contacting Ideal about this problem. If you have an invoice, receipt or any other proof of purchase you could pursue repair with the retailer under SOGA. Regarding whether it is more cost-effective to replace the boiler, I would guess that there would not be much change, if any, from a thousand quid (about 400 quid plus VAT for a new Ideal Ideal Mini C24 and at least as much again for labour and VAT). To decide which is more cost-effective you would need two quotes, one for replacement of the faulty part and one for replacement of the whole boiler. Good luck.

[John]

Thanks for the info Do you really think the labour would be so much as it is a like for like swapout, all the pipework etc is there and (presumably) in the correct places for reconnection. I realise there would be recommisionning etc, but I would have thought this could easily be done in a day. You may well be right I have no idea hence the question here in the first place.

Many thanks

John

[Phil Anthropist]

Just an educated guess based on the labour charges plus VAT for two recent plumbing jobs, done by a self-employed plumber, which both took the best part of a day. I would be interested to know what you get quoted/charged for labour. British Gas charged a relative about £200 for power flushing radiators and that only took a couple of hours at the most.

[Christian McArdle]

A direct replacement might not be legal, as it is not a condensing boiler. There are exceptions allowed in some cases. Besides, if replacing, you might want something more powerful than 24kW, which will give very poor hot water performance.

There is an Ideal Mini HE, available as 24kW or 28kW. However, it is a lot more expensive, requires an additional condensate connection, will need a new flue and may or may not have the water connections in the same place.

Christian.

[nige]

Ideal charged me £300 for a heat exchanger for a responce 120. It was that or a new system installed for which i couldnt afford so i gambled on a new h.e.

nige

[John Stumbles]

If it has to be taken off the wall and from what you said this sounds like the expansion vessel. If it is that and not the heat exchanger then the cheap way to fix this is not to touch the boiler but fit a separate external expansion vessel. I think this is in Ed's sealed system faq.