Boiler Help

[BigWallop]

All instant water heating appliances suffer from this. Our instant shower is usually set around the four or five mark on the temperature gauge in the summer time, but it is now being set to either six or seven. We also notice the flow dropping when we set the gauge to a higher temperature setting, because that's how these things work. You slow down the flow rate to keep the water in the boiler (heater tank) a bit longer so the heating element (exchanger) has time to heat it up to the temperature you need.

You could fit a hot water storage tank dedicated to the shower and fed from a loop off the central heating system.

[geoff]

In message , Ed Sirett writes

As far as I can remember, there is no mechanism for controlling the flow rate

[Skip]

Try these

1) Adjust a tap so it fills a pint bottle in 6 seconds...............is the water now hot?

2) Also look in the instructions and find the spec. of the boiler usually quoted to give a flow rate against temp. rise (eg 2.2 gallons/min @ 35' C temp rise.)

Subsitute the figures for your boiler, for the ones I have us below. Note the temp. of the incoming cold water (eg 12'C) Slow the hot tap down to give a flow rate of 2.2 gallons per minute The hot water should now be 12'C+35'C = 47'C

Skip

[PhilÃÂÂ]

Hi Skip what you say is probably correct, but I didn't have to adjust the flow at the tap previously, even if I had the hot tap on full, it would be only flow at a normal speed with piping hot water.

Maybe the input cold pressure has increased and I have to restrict it??.

[BigWallop]

The water going into the boiler is now colder than it was in the summer months, so the boiler needs more time to heat the water. If the flow rate stays the same and the incoming water gets colder, then the boiler will not heat it to the same temperature in the same time as it used to.

Try this:

Fill your kettle with cold water from the tap. Switch it on and time how long it take to boil.

Now fill your kettle with water that has been stored in your fridge for a day. Switch it on again and time how long it takes to boil.

You should notice a difference in the times, with the colder water from the fridge taking longer to come to the boil than the water straight from your tap.

The same thing is happening with boiler.

[David W.E. Roberts]

Ignore this line :-)

Having just read this, the discussion seems to be going round in circles.

The simple problem seems to be that the hotwater is now flowing much faster, and so comes out of the tap much cooler. [So don't turn the tap on full!]

There are two different possible reasons which have been suggested for the change in water flow:

(1) There is a flow control valve in the boiler which restricts the flow of water through the boiler to allow it to be heated to the set temperature. This is now not working.

(2) The rate of flow is not regulated by the boiler. Therefore something has changed in the mains cold feed to the boiler, resulting in a faster flow rate than before which is now too fast for the boiler to heat the water properly when the bath tap is fully open.

Attempted diagnosis seems pointless until you establish which of these two conditions is true.

The fix to (2) is obvious!

HTH Dave R

P.S. (3) The OP has neglected to mention that the bath taps have been changed :-))

[Ed Sirett]

I can only think that there is some external reason why the boiler flow has suddenly increased. If you can slow the HW down to a reasonable flow rate and it then comes out hot enough then: I suggest you add some sort of restriction on the flow to brings things back under control. Perhaps the Water Co. have improved the pressure in the area?

Note that some boilers have an adjustable restrictor (usually on the the CW inlet) to do exactly what you require.

[PhilÃÂÂ]

Taps not been changed, but there is a flat bladed screw on the cold water input pipe, this has been switched off and on in the past, it turns 45 degrees, maybe I should turn this to restrict the flow???

I would like to know if the Worcester 24 CDI does have a flow restriction device.

Thanks for all your help, I will have a fiddle with the little screw thing to restrict it.

[BigWallop]

temperature.

The valve you're describing is called a service valve, and the slot is connected to a ball shaped (spherical) closer inside the valve. The slot will be at a right angle with the direction of the pipe to be fully off (closed) and running in the same line as the direction of the pipe to fully on (open).

As in:

|_| = Closed (off) | |

| | | = Open (on) | |

[Skip]

Check flow regulator Part No. 8-716-141-052-0

8 litres/min Fitted in top side of flow switch

[David W.E. Roberts]

Aha! If this is on the cold feed to the boiler then this may explain all. Turning it slowly whilst an assistant hold a hand under the bath tap may allow you to adjust it to roughly where it was before.

Once you have adjusted the mains cold input to the boiler, I guess you should then measure the flow rate of the hot water to see if it is sufficient for the proposed thermostatic shower. You could also check that this is the expected flow rate of hot water through the boiler.

As suggested elsewhere, if you don't have sufficient flow then you will need some sort of thermal store and a pump to supply pressurised hot water to the shower mixer.

HTH Dave R

P.S. It is where you replace a traditional boiler and hot water tank with a combi boiler to reduce complexity and save space, then add on a thermal store because you don't have enough flow for your shower(s), that I start to lose the plot :-)