Gas heating options

Don't think so, flogas say the tare weight is 34kg

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Calor say 95 kg full for their 47 kg cylinders. Mind you they have quite a spread for tare weight 29.5 to 57.7 kg.

Yes, just noticed that, have they switched from steel to aluminium? I wouldn't have thought so ...

I was told by the company that we buy our gas from that gas safety laws prohibit the customer from uncoupling the hoses and replacing cylinders, and that only authorised, qualified people (their drivers and also central heating plumbers) are allowed to do it. Maybe it is a company rule (if you buy from *us*, we are the only ones who can disconnect the hoses) - but if you buy from someone else you can connect the cylinders. How does it work with cost if you obtain your own cylinders? Do you pay a deposit for the cylinder itself which is refunded (or transferred to the new cylinders) when you take the old cylinders back and exchange them for full ones?

I agree, my parents regularly used to disconnect and connect the butane cylinders on their caravan. I wondered whether the rules were different for butane versus propane or small cylinders versus the big 47 kg ones.

I remember the left-hand thread thing: every face of the hexagon nut is marked with a notch to say "this is left-hand thread".

Ah, I always wondered what the 47 kg related to. I wasn't sure whether it was a gross weight, cylinder weight and gas weight. But it's 47 kg of gas, plus a variable weight of cylinder, making up to around 80-90 kg gross. I presume each cylinder is weighed "empty", then filled until the gross weight is empty weight plus 47 kg.

Flogas is our supplier, and they do all the handling and connecting.

Generally though camping/caravanning/boat cylinders are smaller, typically the 13kg or thereabouts variety.

Depending on the country! I didn't believe this until I saw the reality, they vary from country to country even within the EU.

Yes, but 100% of those electric kWh will end up heating my water or my house. Quite a significant percentage of the oil or gas kWh will go up the chimney (or flue, or whatever). I guess boilers have become more efficient now though so the balance may have swung more in favour of gas/oil.

Cylinder weights vary and how "empty" a cylinder is varies as well. So simple weighing and adding 47 kg of gas don't work. One of the sets of numbers on the embossed ali collar is the true empty weight of that cylinder. That is entered into the filling machine that then adds gas so the gross weight is cylinder label weight plus 47 kg.

Well that's one definition of "competent person"... the one that Gas Safe or others with a vested interest like to push. Bear in mind that "LPG work" requires another tick in another box on someones Gas Safe ticket. So a bog standard "central heating plumber" may not be "authorised" as their ticket is for domestic natural gas.

If starting without a cylinder yes you pay a deposit and for the gas. The deposit is refundable but you'll need the bit of paper to show how much you paid and I'm not sure that you can get a refund from any place selling full cylinders.

It's normally easier to obtain a cylinder from some where (word of mouth, freegle etc) for nowt or a few beer vouchers if it has a useful amount of gas left in it. You just take empty cylinders to a seller of full ones and exchange it for a full one for the price of the gas.

Niether would I ali isn't that strong. Look at how much ali there is in an alloy wheel compared to a steel one. Ali might have a lower density but you need more of it to get the strength of steel, so the weight ends up about the same.

Perhaps older cylinders were over engineered?

prices.

A modern condensing boiler running in condensing mode can get over

Forgot to pick up on this earlier.

Depending on her circumstances she might be able to get that done for free. There is (hopefully not was) a scheme about that replaced old storeage heaters with modern high heat rention ones. One snag is that such heaters require both an E7 switched supply and an unswitched one of a kW or two.

Calor did use aluminium for smaller (6 or 7kg ?) cylinders in the late '70s or '80s. They were lighter and I think that they actually held more gas than the steel equivalents.

SteveW

"Dave Liquorice" snipped-for-privacy@howhill.com wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@news.individual.net:

she has that.

She works! But thanks.

I'd be careful of wood burners as the Government has them in its sights as pollution machines. I have to say that a bloke down my road has one and when the weather conditions are right, or wrong, so to speak I cannot open a window or sit in the garden. Brian

Yes those stand alone heaters are no better than paraffin heaters for condensation. I remember during the years of the rolling power cuts when most people used on or the other that condensation and mould growth was a nightmare unless you opened windows, which in mid winter of course meant draughty rooms or possible carbon monoxide dangers if you sealed the room. Brian

Is that why so many of the millions of houses with mains gas CH go bang?

Ah, oil never leaks and oil boilers never go wrong!