Ideal Mini HE boilers - any good?

Just noticed Ideal do a small condensing boiler, the Mini HE, but I can't find any more than a consumer glossy about it on their website

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worryingly this says "Based on a familiar product (mini C)" so I wonder if it's the bog-standard non-condi with a secondary heat echanger. Even if not I wonder if the PCB is to Ideal's notorious Icos/Isar PCB quality.

Any info/experience?

Reply to
John Stumbles
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Reply to
John Rumm

Ideal boast that no part takes more than 15 minutes replace.

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Reply to
IMM

Some (scant) consolation given recent discussion on their PCB quality :-)

Reply to
John Stumbles

This is doubtless just possible since the whole boiler could be changed in 15 minutes:- The flue is one screw and it then unclips. The electrics plug in. Isolate and drain boiler. (internal drain point provided). Isolate gas. Uncouple 4 water connections, 1 gas connection, 1 releif connection

1 condensate drain. lift boiler off mounting frame!

I was thinking as I was installing it that the whole things had been carefully designed to minimise the time to swap the entire unit.

Reply to
Ed Sirett

British Gas would not sell the Isar and Ocos when they came out because of pcb problems. The intro of new boards has changed that.

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Reply to
Dr Evil

You are right. With many Ideal's it is possible to remove the whole unit and work on it much easier.

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Reply to
Dr Evil

2-man lift though, unless you were cast in the Schwartzenegger(sp?) mould :-)
Reply to
John Stumbles

With many Ideal's what?

Reply to
Dave Plowman (News)

You are right. With many Ideal's it is possible to remove the whol

unit and work on it much easier.

Ah, that would be where I went wrong then, also lack of familiarit with the beast and topsy turvy instrauctions which have you dottin about from page to page a bit like a Haynes car manual but wit uninformed line diagrams instead of dark photographs that you can' make out a thing from.

30 minutes to read the manual and fifteen minutes to get at the part once you've sussed out the route.

Next time'll go easier granted.

Still prefer my Buderus. Takes a strong man to hike it up to the wal though and requires more of an airing cupboard than a kitchen wall uni for space.

First one I did there was me walking up the steps blindly bear huggin Buderus while assistant pushed on my back so if I over balanced I wa launched into wall. Ended up it thumped the wall in about the righ place and dropped onto it's mounting by pure blind chance.

Second one assistant got the job of taking all the weight while I acte like the trapeeze artist hovering above him and boiler to giude boile top into location on mounting.

It's all part of the fun.Least everything is well seperated b everything else by a goodly amount of space and enough room to swing spanner.

I say stuff vanity and klitchen units and all that, make your house fi your boiler

-- Paul Barker

Reply to
Paul Barker

I have noted boiler manual tend to gloss over the practicalities of actually hanging the thing, in much the same way Haynes manuals casualy direct you to the page entitled "removing engine" ;-)

I found that my Isar was an easy enough lift so long as I did not need to put it anywhere awkward.... like on the wall, in a corner, right beside a kitchen cabinet, while working over a long stretch of unsupported worktop that was strong enough to take the boiler, but not me and the boiler!

(the solution was to pile plastic tool/drill cases etc onto the worktop and place the boiler on them. Then push the whole pile back toward the wall, then, while up a stepladder, place your knee on the top case to stop it shooting forward, and rock the top of the boiler back towards the wall and align with the frame, now get assistant to slowly withdraw the middle plastic case so the boiler descends onto its hook)

Reply to
John Rumm

I would like to point add that my observation about the relative ease to exchange the whole unit was not so as to facilitate maintenance. Rather I suspect so that manufacturers can simply send out duos (only one of whom has to be registered) whose function is to swop over units under warranty with minimal cost. This is rather better than letting them loose on (multiple mis-)diagnosis and subsequent call backs.

Reply to
Ed Sirett

Or 'separate the two halves of the propshaft' .... >:(

cheers, Pete.

Reply to
Pete C

-- Paul Barker

Reply to
Paul Barker

That's the solution, spend more money on steak! Mmmmmm... feeling hungry now...

Reply to
John Rumm

Yes I had a few hairy moments doing a single-man lift of my Keston into place, which I had decided to mount near the ceiling to make most use of the space underneath. It's a 43kg lift, which when added to my weight (not excessive), exceeded the max weight the ladder was rated for, which was bending in all sorts of strange ways;-) I had already decided that if it started going in the wrong direction, I was just going to leap out of the way -- wasn't worth attempting to save £600 for another one at the cost of doing my back in. ISTR it did take two attempts to get it hung on what seemed to be the rather feeble supplied bracket for the weight, but it's been there a few years now without falling down.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

Shame - one I looked at seemed quite small (and, I asumed, light). It was a display unit in one of our local PMs, and it was some time ago and I didn't note what it was: maybe it was a small heating-only unit not a big combi.

Reply to
John Stumbles

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