What kind of boiler should I get?

This is a very commonly asked question.

To avoid going over the same ground again, please could you look at the archives in Google Groups first.

The short version is that you can get larger combi boilers, but the truly instant ones will struggle with two decent showers or a shower and bath simultaneously.

Don't forget also that the water supply needs to be up to supplying it all.

One option are to get a storage combi which basically has a small (typically around 50 litre) of very hot water that is then used to heat the water to be used through a heat exchanger. This helps with both delivery and capacity but is limited by the size.

Another is to use a combi to supply taps such as the kitchen but to use the heating side of the boiler to heat a conventional cylinder.

You could replace with another combi to give you instantaneous hot water at selected taps or one shower, and run a stored hot water system off the combi 'radiator' side.

Owain

If cost is a concern, have you considered having one of the showers (perhaps the lesser-used one?) as an electric shower ? That way you can just keep the "main" shower supplied by the combi, and the second shower will always be able to provide hot water reliably.

On 10 Apr 2006 10:47:27 -0700 someone who may be snipped-for-privacy@hotmail.com wrote this:-

Depending on the existing building, the layout of your extension and the use it will get there are all sorts of other things to consider. Local electric heaters, multi-point heaters, thermal store, conventional cylinder being some. All discussed here many times and available for you to peruse.