Central heating - always on ?

[richmarks]

Hi,

I have the following set-up.
Rayburn 380G , with Lifestyle LP241 controller. Dual zone.

When the timers are off, the water pump is on constantly, the water heater part of the rayburn is on for short durations, and one radiator is warm.

I have the following observations:
1. When I take the power off - it all shutsdown
2. When I set turn the thermostat on the rayburn down or to zero, the rayburn goes off, but the water pump stays on.
3. After some on/off the system settled down and the pump stopped (having been running all night with the cw & hw off on the timer)
4. The ch valve & hw valve seem to be operating ok
5. The pipes upstream & downstream of the ch valve were hot. For the hw valve - cold.

My questions/theories :
1. What starts the pump/heating system ? Can it be that the ch valve is faulty and not closed properly. Does this somehow intiate the pump & boiler to fire ?
2. Why would only one radiator be warm - could this be a heatsink for the rayburn, or could it be that with only a small ch flow (passing faulty valve) the heat is only getting to the 1st radiatir in the system. all the pipes are behind the walls so I can't see the radiator line-ups.

Any thoughts would be appreciated before I call an engineer (i haven't been successful with them in the past, so wish to mug-up before hand so I don't get fobbed off)

Any help greatly appreciated

Cheers

Rich

 

[Renewable M]

As for getting fobbed off, it sounds like a mess to start with so you can't do much worse.

As you have control issues, it sounds very much like the wiring is wrong. Did you do it yourself?

If the pump is running at odd times, its getting juice from somewhere.....

Dont be surprised if it takes some time to trace the error. It is highly likely than a competent person will disconnect much of it, and re-establish again.

The pump would only normally be running if one of the valves was open and there was a call for heat from the room stat of cylinder stat.

Dont attempt to touch it yourself, not worth it.

 

[richmarks]

Thanks.

The call for heat is coming from the rayburn itself I guess (the hot water is set at 60degC), but I would have thought with the timer "off" it would not make this call. Rayburns do seem to keep themselves warm, so I guess with the pump running , even with the timer off, it's trying to keep itself at the 60degC internally ?

I wonder if it's a faulty valve - which will then call for pump to run ?

Maybe it is faulty wiring - I don't know who installed it.

I will not do anything myself, but am trying to better understand how/what maybe going wrong, so I can speak knowledgably with the engineer (when I find one !)

Thanks

Rich

 

[Renewable M]

I wouldnt put yourself through the grief. Nothing an engineer hates more than getting to a house and some bloke standing there saying he knows what the problem is.

I have several times suggested that they fix it themselves. 9 out of ten of them are wrong because they lack the whole view of the system and the potential issues.

Just my observation. DIY usually stands for Destroy It Yourself. Dont embarrass yourself trying to speak knowledgeably about something that you know absolutely nothing about. Any tradesman will see through you in a second. And if you are asked a question, you wont know the answer.

Just let them at it and dont stand looking over their shoulder making suggestions. Just ask them to have a look, tell YOU whats wrong and what the way forward is, and the cost.

Simple.