General Question Please

[Leoki]

I have a question about indirect heating systems please. No actual problem at the moment, i am just interested to know what the possible warning signs might be if i had a crack or hole in the coil inside my hot water cylinder. Would signs be along the lines of -

1. Dirty water coming out of the hot water taps indicating water from the heating system has leaked out into the cylinder.

2. Water coming out of the warning pipe for the F & E tank as water from the larger cold water storage tank would create excess pressure forcing the level of water up in the F & E tank or would this be the other way around with water from the F & E being pumped into the cold water tank and water in that tank rising and coming out from that warning pipe ?

 

[Bernie2]

Water finds it's own level. So if the F& E tank is placed lower than the main tank it will come out the F & E overflow and the other way around. So if you thought it was that tying or stopping the two ball valve flows would tell you. Eventually both water levels would be roughly the same.

Incidentally, unless you have really aggressive water it's about as likely the coil developing a hole, as it is the pipe in the rest of the house. After all its only a coil of pipe inside a cylinder.

It is possible of course, that if you had an unvented cylinder working off the water main pressure, heated indirectly by a vented boiler and the coil went. The higher water mains pressure could push the mains water through the coil and overflow the boilers F & E tank. Turning the mains stopcock off would stop it.

As to water being discoloured, well yes and no, it depends on the amount of corrosion in the system. In the case of an unvented cylinder with the water coming from the water main it may not be discolured at all.

 

[Johnno]

In an indirect system, if you have two tanks sitting on the same level in the loft but one is larger with more water in it, that will feed water trough the pipe at the bottom of your cylinder, through the hole in the coil and back to the smaller tank via the feed pipe at the bottom of the tank - just in case you know that its not the overflow.

 

[REDSAW]

correct.!.
answer 2.

also you can check it by draining down hot water from cylinder.
then the f/e tank will start draining off.