glow worm hxi(british gas 330)

[chelsea]

went to service this today has not been looked at in 4 years

gaskets all perished so replaced

there has been sign of leakage as corrosion is present at the bottom of the exchanger

anyways so once that was done fired it up and put my analyzer on the flue terminal

sent all my readings off the chart

high CO

ratio was too high as well

checked the gas at the meter thinking maybe governor was not regulating the gas but all OK

thinking maybe gas valve not working properly as when it fires up it modulates gas erratically then settles but seems like its burning not enough

fan seems to be working as it should and nothing is blocked as far as the condense is concerned

any advice would be great

 

[nysk2008]

Hi, What ratio, CO2% and PPM were you getting?

 

[hammers4spanner]

check flue?
possible drawing air anywhere?

 

[chelsea]

ppm was 500 and then my analyzer just started beeping HIGH CO,can't remember CO2% i know it was high and ratio was 0.090

i just spoke to glow worm and he says coz of the leaking gas from the burner door could have caused warping on the door and any of the components

he just said it was well documented with British gas and gas safe about this he just said replace the boiler,i personally never heard this

he said you could replace gas valve and fans and thermistors but will still end up the same

it does suggest to much air but i have checked everything

 

[villa_tom]

ppm was 500 and then my analyzer just started beeping HIGH CO,can't remember CO2% i know it was high and ratio was 0.090

i just spoke to glow worm and he says coz of the leaking gas from the burner door could have caused warping on the door and any of the components

he just said it was well documented with British gas and gas safe about this he just said replace the boiler,i personally never heard this

he said you could replace gas valve and fans and thermistors but will still end up the same

it does suggest to much air but i have checked everything

Ive seen it before where a dodgy seal has warped a case. We changed the heat exchanger and door to get it up and running again, but this was a HA job and money wasn't an issue.

Did the boiler have Intermitant lock out before you went? The one I found did.

The easiest way to check if the door is warped is to run a match around the seal to see if it gets blown out or sucked in (I can't remember which).

Could you not try and adjust the setting at the gas valve?

 

[chelsea]

well the seal was non existent when i took the burners out and its been like this for years

all he said to me was just replace it rather than look stupid throwing parts at it

all i have down is service and install gaskets and now the boiler runs badly so i told the customer this and he was quite understanding and asked for an estimate for a new boiler

 

[Dotty]

If the manufacturer tells you to bin it there's really not much else you can do.

 

[mfgs]

Check the flue collector at the back of the heat exchanger hasn't cracked. This would cause vitiation and explain your high CO readings, it is also a very common problem on these boilers.

 

[hammers4spanner]

Difficult on ethis i would say as if its a private job you could end up putting parts and labour in on this boiler only to end up going for replacement. Then you will have what i had recently where a cust moans because you couldnt get the boiler up and running and had to go for replacement even tho you suggest it in first instance .

 

[mfgs]

You could tell your customer about the glowworm fixed price repair. I think it is £280, I had one similar to this a couple months back where the boiler was a mess because the burner door seal had failed. It would have cost a fortune for me to sort it, so I recommended they got the fixed price repair from glowworm. They replaced pretty much everything in the boiler for £280, customer was happy.

 

[chelsea]

Difficult on ethis i would say as if its a private job you could end up putting parts and labour in on this boiler only to end up going for replacement. Then you will have what i had recently where a cust moans because you couldnt get the boiler up and running and had to go for replacement even tho you suggest it in first instance .

i'm self employed so its a job through the books i personally don't want to spend his money and the problem still persists, i will be happy to start from clean slate and stick in a Worcester valiant or Veismann

and to be fair to the fella he is very understanding

one thing i noticed that the magnaclean was put on the flow side and i thought to myself(this is doing nothing to help this) and basically just gonna stick in a new boiler,power flush the system

 

[dmheat]

Check the flue collector at the back of the heat exchanger hasn't cracked. This would cause vitiation and explain your high CO readings, it is also a very common problem on these boilers.

This. Very common on these, there is a bulletin for this boiler re; burner seal and flue collector

 

[chelsea]

the flue collector at back is that a exchanger out jobby to get to it?

 

[dmheat]

Yuuuuuup. You should be able to see it with a mirror and a torch, it's usually quite obvious and chucks readings way out, take an fga reading round the back too if possible, obviously there should be nothing picked up if the collector is intact

 

[dmheat]

Should be able to confirm whether this is the fault or not without removing the heat ex basically

 

[chelsea]

OK going back on Tuesday so will have a peek, thanks guys

its good to have back up,saves spending hours looking for the fault manually

 

[arran197]

If the door seal was no good then most probably then the door might be warped. The collectors leak also as has been said, but the best ex comes out fairly easy if it's the boiler I'm thinking about.

 

[chelsea]

Went back to this on Tuesday and the customers are basically ****ed off as they said the boiler was working OK last week

and my reply was, you not serviced it in years and basically it was spilling CO into your house and basically saved your lives now we have turned the boiler off and your unhappy

It seems saving peoples lives are not enough these days

 

[dmheat]

Get it all the time.....it was working fine and you've turned it off blah blah blah

working and working safely are two totally different things