New house -not very hot water!

[burnside]

Hi,

we recently moved house and we are having problems with the amount of hot water we are getting from the oil fired central heating.

Im a newbe and novice so forgive me if Im not 100% clear with my jargon, we have an open vented system - two F&E tanks in the attic of the bungelow one for hot water the other for the radiators?? the central heating is a single channel system where I can't heat the water independantly to the radiators its just a simple on or off.

Our oil central heating is on for approx 1.5-2 hours in the morning and although the radiators are hot enough we dont seem to get much hot water its really only luke warm. our hot water cylinder has an insulated jacket around it and the circulation pump is located by the burner out in the garage.

Just to complicate matters we have a soild fuel range in our kitchen which is tied into the system when it is lit we have plenty of hot water and even when it goes out we have plenty the next morning so I was thinking it wasnt the cylinder. The range seems to heat the water first then the circulating pump (located by the cylinder in the hot press) kicks in thermostatically we can set what temp it kicks in.

Any ideas? is it worth getting someone to install a duel channel system i.e motorised valve so I can operate the hot water and radiators independantly? approx how much would this cost?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Gray0689]

Hi,

we recently moved house and we are having problems with the amount of hot water we are getting from the oil fired central heating.

Im a newbe and novice so forgive me if Im not 100% clear with my jargon, we have an open vented system - two F&E tanks in the attic of the bungelow one for hot water the other for the radiators?? the central heating is a single channel system where I can't heat the water independantly to the radiators its just a simple on or off.

Our oil central heating is on for approx 1.5-2 hours in the morning and although the radiators are hot enough we dont seem to get much hot water its really only luke warm. our hot water cylinder has an insulated jacket around it and the circulation pump is located by the burner out in the garage.

Just to complicate matters we have a soild fuel range in our kitchen which is tied into the system when it is lit we have plenty of hot water and even when it goes out we have plenty the next morning so I was thinking it wasnt the cylinder. The range seems to heat the water first then the circulating pump (located by the cylinder in the hot press) kicks in thermostatically we can set what temp it kicks in.

Any ideas? is it worth getting someone to install a duel channel system i.e motorised valve so I can operate the hot water and radiators independantly? approx how much would this cost?

Thanks in advance.

It's just not as simple as that if pipework not correct for it it may take a lot of work for you to have a hot water coil you need a plumber to come and see the system if you let know what part of uk you are in there maybe a plumber on here near you to help

 

[burnside]

I live in Co Londonderry - Northern Ireland.

 

[Gray0689]

I live in Co Londonderry - Northern Ireland.

I'm co tyrone

 

[Reg Man]

Sounds like a bit of a problem? Duel fired with solid fuel is complex. The solid fuel needs to be indirect from the oil fired system. Therefore we need more information on the system.

 

[WHPES]

Is it a thermal store system?

Perhaps it just needs servicing?

 

[burnside]

Hi I've been having a look over the weekend and I can confirm that the solid fuel burner is plumbed independantly to the oil central heating, the cylinder is has two coils (indirect heating) and the solid fuel coooker has a T joint to a circulating pump and onto the radiators this kicks in via the thermostat which I have set to 45-50oC, the hot water from the cooker also has an expansion going to the small tank in the attic.

I can see the oil central heating pipe comes out of the floor and feeds into the 1st coil on the cylinder, it also has a pipe going to the attic which is linked into the small tank as an over flow and a feed. I cant see where the oil heating hot pipe T's of to the radiators so I assume this split off will be under the cement floor. The house is 24 years old and we have a bentone oil burner. Would our burner be too small for our our system we have 9 radiators. what are my options to improve the hot water?

 

[dontknowitall]

Usually ... (not always!) the top pipe from the boiler will go up to the airing cupboard and will tee off for the hot water and the central heating. Depending on the set up you will have one or two zone valves (silver box type things on the pipework).

If you have one zone valve (which I suspect you do) then it sounds as if this is at fault. The lever on it can be moved across by hand (and temporarily locked in place).

Before fiddling with the valve, feel the temperature of the pipework around this zone valve. If the pipe going to the radiators is the same temperature as the pipe coming up but the pipe going to the hot water cylinder is cooler then this valve is probably at fault.

When the boiler is working try moving this to the far right and feel the pipes again. If the pipe going to the hot water cylinder starts warming up to the same temperature as the pipe coming up then it means there is definitely a fault with this zone valve. It could be the motor, or a wire coming loose or the actuator or the whole valve. 9 times out of 10 it's just the motor inside the valve.

If, on the other hand, you haven't got one of these zone valves ... it'll be somat different!!

 

[burnside]

The pipe coming out of the floor in the hot press has no visable T to the rad's it comes up goes into the cylinder but does have a reduced size pipe continuing up through the roof into the attic which then connects into the small F&E tank.

Last night I turned off about half of our rad's and this morning we seem to have alot more hot water, would this point to the oil CH not being big enough to do both rad's and hot water at the same time? or could this point to the fact that I would be better investing in a duel channel control system so that I could dictate that the hot water only is heated then have the Rad's coming on at a later time in the morning? would this not also make sense for the summer so that Im not wasting time heating the rad's when I only want water heated?

By the way thanks for everyones help this forum is fantastic.