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Are BG trying it on...

View the thread, titled "Are BG trying it on..." which is posted in UK Plumbers Forums on UK Plumbers Forums.

Riley

Plumbers Arms member
Plumber
Gas Engineer
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Hi all, bit long winded but please stick with me.

Was called to a property where 3 or 4 radiators are not getting any heat at all. I did all the usual tricks of opening all valves, closing working rads etc until we finally got a little heat into some of the non performers. Then I thought brilliant just needs balancing.

Went out to garage to put heating on constant to begin balancing and noted that the boiler is only an 18kw Worcester heat only.

I did sort of a reverse calculation and worked out that to warm the existingrads and hot water (150L Unvented) will take approx 24kw.

I fed this back to the LL as I didn’t want him to be ripped off as it was BG that did the install and would imagine he’d have some recourse even a couple of years down the line. He got a BG assessor out (you know the sort that have been installers for 20 odd years and think they know it all) and he said that I’m wrong and based on his heat loss calc the requirement is 18.22kw. I know!!! Already over the boilers capability!! He said that it can’t be wrong as when BG put it in they would have run 28mm primaries to the airing cupboard to deal with the heating load and as there are only 22mm pipes there currently putting a larger boiler in would have no impact on the total output.

He has said that TRVs are to blame and has recommended that Drayton TRV4s are fitted throughout to prevent the problem reoccurring in the future.

I have never come across this scenario where I have had to work backwards and want to make sure that I’m not doing something glaringly wrong but the heating requirement is 13 rads (4 big doubles) of various sizes but only a couple I would say are small as well as 4 big towel warmers and the unvented cylinder.

Surely the fact that the BG guy already says the requirement is 18.22kw says that the boiler isn’t up to it?

Thanks so much if you’ve read this far.

Any thoughts
 
Separate timings eg hot water on its own 5-6 heating 6-8 etc

Did them rads heat up fully when you closed the rest down ?
 
But running them separately still came in at 20kw roughly for rads. Is it unreasonable to want hot water and heating running at the same time??
 
What I mean is surely if their own guy says 18.22kw then that’s proof enough??
 
Not this argument again mate😛😛😛
Well as I say mate I’m having to work a bit backwards sizing the boiler to the rads which I know isn’t the correct way but all the rads and the cylinder were there when the boiler was fitted so surely they should have taken the layout into account rather than just doing a house calc??
 
Well as I say mate I’m having to work a bit backwards sizing the boiler to the rads which I know isn’t the correct way but all the rads and the cylinder were there when the boiler was fitted so surely they should have taken the layout into account rather than just doing a house calc??
You would hope. Wouldn’t you!
 
Ha ha I’m sure you wouldn’t lead me astray mate. And to be fair from my assessment it’s not just short power wise it’s well short
 
Not at all I would say it well undersized and with the outside temperatures dropping the homeowners are struggling to heat the property, gas rate the boiler after 30minutes of being on that will give a indication of load. Kop
 
This where I would look in the book and uprate the burner. God bless oil 😛

Upsize the nozzle, often helpfully indicated on a little table inside boiler, set new pump pressure, combustion settings checked and air adjusted, job done! Lovely.
 

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