V
vetinry
Evening everyone.
I'm just about to embark on a major change to the heating and hot water and have a few questions before work starts.
Current system is oil powered gravity fed hw and y plan system. The house is over 300sq metres and last year's oil bill was not far off £2.5k. On top of this, the cylinder is only 140 litres and is crammed into the eaves of upstairs with a broken immersion heater.
There are a couple of key reasons why I want to change things:
Firstly, If oil prices increase as expected, I would like to reduce my reliance on it.
Secondly, the current y plan system doesn't allow much in the way of control of heating in the property and since we've recently installed ufh in the kitchen, I would like add some zones.
The plan
Can't get a bigger cylinder into the current area so creating an insulated room in the garage.
Change to an unvented cylinder and going to try an ecocent to see if I can achieve some savings on my energy bill (hopefully not just a reduction in oil bill but corresponding increase in electricity bill).
Change from Y plan to S plan plus with 3 zones (downstairs, upstairs and UFH) and water.
Questions
The property appears to have 2 main supplies. The main one comes in under the sink (28mm? OD MDPE) and provides water to kitchen utility and tanks in top loft.
However, there is a second MDPE pipe (20mm OD?) in garage, where we'd like to site the tank.
I've measured static pressure of approx 3.5bar at each of these and it doesn't appear to drop much if I switch on kitchen / utility tap.
I've then timed filling up a 3 gallon bucket and it takes approx 30 seconds at both supply point, which I've therefore calculated at approx 25 litres per min. Again, this doesn't seem to drop much with the kitchen and utility tap on full.
There are 3 showers in the house, and each is currently running of its own shower pump. All the pipe work is 22mm, apart from the secondary circulation which is 15mm, and so unfortunately is the mains supply upto the top loft from the kitchen.
So, I'm wondering whether I can use the kitchen main to supply the cold water, and the garage main to supply the unvented cylinder and therefore the hot water.
Are there any fundamental reasons not to do this, and from what I've measured for pressure and flow, am I likely to enjoy showers as much as I do now (until the water runs out).
All help / comments very gratefully received.
Steve
I'm just about to embark on a major change to the heating and hot water and have a few questions before work starts.
Current system is oil powered gravity fed hw and y plan system. The house is over 300sq metres and last year's oil bill was not far off £2.5k. On top of this, the cylinder is only 140 litres and is crammed into the eaves of upstairs with a broken immersion heater.
There are a couple of key reasons why I want to change things:
Firstly, If oil prices increase as expected, I would like to reduce my reliance on it.
Secondly, the current y plan system doesn't allow much in the way of control of heating in the property and since we've recently installed ufh in the kitchen, I would like add some zones.
The plan
Can't get a bigger cylinder into the current area so creating an insulated room in the garage.
Change to an unvented cylinder and going to try an ecocent to see if I can achieve some savings on my energy bill (hopefully not just a reduction in oil bill but corresponding increase in electricity bill).
Change from Y plan to S plan plus with 3 zones (downstairs, upstairs and UFH) and water.
Questions
The property appears to have 2 main supplies. The main one comes in under the sink (28mm? OD MDPE) and provides water to kitchen utility and tanks in top loft.
However, there is a second MDPE pipe (20mm OD?) in garage, where we'd like to site the tank.
I've measured static pressure of approx 3.5bar at each of these and it doesn't appear to drop much if I switch on kitchen / utility tap.
I've then timed filling up a 3 gallon bucket and it takes approx 30 seconds at both supply point, which I've therefore calculated at approx 25 litres per min. Again, this doesn't seem to drop much with the kitchen and utility tap on full.
There are 3 showers in the house, and each is currently running of its own shower pump. All the pipe work is 22mm, apart from the secondary circulation which is 15mm, and so unfortunately is the mains supply upto the top loft from the kitchen.
So, I'm wondering whether I can use the kitchen main to supply the cold water, and the garage main to supply the unvented cylinder and therefore the hot water.
Are there any fundamental reasons not to do this, and from what I've measured for pressure and flow, am I likely to enjoy showers as much as I do now (until the water runs out).
All help / comments very gratefully received.
Steve
