What's the best oil boiler?

[Sackboy]

Hi,

New to the forum, been gas safe for a few years now but need help with oil boilers!

Currently got a very old oil heat only boiler on an open system feeding 12 rads and hooked up to an unvented hot water cylinder. The boilers in an outside cupboard but needs to move to the garage after a house extension is going to incorporate the old boiler room.

What are the best oil boilers?
Are external boilers any good?

struggling to find much info online, it seems worcester Bosch and Grant are the best options?

What's the condensing side like? Are they proper condensing or work with a secondary heat exchanger (which always leak and corrode everything in sight!)

thanks sackboy

 

[Beboers]

Grants all day long, hate oil worcestors! just personal preference. External grants are good, the combis are quite large but if you need a heat only then i would go for grant.

 

[Ray Stafford]

Grant or Worcester. Can't sell anything else, particularly to the boys who do a lot of oil. Mostly Grant to be honest, but Worcester also has its followers.

 

[kimbo]

Grant my no1 choice there are those who will recommend worcester. Worcester have redesigned their boilers because of problems they hsd before so I would be dubious about them until their teething troubles have sorted themselves out. Having said that I installed their mk2 heatslave the other day. Nice boiler but I wouldnt want to go to a breakdown on it. They rely on fault codes and it has been designed around their gas boilers. Nice bit of kit if nothing goes wrong with them

 

[SimonG]

Grants - dont like them.
Worcester - customer service is poop

So its Warmflow at the minute.

Mate'o will be along to tell everybody Mistral are the best.....and he doesnt work for them.....honest.

Tbh its personal preference and i also find area preference as well.

 

[Sackboy]

Thanks for your replies.

looking online there seems to have been issues with grants and leaks/expansion issues but these appear to be with the combis.

The general consensus online appears that all condensing oil boilers have problems with the condense side of things. I don't want to end up with the oil equivalent of a Ravenheat Csi85 or vokera syntesi which need replacing after 3 years!

 

[Chalked]

Grants for me, but hate all external boilers!

 

[SimonG]

Grants for me, but hate all external boilers!

Funny that. I prefer the externals.

 

[Chalked]

Funny that. I prefer the externals.

Not the fact that its outside, more the poor design.
when the auto air vent on a Grant wall hung external fails, it leaks onto the pump and frys the pump. Then if its cold everything freezes.

 

[kimbo]

Thanks for your replies.

looking online there seems to have been issues with grants and leaks/expansion issues but these appear to be with the combis.

The general consensus online appears that all condensing oil boilers have problems with the condense side of things. I don't want to end up with the oil equivalent of a Ravenheat Csi85 or vokera syntesi which need replacing after 3 years!

Never had a ptoblem with the condensing side of any oil boiler if its fitted right.

 

[Gray0689]

Grant are best
Warm flow are crap

 

[Sackboy]

Never had a ptoblem with the condensing side of any oil boiler if its fitted right.

Even a Ravenheat? Or syntesi? Secondary heat exchangers on these are god awful and leak condensate everywhere

 

[Dotty]

NXR3 with a Riello G20S.

 

[Dotty]

I have to be honest, I like the Firebird condensers but they're betterer if they're installed on a couple of blocks to raise the condensate trap to a working level.

 

[Best]

I think I am correct that Grant boilers are more efficient than Warmflow boilers. Not surprising really, when you compare the way each are baffled.
Most of the non combi Grants are from 93% to 97% efficient Sebuk - which is actual efficiency over a year. At the price of fuel, the extra saving will always be considerable - even if you only use small amount of oil each year.
Grant Vortex is the better Grant boiler with a larger secondary exchanger. Very easy to service. Can't say how long they will last until they leak someday, but so far they seem reliable & Grant were making condensing boilers many years ago & were ahead of many other manufacturers.
All combi oil boilers are trouble, so avoid.

 

[Ermintrude]

Best oil boilers are in skips! Nice solar thermal with some bio mass.

 

[Killy Bing]

Hmm, grants, warmflow or firebird for me.
worked one a pair of mistrals and.....don't...
worcesters older offerings were/are a pain to work on, particually the damn heatslave combis.

avoid an oil combi like the plague, ive found firebird externals the worst combi wise (of my choices)

Fire birds need to go up on a slab or two, their condence connection is right on the base.

In a garage? Any of the three.

could always go for a boiler house model?

Again if you fit a mistal...i'll bribe a mod to change your tag to somthing else ending with sack!

 

[Best]

If you do decide to put a boiler into the garage, it is the better place for a boiler IMO for various reasons - neat & hidden, easy to service & replace & nice & dry, particularly for a service guy.
The only issue & this also applies to an outdoor boiler, is that pipes to the boiler need to be fully insulated & protected from damp ingress - particularly if underground, so need ducted, or if you don't then you will lose serious heat from the boiler.

 

[lame plumber]

I have to be honest, I like the Firebird condensers but they're betterer if they're installed on a couple of blocks to raise the condensate trap to a working level.

good point on the blocks, firebirds for cheaper choice grant if you spend a bit more, wb if you want to go to hell.

 

[Killy Bing]

Also, if the garage is unheated fit a frost stat. They could bugger off on holiday when we eventually get some snow and ice!

 

[Killy Bing]

good point on the blocks, firebirds for cheaper choice grant if you spend a bit more, wb if you want to go to hell.

Hell is reserved for people who put worcesters in lofts without an external low pressure switch....

on the lines of this oil thread.
i went to look at a hrm wall star today.
they ran out of oil and burner locked out, needed to be bled through.

funny enough i couldn't get to it!!

they built a house in their garden, about 7 inches away from their house and have now sold it.

guess where the outside panel is!!!

some peoples stupidity amazes me...

 

[Sackboy]

Thanks for all your quick replies guys. The garage the boiler will be fitted in will be more utility room so frost protection shouldn't an issue (hopefully).

Ive seen Worcestershire oil boilers briefly on a gas training day at the factory but we just got to play with the oil burners rather than assessing their quality 🙂

looks like issues are mainly with combis!

leaning towards Grant as there after service appears good too.

did contemplate LPG as I need a new oil tank too so it's going to cost a few £000s. But the. LPG is more expensive. Agh too many decisions

 

[Soggy]

The latest independent industry data has revealed that oil is the only heating fuel that has come down in price over the past three years. The current annual cost of using oil in a three bedroom home in Great Britain is now 5% lower than the average cost reported over the last three years, whereas the same average figures for homes using gas and electricity show an increase in heating costs of 14% and 16.5% respectively.

The price difference between gas (by far the most widely used fuel) and oil (used an estimated one million off-grid households) has narrowed significantly. Three years ago oil was nearly 60% more expensive than mains gas but now it is just over 12% more expensive, based on using a condensing boiler.

LPG, used by some 170,000 off-grid households, remains the most expensive fuel, costing a three bedroom home with a condensing boiler £1,923 per annum compared to oil at £1,275 and gas at £1,136.

Directly comparing the price of heating a three bedroom home in January 2011 to January 2014 provides an even starker result and shows that electricity has seen the greatest price increase over the last three years at 38.89%. Similarly, gas prices have increased by 37.3% and solid fuels by 26.1% respectively, whereas in comparison, the price of oil has decreased by 2.18%.

The substantial increase in electricity prices is especially notable as it means that renewable technologies such as air source (ASHP) and ground source (GSHP) heat pumps which run on electricity are becoming a much more expensive option to heat a typical home in Britain.

Oil is certainly cheaper than LPG these days.

 

[Silent Dancer]

New Worcester Danesmoor and Heatslave must be the easiest to install and service. Plus of course there is great backup and service.

 

[lame plumber]

been offered a firebird combi for 1/2 price around £600 as it was a cancelled order and merchant is fed up with it sitting around, 🙂 just hope my custard now says yes please