Thank you. I had a new boiler installed. Couldn't understand why it was constantly firing up. Costing me a fortune. My pre heat water 'was' switched on. Again, thank you 😊
Thank god for you Mark! I’ve just moved into a house, newly renovated but still 150 years old. The boiler (Glowworm E25C) was set so inefficiently and I’ve been waking up to energy costs on the smart meter at over £4.00! I live alone and I’ve barely touched the hot water or heating but still! Cheers for all the advise!
Yes, that's why new boilers have fully modulating pumps and gas valves. Never a simple answer. Every time a thermostatic radiation valves turns off the the return temperature will change. Central heating system are far from perfect. And yes old systems are inefficient. It's the best option on most systems. Plus
@@MarkBallardLTD FAR FAR FAR from perfect!! Awful design. A block of cold metal, (usually) stuck under a cold window, heating cold glass, and forming condensation. I can't believe some clever gas engineer (MARK) hasn't come up with something better.
I invested in a Boiler management unit, best 160£ I ever spent Stops the boiler from dry cycling & waisting cash, don’t understand why they are not compulsory , but no body seems to talk about them Took me 1/2 hour to wire up
Very good clear Mark you know your stuff. Thanks will be investing in some decent auto radiator valves likely save me loadsamoney and give much more comfort.
Hello Mark and thank you for all your videos. I have learned a lot. I found that all the pins under my trvs had seized. So changing the trvs made no difference as they were stuck fully open. Some WD40 freed up the pins and all now work. 🙏🏼
Thats why his tip number 2 is bollocks. The room walls of those rooms turned off, will be sucking the warmth through and the boiler will be chugging away trying to compensate.
Re Hot Water Heating on a system/heat only boiler I've found it best to simply run it for a fixed time (usually a one hour on the boost button is more than enough). As you say, waiting for it to increase by the final few degrees till the thermostat cuts it out takes ages, with the boiler mostly idling during that time. One question if I may, on a Y Plan system during the low heating load part of the the year (spring and autumn) is it best to heat the hot water and house at the same time, or one after the other? I can see arguments either way - heating together imposes a higher load on the boiler so is going to run it for longer before it hits its lower modulation limit and cuts out, on the other hand the high return flow rate from the cylinder's heating coil is going to mostly determine the temperature of the return flow to the boiler, and so reduce boiler condensing when the water is nearly warm. Would welcome any comments.
Difficult one that all day/not all day thing. If it's real cold it could be false economy if things start getting qwrecked by damp, condensation. I'm experimenting at the mo. We used around £9.50 -£10 for one day, on at 07:10, off at 21:00. That includes showers, cooking etc. One week has cost around £68.00 inc standing charge. We must hace a cold house because there is still loads of condensation on the windows in the morning.
I've been experimenting too...when it was really cold here in Manchester last week up to -8 at night I had the flow temp of the boiler at 75 and didn't have the heating on during the night... it cost £12 a day!.. gradually I started to reduce the temp of the boiler from 65 to 55 leaving the heating on all day and night turning the room thermostat to16 during the night. The cost has gradually reduced and now costing around £6 a day with a boiler flow temp of 55. The house is much more comfortable. It has got warmer outside of course so the house is warming up quicker but is now an even temperature rather than freezing in the morning and taking hours to heat up.
Also, not having the heating on low during the night we were getting loads of condensation on the windows in the morning...we also haven't had frozen pipes which a lot of our neighbours have!
in this day and age in modern homes and how we use it. is it really more cost efective to heat a full tank of water, rather then having instant hotwater via a combi ?
I live in a flat but what I've found is my radiator in the kitchen (closest to the boiler) is always hotter than the radiator in my bedroom (furthest from the boiler) even after the radiators have been bled. Could it be a balancing problem?
So the boiler will cintinue to go on and off and the circulation will happen through the bypass right. Cause otherwise no circulation will get the pcb to turn the boiler off isn't it?
What is your opinion on using Drayton TVR4 balancing valves for balancing the house radiators? I have 10 rads with standard TVR’s on them except for the towel rad and the hall rad where my T/stat is located. If you give the thumbs up for the Drayton balancing valves would I install them on all 10 rads or just the 8 as it is now and leave the other two to act as bypass valves? My concern with that scenario is that the return water to the boiler would look for the least path of resistance and flow back to the boiler at a similar temp to the flow through those two rads without balancing valves and thereby not allow any condensing to take effect. Your thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.
Those draytons are excellent trv's.Very reliable.The pegler terriers are bloody good too. You really get what you pay for in this respect.Don't skimp here. Worst case, it is better to find someone selling half a dozen of these on facebook marketplace(as over ordered), than buy your b and q/homebase/screwfix own brand. They will cost about the same in totality,but you will have 3 times as many breakdowns and leaks with the own brands.
I have a question regarding why the TRVs need to be fully open when balancing the system? They will only close when they desired room temperature has been met, so having it on #4 means the valve is fully open until temp of around 25degrees has been met?
Very interesting. What's your thoughts on chrome rads..daughters just had all chrome rads everywhere looks great but not to warm.Rads are piping hot could fry eggs on them but don't seem to heat house up to well.Also why is it that I've noticed some thermostatic valves don't shut off completely. Thanks mike.
I am presuming you a talking about tall ladder style radiator a bit like towel rail. Unfortunately these look very nice but they put out way less heat than a convector radiator which have the fin on the back of them. Ladder radiators normally just radiate heat out. Not Like a convector radiator which connects heat out and radiates heat out, which are way more efficient, like I said in the video don't block the top because you will stop the convection of heat. Just look at the kw output of some ladder radiators compared to a similar sized convector radiator. Thermostats, maybe heads not screwed down properly, maybe there jammed ruclips.net/video/GhWp2ef_2pY/видео.html maybe there faulty.
I have 2 steel cheap vertical rads, they are very thick. ones white one matt grey, both give out lots of heat. infact too much as i have to turn them down. I have 2 stelrad verticals. they dont get as hot or give out as much heat, they are all the same size. the stelrads cool really quick where the cheap one sstay warm for ages.
Yes. Best way to drop the pressure is to bleed it off a radiator. this may take a long time and you need to bleed off several pints of water. Safest way.
lots of good points here, but please also add that Domestic hot water needs to go through a legionella cycle. Doesn't matter one bit with heating, but water coming out of the taps which you are going to use for showering/bathing/washing up and cooking etc needs a good blast at high temperature every so often to kill the bugs. Your choice whether you set it at constant 62c or set to 50/55c and do a weekly blast through at 65/70.Personally I think better to keep as a constant 62.It might be slightly less efficient in terms of energy but the money you spend here will cost you about 10 times as much in diacalm and bog roll if you try to cheap this out!
Thank you. I had a new boiler installed. Couldn't understand why it was constantly firing up. Costing me a fortune. My pre heat water 'was' switched on. Again, thank you 😊
Thank you for the social -community support.
Thank god for you Mark! I’ve just moved into a house, newly renovated but still 150 years old. The boiler (Glowworm E25C) was set so inefficiently and I’ve been waking up to energy costs on the smart meter at over £4.00! I live alone and I’ve barely touched the hot water or heating but still!
Cheers for all the advise!
Amazing especially the balancing part. Never knew that!
Learned more on this video than I expected to, thank you!
Tip no.4 contradicts tip No3. A radiator turned off also increases the overall return water temperature making the boiler less efficient.
Yes, that's why new boilers have fully modulating pumps and gas valves.
Never a simple answer.
Every time a thermostatic radiation valves turns off the the return temperature will change.
Central heating system are far from perfect.
And yes old systems are inefficient. It's the best option on most systems. Plus
@@MarkBallardLTD FAR FAR FAR from perfect!! Awful design. A block of cold metal, (usually) stuck under a cold window, heating cold glass, and forming condensation. I can't believe some clever gas engineer (MARK) hasn't come up with something better.
Thank you for the great advice!
I invested in a Boiler management unit, best 160£ I ever spent Stops the boiler from dry cycling & waisting cash, don’t understand why they are not compulsory , but no body seems to talk about them Took me 1/2 hour to wire up
Very good clear Mark you know your stuff. Thanks will be investing in some decent auto radiator valves likely save me loadsamoney and give much more comfort.
Hello Mark and thank you for all your videos. I have learned a lot. I found that all the pins under my trvs had seized. So changing the trvs made no difference as they were stuck fully open. Some WD40 freed up the pins and all now work. 🙏🏼
Tip 10 is spot on !!
Over at heat geek he says not to shut any rads completely as the boiler will still be trying to heat those rooms just inefficiently.
Thats why his tip number 2 is bollocks. The room walls of those rooms turned off, will be sucking the warmth through and the boiler will be chugging away trying to compensate.
Re Hot Water Heating on a system/heat only boiler I've found it best to simply run it for a fixed time (usually a one hour on the boost button is more than enough). As you say, waiting for it to increase by the final few degrees till the thermostat cuts it out takes ages, with the boiler mostly idling during that time.
One question if I may, on a Y Plan system during the low heating load part of the the year (spring and autumn) is it best to heat the hot water and house at the same time, or one after the other?
I can see arguments either way - heating together imposes a higher load on the boiler so is going to run it for longer before it hits its lower modulation limit and cuts out, on the other hand the high return flow rate from the cylinder's heating coil is going to mostly determine the temperature of the return flow to the boiler, and so reduce boiler condensing when the water is nearly warm.
Would welcome any comments.
Difficult one that all day/not all day thing. If it's real cold it could be false economy if things start getting qwrecked by damp, condensation. I'm experimenting at the mo. We used around £9.50 -£10 for one day, on at 07:10, off at 21:00. That includes showers, cooking etc. One week has cost around £68.00 inc standing charge. We must hace a cold house because there is still loads of condensation on the windows in the morning.
I've been experimenting too...when it was really cold here in Manchester last week up to -8 at night I had the flow temp of the boiler at 75 and didn't have the heating on during the night... it cost £12 a day!.. gradually I started to reduce the temp of the boiler from 65 to 55 leaving the heating on all day and night turning the room thermostat to16 during the night. The cost has gradually reduced and now costing around £6 a day with a boiler flow temp of 55. The house is much more comfortable. It has got warmer outside of course so the house is warming up quicker but is now an even temperature rather than freezing in the morning and taking hours to heat up.
Also, not having the heating on low during the night we were getting loads of condensation on the windows in the morning...we also haven't had frozen pipes which a lot of our neighbours have!
Tip number 6 😉
in this day and age in modern homes and how we use it. is it really more cost efective to heat a full tank of water, rather then having instant hotwater via a combi ?
I live in a flat but what I've found is my radiator in the kitchen (closest to the boiler) is always hotter than the radiator in my bedroom (furthest from the boiler) even after the radiators have been bled. Could it be a balancing problem?
Most likely. The water will always take easiest route
So the boiler will cintinue to go on and off and the circulation will happen through the bypass right. Cause otherwise no circulation will get the pcb to turn the boiler off isn't it?
What if the water tank is set at 61c can you still turn it down on the boiler?
What is your opinion on using Drayton TVR4 balancing valves for balancing the house radiators? I have 10 rads with standard TVR’s on them except for the towel rad and the hall rad where my T/stat is located. If you give the thumbs up for the Drayton balancing valves would I install them on all 10 rads or just the 8 as it is now and leave the other two to act as bypass valves? My concern with that scenario is that the return water to the boiler would look for the least path of resistance and flow back to the boiler at a similar temp to the flow through those two rads without balancing valves and thereby not allow any condensing to take effect. Your thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks.
Those draytons are excellent trv's.Very reliable.The pegler terriers are bloody good too.
You really get what you pay for in this respect.Don't skimp here.
Worst case, it is better to find someone selling half a dozen of these on facebook marketplace(as over ordered), than buy your b and q/homebase/screwfix own brand.
They will cost about the same in totality,but you will have 3 times as many breakdowns and leaks with the own brands.
How do I use the frost setting on my therma thermostat
I have a question regarding why the TRVs need to be fully open when balancing the system? They will only close when they desired room temperature has been met, so having it on #4 means the valve is fully open until temp of around 25degrees has been met?
Very interesting. What's your thoughts on chrome rads..daughters just had all chrome rads everywhere looks great but not to warm.Rads are piping hot could fry eggs on them but don't seem to heat house up to well.Also why is it that I've noticed some thermostatic valves don't shut off completely. Thanks mike.
Shiney surfaces are the most inefficient at radiating heat. ( matt black are the best)
I am presuming you a talking about tall ladder style radiator a bit like towel rail. Unfortunately these look very nice but they put out way less heat than a convector radiator which have the fin on the back of them. Ladder radiators normally just radiate heat out. Not Like a convector radiator which connects heat out and radiates heat out, which are way more efficient, like I said in the video don't block the top because you will stop the convection of heat. Just look at the kw output of some ladder radiators compared to a similar sized convector radiator. Thermostats, maybe heads not screwed down properly, maybe there jammed ruclips.net/video/GhWp2ef_2pY/видео.html maybe there faulty.
I have 2 steel cheap vertical rads, they are very thick. ones white one matt grey, both give out lots of heat. infact too much as i have to turn them down.
I have 2 stelrad verticals. they dont get as hot or give out as much heat, they are all the same size. the stelrads cool really quick where the cheap one sstay warm for ages.
Hi my bar is reading 3.5 is this to high 😬
Yes. Best way to drop the pressure is to bleed it off a radiator. this may take a long time and you need to bleed off several pints of water. Safest way.
@@MarkBallardLTD thanks a mill for getting back to me
Hi Mark, what should be a hot water setting on a vaillant boiler be set at.
I set it at 45 . Please advise
DO YOU RECOMMEND A HIVE WIRELESS THERMOSTAT ON A WORCESTER GREENSTAR 8000.
lots of good points here, but please also add that Domestic hot water needs to go through a legionella cycle.
Doesn't matter one bit with heating, but water coming out of the taps which you are going to use for showering/bathing/washing up and cooking etc needs a good blast at high temperature every so often to kill the bugs.
Your choice whether you set it at constant 62c or set to 50/55c and do a weekly blast through at 65/70.Personally I think better to keep as a constant 62.It might be slightly less efficient in terms of energy but the money you spend here will cost you about 10 times as much in diacalm and bog roll if you try to cheap this out!
Helloooo ! It's the wrong trousers grommet!
lol