60000 KWh (oops)per annum on gas !!! :(

elster_2

I was thinking of getting my meter checked , this works out at about a grand a year on gas.
it is on about 10 hrs a day ...
big , old (1900) 4 bed house, cannot have cavity insulation etc etc , done all I can with it , under floor insulation etc

hallway is cold , (where the room thermostat is) and does ever switch off the boiler if I were to set it at 19 degrees ie it never reaches 19 in the hallway on a cold ish day, over nite the house will drop to 12 or there abouts in the winter

any ideas?

apart from the obvious ... move to a new build house

Cardew

I assume you mean you use 60,000 kWh per annum?

Your boiler output is rated in BTU's. A 60,000BTU boiler would be a small(inadequate?) boiler for a big 4 bed house without cavity insulation. 10 hours useage per day would very easily run up a bill of £1,000 pa in such a house.

The actual temperature reached in the hall isn't the important factor and the reading on the thermostat is pretty meaningless. It could be situated in a draft or simply the radiator is not large enough.

Things to do:
Fit thermostatic valves on all the radiators.
Check boiler is big enough.
I have an old annex that does not have cavity insulation. I dry lined the walls and put insulation in. Quite an expensive task so you would be better concentrating on the rooms you heat most.

Wig

Check when your current meter was last renewed, they have to be replaced every so often. Mine was last renewed in 1996. I dunno if that is because they changed all the old style (grey ones) to new style beige ones, or if it is an on going thing they do every 15 years or so. The old grey one apart from being grey differed also in that it was uniformly cube shaped, whereas the new one is cubeshaped with a sticky out bit which houses the number dials, hope that make sense to you.
My new one looks like this:
http://www.abplumbing.fsnet.co.uk/boilernew/04612013.jpg

But from what you describe 60,000Kwh sounds about right.

top_banana

Wig wrote:

Check when your current meter was last renewed, they have to be replaced every so often. Mine was last renewed in 1996. I dunno if that is because they changed all the old style (grey ones) to new style beige ones, or if it is an on going thing they do every 15 years or so. The old grey one apart from being grey differed also in that it was uniformly cube shaped, whereas the new one is cubeshaped with a sticky out bit which houses the number dials, hope that make sense to you.

But from what you describe 60,000Kwh sounds about right.

Thats interesting,................. my gas meter is over 20 years old!

Wig

Maybe, just maybe it was because my old one had dials (like a clock face) and they changed it to a new one with numbers like in the picture. I can't honestly remember.

top_banana

Thats like the one we have now - with the clocks on.

we pay 37.50 month for our gas, thats just to heat our 3 bed house and heat water.

hmmm something to look into cheers

elster_2

Yup I meant Kwh! (doh!!) , I am obviously out of touch ... I was thinking I was going to get the bills down to about 50 quid a month 60000 Kwh is way too much gas for my pocket!

the problem is that with the wall thermostat not reaching temp the boiler never cycles off and on , all the rooms have rad valves except the one in the hall (where the thermostat is), boiler temp is at about 2oclock position

Cardew

elster wrote:

Yup I meant Kwh! (doh!!) , I am obviously out of touch ... I was thinking I was going to get the bills down to about 50 quid a month 60000 Kwh is way too much gas for my pocket!

the problem is that with the wall thermostat not reaching temp the boiler never cycles off and on , all the rooms have rad valves except the one in the hall (where the thermostat is), boiler temp is at about 2oclock position

The boiler will(should) switch off when the water temperature in the heating system reaches the temperature you have set on the boiler 50-60C or whatever.

If you have thermostatic radiator valves, and your rooms are at the temperature demanded by these valves, there will be little water flowing through the system and a single radiator in the hall should not(in a properly designed system) cause the boiler to run all the time; regardless of the wall thermostat setting.