Can I just change my boiler???

samuela66

Hi, I am doing some work on my house, and my central heating is fine, the boiler is old but works well, I am wondering about changing it to a combi boiler, could any one tell me if you can just do this and also approx how mcuh would it cost me, many thanks
Sam

penrhyn

My mum had her boiler changed back in July last year.
A Baxi 105HE combi boiler, a Honeywell RF programmable thermostat and one radiator was fitted. It cost us around £2K.
There was quite a lot of plumbing to be done for the new combi, including draining of the old hot and cold tanks that were no longer required, and running in a larger bore gas pipe from the meter to the boiler.

The combi boiler itself has to have a pressure relief pipe and condensate drain.

It took the plumber about 4 days and a lot of tea.

BTW You cannot do this sort of work yourself, it must be done by a Corgi registered tradesman, and the job has to be registered with the local authority.

Details here http://www.corgi-gas-safety.com/section_gas_law/house-owner.asp#changestoregs

Cardew

penrhyn wrote:

BTW You cannot do this sort of work yourself, it must be done by a Corgi registered tradesman, and the job has to be registered with the local authority.

Details here http://www.corgi-gas-safety.com/section_gas_law/house-owner.asp#changestoregs

In pedantic mode that doesn’t actually say you cannot do the work yourself.

You certainly cannot get a non-Corgi registered installer to carry out the work, and they try very hard to imply that owners cannot work on gas.(as any trade organisation would!!) However their link on ‘gas and the law’ states the following:

• Anyone carrying out work on gas appliances or fittings as part of their business must be competent and registered with CORGI.
• Only a competent person can carry out work on gas appliances or fittings. Do-it-yourself work on gas appliances or fittings could be dangerous and is likely to be illegal.

I am not advocating that you should work on gas. However in many cases when changing a boiler the vast majority of the work is not on the ‘gas fittings’.

MiM

I'm in a similar situation and was told by a trustworthy, reasonably priced plumber that it would cost £3,000. He said 18 months ago it would have been much less but new legislation had made it more expensive. Bummer!

penrhyn

Yes most definitely in pedantic mode.
I'm afraid I made the assumption that the OP was not a tradesperson.
In fact I'm not sure what your post added to mine, I just didn't want Sam to blow himself up.

Cardew

penrhyn wrote:

Yes most definitely in pedantic mode.
I'm afraid I made the assumption that the OP was not a tradesperson.
In fact I'm not sure what your post added to mine, I just didn't want Sam to blow himself up.

To continue in pedant mode:

The title of the thread was ‘Can I just change my boiler?’ and he stated he was doing some work on his house. Given that it is pretty obvious that a contractor could change his boiler, it is reasonable to assume that he could have been thinking of some DIY element carried out by himself or friends.

Your post also detailed a lot of work that doesn’t involve gas – plumbing, draining tanks, fitting thermostats etc etc.

Thus your statement “BTW You cannot do this sort of work yourself” is incorrect.

Having said that I admit that I was also under that impression with gas, but looking at the link you posted it is evident that DIY work is allowed, even on Gas connections; but Corgi not unnaturally do their best to discourage it.

In any case these forums are read by many other people for advice so it surely does no harm to put the record straight?

However we can both agree that we don’t want Sam or anyone else to blow themselves up.

BritBrat

BTW You cannot do this sort of work yourself, it must be done by a Corgi registered tradesman, and the job has to be registered with the local authority.

To continue in pedant mode:

Any house holder can do any gas work themselves on their own property, but they cant do it for others.

Only tradesmen have to be Gorgi registered and have the ACOPs code.

Having said that if you have no clue what you are doing it may be safer to get a qualified person to do the instalation for you, or at least get one to check what you did before connecting it up to the gas supply.

I have taken the ACOP test 3 times and other individual elements too, I must say its the hardest test I have ever done and the tests take at least 2 days.

You are not very likley to blow yourself up as you would smell the gas before it became a danger, what you are more likley do do is kill yourself and family with a bad instalation of the flue and ventilation.

Now with the new electrical regulations you would be right and only qualified persons can do the work.

caveat_emptor

BritBrat wrote:

To continue in pedant mode:
Any house holder can do any gas work themselves on their own property, but they cant do it for others.
Only tradesmen have to be Gorgi registered and have the ACOPs code.

Is that right? I understood that if I have a boiler or any other gas appliance fitted I would have the option of doing it myself and then have it certified by the local council OR get an accredited trademan (CORGI registered) to
certify the fitting. Either way there should be some form of certification.
Normally DIY wouldn't be a problem until there was an accident which would invalidate your house insurance or you sold your house and the buyer would need to see the certification in which case you'd need to get retrospective certification.