What could be wrong with my boiler?

G_M

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

One of the ways you can preserve the heat in the bathwater is to insulate the space underneath with bubblewrap. You'll need to remove the bath-panel to do this but it can make a huge difference if you fill up the entire space with it.

Good luck with your hot-water problem-solving

You could also put loft insulation round the sides of the bath itself (hold it in place with string) and construct a dome of bubbly rap above the bath so that you are sitting in a fully-insulated, space-ship affair. Great for playing Star Wars too!
:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

roses

It's quite possible the hot water tank is not sufficiently sized. In my first rental property the tank would only fill half a bath.

DVardysShadow

Firstly make sure it is the boiler heating the water and not the immersion heater. Then make sure the hot water cylinder is large enough, then make sure that the water is being heated to a high enough temeprature, then make sure that if the boiler is in part controlled by a thermostat on the cylinder, that the thermostat is sufficiently low down the cylinder to allow a fair amount of hot water above the thermostat line.

clutton_2

i used to have a "dual immersion heater" insider my hot tank..... which had 2 kettle-like elements - one inside the other - one was long and reached 3/4 tge way down the tank, the other was about 6" long and just heated the top of the tank. It was a brilliant energy saving device as if i only wanted to wash up pots, i could switch the switch to "sink" and if i wanted a bath i switched it to "bath"

if i had had it on sink and tried to have a bath, it would only just cover the bottom of the bath in hot water

the switch was on top of the tank itself, not on the wall, as it was an integral part of the tank... have a look see if you have one... my switch was round, as big as beer mat standing proud of the tank itself and was about 3" tall...

jinglejones

clutton wrote: »

i used to have a "dual immersion heater" insider my hot tank..... which had 2 kettle-like elements - one inside the other - one was long and reached 3/4 tge way down the tank, the other was about 6" long and just heated the top of the tank. It was a brilliant energy saving device as if i only wanted to wash up pots, i could switch the switch to "sink" and if i wanted a bath i switched it to "bath"

if i had had it on sink and tried to have a bath, it would only just cover the bottom of the bath in hot water

the switch was on top of the tank itself, not on the wall, as it was an integral part of the tank... have a look see if you have one... my switch was round, as big as beer mat standing proud of the tank itself and was about 3" tall...

YES! Mine has this too! And its definately on bath, because I've checked it loads of times, but its good to know what that switch actually does, because I have been wondering!

jinglejones

I can't get into the boiler to feel if its hot or not because the "padding" is totally solid - kind of like, paper mache bolted on with metal straps.

I've had a look though and there is a thermostat on the side, like you guys said. It was set to 140, which I'm assuming is farenheit (ie 60 degrees) I've turned it up to 160 (it goes to 190 - hope it doesn't explode!) so I'm wondering if that might work?

I've also cranked up the switch on the downstairs boiler too.

Thanks for the advice. I know a huge 5 person family lived here before me for many years, so surely the boiler must be big enough! Otherwise they'd have moved out?

jinglejones

Oh and thermostat is not covered, and its on the bottom of the tank.

I'm also heating the water through the downstairs system, not the immersion because I was told heating with immersion is the expensive way to do it. I have, however switched the immersion on AS WELL at times, and it doesn't seem to make much of a difference.

Do you think changing the temp on the boilers will help?

clutton_2

the dual immersion heater device i described, also has to have an electric fused unit switch someone on a wall so that you can isolate it... if that is off, that could also be a reason why using boiler and immersion at the same time makes no difference.

roger196

If the thermostats are set correctly and are working, there is a possibility that the hot water tank is furred up inside and not heating up properly or the copper heating coils inside the hot water tank are furred up. I am assuming that the tank is an indirect one.
Best post on www.diydoctor.org.uk for advice on how to sort this and correct diagnosis.

googler

www.diynot.co.uk is another possibility for advice....