Should hot water and central heating work at the same time

ncooper1974

Hi

A few weeks ago, we had a leak on one of the central heating pipes. An engineer came out to fix, and all appears well...
however, while in the bathroom the other day, I noticed that the central heating light on the combi boiler went off when i put the hot water tap on. Is this right? Should the central not 'work' while we're running hot water?
I'm sure i've noticed both lights on at the same time before we had the issue of the leaking pipe. I know that a leaking pipe in itself would not cause this to happen, so is it just coincidence?

As a bit of a background, the engineer had to flush the system before he could cut the pipes to fix the leak. When we switched the boiler back on, and blead all the rads, the boiler started to make a racket. the plumber said this is simply the boiler getting rid of any air that was in the system. It (the boiler) seems to be running fine and not making an noise now.

Razor

It's fine a combi will do hot water or heating not both at the same time

ormus

combis work on the principle of priority demand.
DHW has the priority. CH takes a back seat whilst the DHW is flowing.

(combis have a very small heat exchanger).

ncooper1974

Thanks Razor.
I could have swore that I saw both lights on at the same time before, but i'll take your word for it.

NEH

Razor is correct....

The only way to have both at the same time is if you have a separate water tank...

I hate it, it means when you come out of the shower you have to get changed in a cold bedroom...We have resorted to putting an electric heater on in the bedroom when the shower is on.

We're renting at the moment but a combi boiler isn't one thing I want in my next home...

ncooper1974

I disagree NEH. When we moved in last year we had a hot water tank. I could never get it right where we would have enough hot water in the system for a shower/bath.
I like the idea of having hot water on demand. Its combi all the way for me....

NEH

ncooper1974 wrote: »

I disagree NEH. When we moved in last year we had a hot water tank. I could never get it right where we would have enough hot water in the system for a shower/bath.
I like the idea of having hot water on demand. Its combi all the way for me....

I used to have one with a water tank and it would would work ok but there were only two of us....

I don't like getting dressed in a c freezing cold room but it's not helped by the fact our bedrooms are downstairs and have 2 external walls with one big old shop pfront window...

I like having hot water on demand but I just don't like the fact we're running up electric heating bills again...Would far rather wait 20 mins like my mum's and have my shower and come out to a nice warm bedroom....;)

heating-eng

NEH wrote: »

Razor is correct....

The only way to have both at the same time is if you have a separate water tank...

I hate it, it means when you come out of the shower you have to get changed in a cold bedroom...We have resorted to putting an electric heater on in the bedroom when the shower is on.

We're renting at the moment but a combi boiler isn't one thing I want in my next home...

Razor is correct for a change :rotfl:

keystone

heating-eng wrote: »

Razor is correct for a change :rotfl:

and for the second time today I award one of these:



Cheers