Bought a house - heating not working

funkymonkey849

Me and my partner have bought a house and moved in last week. The heating and hot water system is about 8 years old and was serviced last year. It's a combi boiler.

We turned it on and have hot water out of it no problem, boiling hot and good pressure. When we go to put the heating on the boiler fires up for a minute and then cuts out. Something is happening because the radiators get ever so slightly warm but not hot. I don't think it's because they need bleeding because the pipes feeding them aren't even getting hot.

The pressure is above 1 bar which is what the manual says it needs to be for the central heating to work. My partners dad has had a look and he is generally clued up about these things, also someone we know has the same boiler and he couldn't get it to work! I reset the boiler settings and have tried every setting on the boiler to try and get it to work. According to the manual it is quite simple to get the heating to come on.

I rang the estate agents and told them we couldn't get the heating to come on and they said 'well it was on when we were showing people round the house'. I asked them to ask the sellers if there is any reason they might know of why it's not working in case there's a trick I'm missing but haven't heard back.

If the boiler does need repairing am I entitled to claim anything fromn the vendors as they sold the house to us with the promise of a working boiler! Or is it our problem now we've purchased the house and just tough luck?

tanith

I'm sure you have but just in case, have you checked the thermostat isn't turned down?

Milliewilly

funkymonkey849 wrote: »

Me and my partner have bought a house and moved in last week. The heating and hot water system is about 8 years old and was serviced last year. It's a combi boiler.

We turned it on and have hot water out of it no problem, boiling hot and good pressure. When we go to put the heating on the boiler fires up for a minute and then cuts out. Something is happening because the radiators get ever so slightly warm but not hot. I don't think it's because they need bleeding because the pipes feeding them aren't even getting hot.

The pressure is above 1 bar which is what the manual says it needs to be for the central heating to work. My partners dad has had a look and he is generally clued up about these things, also someone we know has the same boiler and he couldn't get it to work! I reset the boiler settings and have tried every setting on the boiler to try and get it to work. According to the manual it is quite simple to get the heating to come on.

I rang the estate agents and told them we couldn't get the heating to come on and they said 'well it was on when we were showing people round the house'. I asked them to ask the sellers if there is any reason they might know of why it's not working in case there's a trick I'm missing but haven't heard back.

If the boiler does need repairing am I entitled to claim anything fromn the vendors as they sold the house to us with the promise of a working boiler! Or is it our problem now we've purchased the house and just tough luck?

Its very unlucky for you if the boiler has only been serviced last year that it breaks the day you take the keys.

You can't claim from the vendors unless you have absolute proof that the boiler would be working when you got the keys and you could argue it was working on the day you moved in and has broken 2 weeks later!

funkymonkey849

There isn't a thermostat, the surveyor pointed this out and we have searched for one just in case! You set the temperature of the heating and the hot water on the boiler

Milliewilly

tanith wrote: »

I'm sure you have but just in case, have you checked the thermostat isn't turned down?

Good point - are the radiators turned on at the valves?

funkymonkey849

Milliewilly wrote: »

Good point - are the radiators turned on at the valves?

Do you mean the temperature setting on the radiators? Or is there another valve?

Milliewilly

funkymonkey849 wrote: »

Do you mean the temperature setting on the radiators? Or is there another valve?

Yes the temperature setting if you have thermostatic valves as if it was set to 'low' this would explain why the radiators were warm not hot. There should be another valve at the other side with a plus or minus on is this turned on? They might need bleeding have you tried that? Have you felt the pipes at the bottom of each radiator - are they hot?

My combi boiler didn't have a thermostat (and its outside) so I bought a radio controlled one - best £50 I ever spent.

funkymonkey849

Milliewilly wrote: »

Yes the temperature setting if you have thermostatic valves as if it was set to 'low' this would explain why the radiators were warm not hot. There should be another valve at the other side with a plus or minus on is this turned on? They might need bleeding have you tried that? Have you felt the pipes at the bottom of each radiator - are they hot?

My combi boiler didn't have a thermostat (and its outside) so I bought a radio controlled one - best £50 I ever spent.

I turned the twisty temperature thing on the radiators but I didn't look at the other side. I will look at that tonight

The pipes aren't hot and the top and bottom of the radiators are the same amount of non-warmth so I don't think they need bleeding

Owain_Moneysaver

Check with your solicitor. There may have been a condition that the heating was working for x days after date of entry in the contract.

Otherwise it might be the CH pump stuck or sludged up, which may or may not be inside the boiler unit.

[Deleted User]

Just a thought before you start to panic though.

On the TRVs (the twisty knobs at the bottom of each radiator where you choose what setting to have each radiator on) some of the valves use a gel-type mechanism to regulate the temperature. Frequently, if a radiator isn't used for a while these valves seize shut and so even when the heating's on, they block hot water from entering the radiator.

It's easy to test - just unscrew and remove completely one of the TRVs from a radiator, crank the heating up to full and see if it gets hot (it won't leak - the valve isn't stopping the water from coming out so don't worry).

This is fairly common and if that's the problem then repeat the process for all the radiators to see which ones work and replace the valves: they're about £15 each and you can go into Plumbers Director or any of those sort of places to get them.

Anew

I had a similar problem, and although it seems you have had some excellent advise here I would suggest posting on the plumbing/heating forums here as I had some awesome recurring advise from a few plumbers there. Several days worth of giving me advise, me going home and trying it, then coming back and taking the next step, got there in the end saving me a fortune!

Also - I know you said you don't have a thermostat - but check again, we thought we didn't have one once when we moved in, the survey did not mention one, then 2 weeks into us living there we found it behind a door which had always been open, with all the boxes stacking up against it we had not seen it at all.

Check everywhere!