new central heating

jasonc_2

I am planning on getting central heating installed (there is no system in place at all at the moment)....but i am getting really conflicting information from the people who have come round to give me a quote.

The house is a two (pretty big bedroomed) semi and i want a boiler big enough to cope with two extra rooms should we choose to extend into the barn area next to the house.

The first guy who quoted me who replaced my parents boiler 18 months ago and did a good job suggested a Worcester Danesmoor (same as parents) one which puts out between 65-85,000 BTus.
Ok,so I thought until the next guy comes round and says that is nowhere near big enough and that I need one that puts out beween 90-120,000 BTus and he recommends a Glow Worm boiler (which I'm not so sure about) and he's also telling me that I need a much bigger hot water cylinder that i currently have....
the first guy never even mentioned it.

Another question I have (sorry if this is really thick) but do Glow Worm even make an oil boiler?.....and everything I read about highly efficient condensing boilers (such as an Alpha which i am interseted in)....what fuel do/can they run on?
Gas is not an option for me so i am only really lookind an an oil fuelled boiler.

Can anyone please help clarify things in this cluttered and confused brain of mine?!

Tallymanjohn

Glow Worm are the cheaper boilers - I've just gone through this in getting our boiler replaced - and they were not recommended by many. We've gone for a Worcester Bosch, purely on many recommendations.

We have a 5 bed detached house, well insulated, but have been quoted (by all suppliers we asked for quotes from) as needing a 100,000BTU (about 30kW). Our old boiler was 80,000, but we've had 2 xtra rads installed over the years.

No idea on the oil bit.

Also, if it's a standard size hot water cylinder (about 4 foot tall?), you just need to make sure it's well insulated (with a solid polystyrene-type coating, not the old wrap-around jacket) & it must have its own temp thermostat fitted.

alanobrien

Boiler size also depends on the system type they are quoting for, i.e. Stored hot water or combi.

A "stored" hot water system consisting of a boiler and Hot water tank typically needs approx 2kw over the heat gen estimate for the house.

Whilst a combi boiler type system will need to be sized much larger as it has to heat a lot of water in a short time period.

In short make sure they are quoting like for like.

Tallymanjohn

Sorry, I was guessing it was a standard, non-combi, system you were talking about as you mentioned the hot water cylinder - combi systems don't have these.

jasonc_2

Yes, you are right it is a standard, non combi i am going for and they have both quoted for the stored hot water system.

My hot water cylinder is about 3 feet tall and has no insulation round it whatsoever and no temp thermostat.

Does this mean it is not big enough to cope with my needs?

Also any clarification on the oil / condensing boiler question i mentioned earlier would be really gratefully received.

Any boilers recommendations in general would also be great!

Tallymanjohn

Yes, you can get oil-fired condensing boilers - try putting 'oil-fired condensing boiler' into Google & you'll get loads of hits.

Your water cylinder will need replacing - size probably isn't important, but the fact of having no insulation & no thermostat will, as far as I'm aware, mean it's necessary as it's part of the requirements for current boiler installations.

plumb1_2

jasonc wrote:

Yes, you are right it is a standard, non combi i am going for and they have both quoted for the stored hot water system.

My hot water cylinder is about 3 feet tall and has no insulation round it whatsoever and no temp thermostat.

If there has not been heating fitted before, you cylinder will be most likely be a direct cylinder( no coil) and will need to be changed to a Indirect type.
As for choice of boiler i would go for the Worcester over the Gloworm