Idiots guide to central heating/hot water pls

bundance

I have a conventional and very old central heating system.

I have some questions please

If I set my room thermostat to 15 degrees C, my boiler to setting 1, the home gets heated enough.

What will happen if I keep the thermostat on my hot water tank continually set to 60 Deg F, as I have been advised to do this by someone with the same heating system as me?

Is it best to keep my hot water thermostat continually set at 60 Deg C? or can I turn it off if I dont need hot water/when I am out?


Sorry, I do not know much about heating systems, and am sure I have broken it before by incorrect settings etc

Many thanks

ormus

normally the systems are seperate. ie the heating and the hot water.
although the boiler heats both.
the controls can control either system at the same time, using pumps/valves.
so you can set the hot water to anything you want without it affecting the CH.
best way is to turn the hot water off completely. although you will have to wait for it to heat up when you switch it back on.
(assuming you remember).

combi boilers work differently. hot water is supplied on demand. hence no HW cylinder.
CH is sealed. so no storage tanks required.

loislane999

I have an old boiler that heats the house and water seperately. My room thermostat is set to 16 degrees (18-19 is best though, but i cannot afford it) and set to go on one hour in the morning and tea time till bed time. During the day I freeze, but am able to keep myself busy.

My hot water tank is heated by either the boiler or an electric heater (you can tell if its electric by the wires going into a heating element which looks like a cap in the side near the bottom of the tank). I suspect the thermostat that you have set to 60 degrees is for the electric heater only (60 degrees is the ideal temperature - hot enough to kill off Legionella but no overly excessively hot), so unless you use the electric heating element, then this thermostat will not kick in.

All of my appliances (washing machine, shower, dishwasher) use cold water feed and so i leave my hot water tank off most of the time. It gets put on about 4 hours a week using the gas boiler system (gas heating is much more economic than electric heating) for baths and high volumes of non-dishwasher washing up ( a kettle of hot water is used otherwise). Water tanks are such a large volume that they take an awful lot of energy to heat up.

In summary - if you have appliances that rely on hot water feeds, or mixer showers that are not electricaly heated showers, then i would say you need to set your gas boiler to heat your hot water every day for a couple of hours. If not, perhaps do what i do and just put it on for a couple of hours before you really need the hot water (mind you, I dont know your personal financial cirumstances, so you may be able to afford to keep your hot water on every day?)

Hope that explains it a bit more.

27col

If you have a well insulated cylinder, all you will achieve by switching it off, is a lot of inconvenience in not having hot water whenever you require it. A well insulated tank will lose very little heat and will therefore not cost much more to run than the initial cost of heating it up. Obviously, if the tank is not well insulated, then the heat losses will be considerable.The tanks with rigid foam insulation are infinitely better in this respect than the older tanks that only have a loose insulation jacket. People seem to think that if their tank is switched on it is using heat all the time. This is not the case, once it is at the required temperature it will no longer be being heated (electric or gas). At that point the only energy being used is to make up losses, in a well insulated tank these will be very low. Only if you use some of the hot water in the tank will it require more input of energy.

bundance

My tank is housed in a box, made of chip-board type material. It is also in a cupboard.
This tells me that the tank is not well insulateed.

Is it true that, if you use gag, are these types of heating systems less likely to break down if the hot water is switched on all of the time?

Am I right in saying, that, because of this, it will be more economical to only have the hot water on when I need it?

Many thanks

ormus

you need to put some photos up.
tank = tank. cylinder = cylinder. etc...

wallbash

My Hot water is on 24/7 , yes if come in at 3am I can have a shower , Not MSE but have a family working odd hours and I can afford it.

bundance

ormus wrote: »

you need to put some photos up.
tank = tank. cylinder = cylinder. etc...

My phone just broke today, and I havent been able to take pics, but I think I have got it working again, and just need to charge it.

Sorry for my ignorance. I am not very knowledgable on these things.

I think I am referring to is the hot water cylinder, the thing with the heating element in.

PS If my hot water cylinder is not well insulated, and I turn it off, but leave the heating on, are my pipes more likely to burst after a cold snap?
Also, does switching the water on and off make the system more likely to break down?

Sorry to sound stupid.

hope you can help
thanks

bundance

Here are pictures of my boiler and water heater

http://s1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee447/starfish53/?action=view&current=DSC00286.jpg

http://s1228.photobucket.com/albums/ee447/starfish53/?action=view&current=hotwatertank_cylinder-1.jpg

Can I assume that the tank/cylinder is not well insulated?
Is there any way I can insulate it, as its housed in a box.

Many thanks

27col

I am unable to enlarge either of your pictures. But it looks as if the hot water cylinder is uninsulated. If this is the case, measure its diameter and height and go and buy a tank jacket to fit. They are simple to fit, they just tie on with ribbon usually. If it is in a box and you cannot get a jacket around it, then buy a roll of roof insulation and stuff that between the cylinder and the box as best you can. In any event, if you have the water heating on continuously there is no chance of anything freezing in the nearby area simply because of the heat losses from the existing arrangement.

jennifernil

bundance wrote: »

I have a conventional and very old central heating system.

I have some questions please

If I set my room thermostat to 15 degrees C, my boiler to setting 1, the home gets heated enough.

What will happen if I keep the thermostat on my hot water tank continually set to 60 Deg F, as I have been advised to do this by someone with the same heating system as me?

Is it best to keep my hot water thermostat continually set at 60 Deg C? or can I turn it off if I dont need hot water/when I am out?

Sorry, I do not know much about heating systems, and am sure I have broken it before by incorrect settings etc

Many thanks

Do you not have some sort of time clock to turn things off and on?

If so you should set the times on that for when you want heating and/or hot water. The HW thermostat set to 60 is fine, set it and leave it alone.

15 on the room thermostat sounds low, but if it is in the hall and the other rooms are warm enough for you, then that's OK.

What settings are marked on the boiler? 1 sounds low. Generally, I think it is more efficient to set the boiler at least above half the max temp, so if your dial has say 1-4, set it at 3. This will make your radiators warmer and heat up the rooms more quickly. But be careful not to set it so high that the rads get burning hot, especially if you have children.

Your photos seem to show "something" between the cylinder and the box. Is it some sort of insulation? As said above, try to insulate it if it isn't already.