Central Heating Leak

keystone

50Twuncle wrote: »

No - no charge yet !!

You're in for a nice surprise then. You need to nail him down as in having a "how much is this going to cost me" Q&A session.

Cheers

50Twuncle

keystone wrote: »

OK then I didn't make it clear then - sorry. The heat exchanger is where the heat from the burner heats the water for both the CH and the DHW. As there is only one burner then this ahppens in the same place. But as you don't want to mix your CH water with your DHW water the HEX it has two halves and by design CH and DHW are kept separate. If, however, there is corrosion within the HEX and the CH side has now become joined to the DHW side through one or more holes generated by that corrosion it will leak from the higher pressure side to the lower pressure side. The pressure will fall. A fall in pressure doesn't mean it has dumped ALL its water. You are looking at a lot less water than you imagine to drop the pressure from 1bar down to zero.

The valves already discussed are in place to be able to isolate the boiler from the remainder of the system. So why not do it and then prove whether its the boiler or whether its elsewhere. If its elsewhere then at least the boiler has been eliminated. Thats why I keep "going on" about it.

Cheers

Thanks - he told me that he has already looked "inside the heat exchanger and it was dry inside also the PRV" !!

I have no idea whether this is possible (looking inside the HEX) but that's what he told me

50Twuncle

Update :
Leak in pipework located and pipe replaced
It WAS a poor joint and slightly corroded pipework under our dining room - the "plumber" replaced about 3 feet on both sides of the radiator - pipes are under the floor - looked in poor condition - especially near the rad (could be linked to an airbrick nearby ?

We plan to ask the "plumber" to replace all the pipework eventually.....
Also a gland in the fill valve needs replacing
Both the HEX and the PRV are fine
Pressure set at 1.5 bar yesterday evening - present reading 1.5 bar
What a relief.....

macman

Good. But if he had to drain down to change the pipe run, why couldn't he fix the filling loop at the same time? It's a 20 minute job at most.
If he charges you for all the unnecessary extra visits he's made I would dispute it.

50Twuncle

macman wrote: »

Good. But if he had to drain down to change the pipe run, why couldn't he fix the filling loop at the same time? It's a 20 minute job at most.
If we charges you for all the unnecessary extra visits he's made I would dispute it.

He's charging me £75 for the job - (I went to the same junior school as he did - 40 years ago and he remembers me !!)
The filling loop seal needs a spare part - which he has yet to obtain
He is also going to properly flush the system - using flushing solution tomorrow and refill with inhibitor solution

southcoastrgi

Are the pipes buried in a solid floor or did he take up a wooden floor ?

50Twuncle

Wooden floor

macman

That's a very reasonable charge then. But I'm still not convinced that his approach to fault finding is anything but haphazard.