I don't have a thermostat

st999

Not quite sure on this point ? does it not cost more to have the temperature on full

Imagine a cold room with a 3 bar electric fire in it.

You want to heat the room up quickly.

What do you do?

Put on 1 bar, 2 bars or 3 bars?

1 bar for 1 hour uses 1 kWh and takes 1 hour to heat the room to a comfortable temperature.

2 bars heat the room up in 40 minutes and use 1.33333333 kWh

3 bars heat the room up in 20 minutes and use 1 kWh of electricity.

I would have thought it was obvious what the hotter water temperature does.

ollski

espresso wrote: »

It is very interesting that you make no comment about the tactics used by this BG [STRIKE]fitter[/STRIKE] salesman!

He insisted that the new pipe had to go though an external wall, along the exterior of the house and then back inside to the boiler, rather than run the pipe neatly internally, as the customer wanted.

You seem to think that BG charging 40% more is unrealistic, this illustrates that you are very wrong and that better quality workmanship was done by a local independent.

I don't comment on hearsay I leave that to those with an agenda.
You seem to miss the point, how can you compare with something non-exsistant ie the bg 'workmanship'.
The op is doing exactly the right thing and getting herself some quotes to choose the best option for her.

st999

If I had listened to a BG engineer/salesman I would have replaced my heating system 16 years ago.

It is still going today.

Cardew

MoneyMate wrote: »

Not quite sure on this point ? does it not cost more to have the temperature on full , when we had a combi boiler fitted 4 years ago in a previous house the heating engineer said ideally set at 60% of maximum available on setting dial. :beer:

Four years ago the boiler would have been a condensing boiler. The idea is to operate these boilers in 'Condensing mode' for maximum efficiency. Presumably that is why the fitter suggested 60C. However the temperature is variable for a reason.

However st999's points are correct. The hotter you have the water, the quicker the house will heat. The boiler will be using more gas, but for less time.

Personally I have never seen any convincing data that quantifies the difference in efficiency between condensing and non-condensing mode