Do I need to leave central heating on when you away in Dec?

toshsam

Hi, everyone,
I plan to go on holiday for few weeks during Dec/ Jan. I wonder if you think I need to leave heating on for couple hours each day.
My main concern is if I haven't leave it on, cold weather would freeze the pipe, and that would be lot of hassle.

What is your opinion?
BTW, my home is a new build terranced house

comeandgo

Hi we go away most winters and leave our heating on as usual but have the main thermostat down to 16. Our winters are extreme with temp down to minus 20 at times but more usual its minus 10ish. Our heating is designed to come on when temp is very cold regardless of whether it is off or on, if that makes any sense.

Biggles

Leave the heating on 24/7 at a setting of 10º and the hot water off. It will cut in occasionally if the outside temperature drops cold enough and protect from frost.

Some programmers come with a 'Holiday' setting that does this.

HappyMJ

toshsam wrote: »

Hi, everyone,
I plan to go on holiday for few weeks during Dec/ Jan. I wonder if you thing I need to leave heating on for couple hours each day.
My main concern is if I haven't leave it on, cold weather would freeze the pipe, and that would be lot of hassle.

What is your opinion?
BTW, my home is a new build terranced house

As it's a new build the boiler should have built in frost protection. It will come on and heat itself to prevent the pipes from freezing. Other pipes in the house will benefit from this small amount of heat and they won't freeze either. So I'd leave it on at the mains but the programmer set to the off position.

You can also turn your water main stop tap off and release some pressure in your pipes by opening a cold tap and you won't get burst pipes even if it's freezing cold.

ariba10

We set ours to come on for a couple of hrs at 2.00am (morning) the coldest time of the day.

Never had a problem.

pelirocco

We used to have coal fired central heating , and we tend to go away over new year . The first year we went away while we had this heating we came back to a very cold and damp feeling house , and that was a mild winter . The next year we changed our heating , always leave the heating on , albeit on a lower then normal setting

Jaynne

Yes. You don't know what the weather will be like - we went away over January that very cold winter (-10 to -20C) a few years ago and came back to a burst pipe inside the boiler that fried its control panel.

macman

If it doesn't have a frost 'stat (which a new build will do) then two hours in the day won't help-its night time when it's going to freeze.
The frost 'stat should do the job, but it's always worth getting up in the loft and checking for draughts and any uninsulated cold pipes-and then leave the loft hatch open to allow some heat in there should the stat kick in.
Most modern programmers also have a frost s'tat setting, which typically kicks in at about 5C.

diywhynot

What minimum temp. does your buildings insurance require?

sillygoose

I always thought the frost stat was to protect the boiler rather than the house by watching the temperature in the area the boiler is in (mine is in the garage and the frost stat is right next to it)

But where the boiler is may not be the coldest part of the house, as other have said I leave the heating on with around 10 degrees on the house thermostat.

Also remember other areas, one year I lost an expensive steam generator iron due to it freezing and bursting. It had been left in the conservatory and I had switched off the heating out there whilst away.

toshsam

Thanks all.
I will leave it on 24/7 at low temp


BTW, I am at west midlands. I don't expect -20 degree here.