New boiler or stick with 18 year old one ?

paul2468

We have a glowworm boiler that is aprox 18/20 years old....works well and has only ever broke down once in all that time...in May this year we had our yearly service by British gas and they said that with it being so old that if it broke down they could not gurantee parts.
It is working well but would it be worth our while changing it as people have said that with a new one it would pay for itself in a few years ?....dont know what to do...local gas shop have said£1.7k for a new one.....advice please.

keith1950

...in May this year we had our yearly service by British gas and they said that with it being so old that if it broke down they could not gurantee parts.

Personally I would not change it until it gives up the ghost.

BG regularly say this and what this really means is that their usual parts suppliers no long source these parts and BG cannot be arsed to spend time looking elsewhere.

If you use a local heating repair company they will usually be prepared to look further afield.

On a couple of occasions in the past BG told me that parts were no longer available however I managed to source the parts online within minutes.

ExtraMask

A boiler that old needs to work harder than a more modern economical boiler. You'll save on energy bills with a new boiler and you'll notice it within the first year how much your usage reduces.

Personally I think it's a no brainer because it's only a matter of time before you'll need a new one. The amount of money you'll save on energy with a new, more efficient boiler over 10 years would far outweigh the cost to install it.

ariba10

If it ain't broke

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Don't mend it!

ihatemyhouse

true it wont be efficient as a new boiler, but will a new boiler make you saving of 1700 and over how long, if it aint broke don't replace it

glowworm as a big company,

[Deleted User]

ExtraMask wrote: »

A boiler that old needs to work harder than a more modern economical boiler. You'll save on energy bills with a new boiler and you'll notice it within the first year how much your usage reduces.

Personally I think it's a no brainer because it's only a matter of time before you'll need a new one. The amount of money you'll save on energy with a new, more efficient boiler over 10 years would far outweigh the cost to install it.

Personally I think its a no brainer to keep the old one , 18 years is nt that old. The new ones break down constantly , needing the £100 call out fee s etc. They are more efficient but the lifespan of a new bolier could be as little as 6 years. The advice on here from the people involved in central heating is to never change a working boiler

[Deleted User]

paul2468 wrote: »

We have a glowworm boiler that is aprox 18/20 years old....works well and has only ever broke down once in all that time...in May this year we had our yearly service by British gas and they said that with it being so old that if it broke down they could not gurantee parts.
It is working well but would it be worth our while changing it as people have said that with a new one it would pay for itself in a few years ?....dont know what to do...local gas shop have said£1.7k for a new one.....advice please.

BG were dragged up on BBC watchdog a few years back for fitting a new boiler at £6000 and failing to mend the old boiler , cost £100 in parts because THEIR parts supplier never had it in stock. BBC watchdog found a dozen different suppliers of the new part in 5 mins on the net.. dont trust BG central heating fitters

Maz

I'd keep it personally. My boiler was in the house when I bought it and had been in situ for 7 years already, so mine is quite elderly too. However, it has never broken down and still functions perfectly well. Sometimes it might overheat but has a safety device that auto shuts off and we just leave it for ten minutes or so, then switch it back on again. That is the only 'problem' I've ever had with it tbh.

The only time I'll be replacing mine is when it falls off the wall in total defeat

DigForVictory

Stick!

Without reading any other posts, I'd say if you can afford to replace it (cost new plus full installation & accreditation on the worst weather day of the year), have that in an easy access account.

By all means research alternatives, but if it's working, let it do the job!
Discuss its replacement as a sometime project with a local installation co so you have trade prices to compare British Gas to as well...

mwbrown

we have just had our old boiler (which to be honest we have been looking at replacing for a couple of years - it was an old biasi pile of !!!! which was constantly not working properly (had BG service cover on it which has more than paid for itself over the years with the parts that have been replaced (had a quote from BG for over 2.5k!!!!!), found a local installer who fitted a brand new vaillant ecotec pro 28kw boiler for just under 1k less than BG quoted.

My thoughts on the boiler replacement would be if its working as it should then leave it working - when it starts to cost money to fix then consider replacing the boiler.

We have worked out that the cost of fitting our new boiler (which comes with a 5 year warranty) will virtually pay for itself in about 7 years (as we no longer need the BG service cover which was costing us about 22quid a month). The guys who installed it will service it every year for £45 to keep the warranty valid.

Mike

Pincher

You should change the boiler at a time of your choosing, in spring and sumnmer, NOT in October when people switch on their boiler and go "oh-oh!?", because it hasn't been used for six months.

They now do up to 10 year warranty now, on decent brands.

http://www.plumbnation.co.uk/