LPG/Calor boilers

SteveE53

Hi
Does anyone have any experience and therefore advice on the use of LPG boilers for water and central heating please? We're in a "no gas" village and at present our heating needs are met by multi-fuel, (wood and solid fuel) burner through the winter and immersion heater for the water through the summer months. As time goes by, the cutting, storage and fetching in of the wood and coal is getting harder and no cheaper. We already have an LPG fed hob, so the infrastructure is all in place for piping the gas in. The central heating system, works on "hot water", so the swap over shouldn't be mega difficult, using the correct contractor obviously. Just wondered if anyone else has had similar experiences or is thinking along the same lines.

Andy_WSM

Bottled gas isn't cheap.

How about exploring air to water heat pumps?

Owain_Moneysaver

What sort of LPG tank do you have?

For central heating and hot water you will need a full size bulk tank, with adequate vehicle access. They can be buried sometimes, but there are restrictions on distance to boundaries etc.

If you are running your hob on a couple of cylinders that won't be sufficient for full central heating.

SteveE53

Thanks folks, would love to go for ground or air source heat pumps but install costs could be a bit prohibitive but thanks for the suggest, will check it out. I do run the hob on a couple of 19kg bottles at the moment but realise that I'll have to increase size for any further use. Only got a small cottage garden so probably can't have a "fixed" refillable tank, will have to see. Thanks anyway, anyone use or used electric boiler for water and heat as on the right tarriff, this could be an option, I suppose.

sk240

You could go for an air to air heat pump system, one fan unit in each room probably for not much more than a fully installed LPG system.
Just beware the cost of cylinders for heating, one large cylinder may last as little as 1 week in the depths of winter!

sunnyboy_2

If the infrastructure is there for gas it's an easy thing to have a new system boiler or a Combi boiler fitted, it just needs an LPG conversion kit being included which costs around £100 + vat

A Combi boiler would give you a limitless supply of hot water on demand without the need for any cold water storage tank or hot water cylinder!

[Deleted User]

LPG is the reason we went air source...


You can either suffer the mental cost of LPG month in month out OR invest in a system that will pay you back through much lower on-going running costs + RHI depending on system.


Log burners are great but if it is your only source of heating then the long warm up times when coming home on a winters evenings are not ideal.


If it is a small cottage I'd probably go air to air heat pumps.


Still have the legacy Bulk tank of LPG in the garden connected to the hob.


Defo would not get an underground tank as more expensive to rent, are often tricky to switch providers and removal is also expensive when you get fed up with cost... Underground tanks are common on metered estates.


Of course there is oil and night storage to consider but IMO there are smarter and cheaper choices out there...

captainhindsight_2

The current RHI payments are too good of an opportunity to turn down and install lpg or oil central heating.

Biomass will offer the best return on investment, and will also be the easiest to install and get right.

Heat pumps are good but operate at low temperatures so you will have the additional cost of upgrading the radiators which you wouldn't have with biomass.

I understand your point that renewables are expensive, but the cost per kWh is less and you get your capital back. You will not get this with lpg or oil.

Rhi is that good people are offering biomass boilers for free (I am not suggesting getting a'free' biomass boilers that would only be a last resort)

Also you do not need huge amount of space there are bBiomass boilers that take up very little space they do not require huge amounts of mainance and are very reliable.