Megaflow boilers

Annie1960

MX5huggy wrote: »

Firstly we're presuming you have mains gas is that right?

Yes.

The survey has to be taken with a huge pinch of salt, it probably says things like the tanks in the loft are coming to the end of their useful life. This means they could last another 20 years.

Not really. There has been no lids on these for some time. The plumber went up to quote for replacing them, and advised me they were 'disgusting', and I should not use the cold water in the bathroom to brush my teeth or drink! I have seen the photos from the surveyor, and I agree.

Then if we understand your system you already have a hot water cylinder which will have or can be fitted with an immersion heater for backup.

Yes, I think it may already have one of these. I can't find a timer or thermostat, though.

The floor standing boiler is probably a high quality boiler you can build a cupboard round it leaving the prescribed space around and access for servicing. You could move it, inside or even to an outbuilding it would need frost protection.

Yes, I am also getting quotes for this from the kitchen designers. I have booked three. One has already been, two next week.

You have enough electricity you possibly don't have enough space on a fuse board for some new circuits.

I think your being lead along to the the most expensive options.

I want to explore all the options before I make a decision. The house is in a very nice area, and it's not worth cutting corners.

Thanks for your views, I will look into all options, including your suggestion, before I decide.

PheoUK

Clean the cold water tank out by draining it N giving it a scrub first. That solves your immediate problem. Although ours was full of crap and we'd been using it for six months.

You have two options:

1) replace current boiler with combo. Pros - less space, eg you don't need the tanks in the loft. But normally the boilers are much much bigger. Cons: single point of failure. Driving two contiguous showers = expensive And difficult. Also requires you to replace a perfectly good boiler

2) keep current boiler, replace current vented low pressure hot water with megaflop. I have just done this. Cost about £1400 to put in loft. Delivers mains pressure hot water to all parts of the house. Excellent feed. Cons: expensive and some technical considerations required (overflow pipe work etc.). Keep your current boiler with this option

3) keep current setup. Clean out cold water tank in loft. Worry about it later

thescouselander

We've just been through a similar process trying to decide what to do with the heating.

I'm really wasn't convinced an immersion heater provides a good backup for hot water. It depends where you live of course but in my experiance if you have hard water it kills the immersion heater very quickly even if you dont use it much. The last 3 houses I've lived in had immersion heaters fillted but they were all unservicable and when replaced lasted less than 3 years.

Also, modern combies can run 2 showers - ours can heat the water as fast as it comes into the house without issue. Yes, its an expensive model but mains pressure tanks arent cheap either.

In the end we went for a combi beacuse it freed up space. A system boiler with mains pressure tank would have worked fine though and I'm not sure there's much difference in running costs.

As far as I'm concerned:

Combi:

Pros - takes less space, hot water doesnt run out
Cons - Takes slightly longer for hot water to come out of the tap (even with pre-heat)


Boiler with main pressure hot tank:

Pros - Delivers hot water quickly
Cons - Takes more space, extra maintenance required for tank.

With either solution the limiting factor will be how quickly the water comes into the house from the water main. So, if you're wanting amazing flow from both showers you'd probably need a conventional system with a large tank in the loft.