Slight smell of gas by flue outside

longwalks1

Just walked outside to look at the wall to see if we've had cavity wall insulation (was looking for the holes in the cement) and smelt a slight smell of gas coming out the flue of the boiler (boiler is in kitchen cupboard, flue goes straight through the wall to the side wall of the house)

Is this normal? Its just fired up as we got home and turned the heating on - am i panicking over nothing??

molerat

There will always be a small discharge of unburnt gas as the boiler fires up, if it carries on for more than a few seconds then there could be a problem.

societys_child

Yup, as above^ mine does the same.

HappyMJ

britishboy wrote: »

Just walked outside to look at the wall to see if we've had cavity wall insulation (was looking for the holes in the cement) and smelt a slight smell of gas coming out the flue of the boiler (boiler is in kitchen cupboard, flue goes straight through the wall to the side wall of the house)

Is this normal? Its just fired up as we got home and turned the heating on - am i panicking over nothing??

Mercaptan is added to natural gas so you can smell it's presence as natural gas has no odour. Once burnt is turns to sulphur dioxide which also has a strong smell.

lemontart

if you can smell gas call 0800 111 999 and they will send a gas emergency engineer out to ensure you are save .

chappers

perfectly normal, assuming the boiler was running at the time.

Panic? You should live with my wife, every morning I go downstairs and put the kettle on, the ignitor on the cooker is pretty rubbish and it usually take a few seconds for the flame to catch, every morning I wait for the call down stairs "I CAN SMELL GAS"

longwalks1

Thanks everyone, its an old boiler and we had it serviced by British Gas on Tuesday as the free annual service and he said no issues with it, but never noticed it before. To be fair, I doubt Ive been stood out there by it when its fired up

Thanks again everyone