Boiler replacement - Boxt.co.uk

Starside

daveyjp wrote: »

How have they assessed the output of a 30i is the one most suited to your property?

On the Boxt website, you fill in details such as number of bathrooms, number of showers number of radiators, type of house etc.

However I Googled my old combi boiler and got the Hot water flow rate, Max outputs in kWh and compared these to the proposed new one.

HUMBUG

danielinto wrote: »

This is obviously a bigger job than a straight combi replacement with no change of location.

However it caught my eye that you've been told thermostatic valves are a building reg requirement - this I do not believe is correct.

There does seem to be some duplication in the jobs which I would have thought formed part of the same job (ie. replacing and changing TRV and lockshields is quoted separately from draining the system? - it will need draining anyway to change the boiler and as part of the flush?)

Anyway, I am no expert but after getting about 8 quotes I have seen all sorts of "extras" being put (I see on yours firing up and testing plus fitting the filter add and extra £500!) on to pad the quote by some plumbers which others do as standard...

It's a shame that most of the time these jobs are urgent and most people (especially the elderly) cannot live without heating/hot water for long enough to get a few quotes and do research.

Apparently the building regs changed for combi installations in April 2018:

I looked at this 'which' website which explains the changes as of April 2018:

https://www.which.co.uk/news/2018/01/if-you-need-a-new-boiler-these-regulation-changes-will-affect-you/

Bits to note are below:

All boilers installed from April 2018 will need an ErP efficiency rating of 92% or higher.
All new gas and oil boiler installations must include a programme timer and a thermostat

"every combi boiler installation must also include one additional energy-saving measure. Consumers will be given the opportunity to select at least one of four additional energy-saving measures.

1.Flue gas heat recovery systems
2.Load compensating thermostat
3.Weather compensating thermostat
4.Smart thermostat

I am assuming the fixing of radiator thermostatic valves is mandatory to comply with point 2 above.

I was a bit confused about separate quotes for Lockshield and Thermostatic valves . I mean a £100 inc vat per radiator seems quite high. But if you look at the actual hours involved 'as a business' to fix a new boiler for a customer it does start to make sense.

1. The manager - travelling and surveying the property , looking at all the options to meet mandatory building regs (will need to be very well acquainted with all of them plus new amendments). Plus typing up a detailed quote. - 2 hour
2. Recycling all the old pipes boilers, hot water tank , expansion tank , cold water tank - 2 hours
3. All the admin work to order all the parts from supplier + any other special items required while 'on the job' - 2 hours
4. 1st day - On site hours - only one man turned up at 08:00 and left at 16:00 (worked continually -no break not even for a cup of tea) - 8 hours.
5. 2 men to turn up tomorrow to remove items relating to point 2 items above - needs 2 because the attic entrance is small and awkward for one man on a ladder. Need to also route the flue , lay down a new gas pipe under the floorboards (taking up our PAKE flooring:( ), route a condensing pipe through our wall to the drain outside. Have to seal up the old chimney flue, fix new thermostatic valves and lockshields. Fire up and test the system - advise us how to use the thermostat controls - approx 12hrs man hours including travelling to site.

I can imagine approx 26 man hours in total for approx 3.6k (including Vat). Which works out to about £136 per hour (inc Vat). Moderately more expensive than another company that installed my boiler but they couldn't do the work for at least 2 weeks (my parents would have been at terrible risk).

I do wonder what happens to those vulnerable people whose boilers have been condemned in winter time and don't have the money to get an urgent installation (that meets all these new building regs which can add many thousands to the cost). I mean all one can do is try and keep warm by buying electric heaters but the rate per Kwh is about 3-4 times that of gas. What about old people with no relatives to help them? Do GasSafe and local authorities get involved to keep them from freezing and getting ill due to no heating and hot water? Its horrific for me to imagine my parents , who are both housebound, being left to fend for themselves.

HUMBUG

JimmyChanga wrote: »

If valves & lockshields are mandatory why aren't they being quoted on other installations? Sounds dubious.
Labour charge seems high. Were the radiators having issues heating up properly in the first place for them to quote for a proper flush? They will usually do a standard cold flush.

What's so amazing about a Bosch filter as opposed to any other magnetic filter?

Get extra quotes. I'd say.

Yes , it did seem on the high side and due to the fact my parents can't really survive for another week (both late 80's , one blind and the other deaf and suffering many serious ailments) , I had little choice.

But after seeing the quality of the work being done , I am really quite impressed with this company. He explained that the whole system was full of sludge, the thermostat on the old boiler was broken, all the radiators upstairs (3 of them ) were actually switched off (for nigh on 20 years I imagine - my parents have never touched the valves) YET they have been HOT to the touch ! How weird is that? When he removed the old pump (ie. to fix the powerflush connections) , thick oily sludge dribbled out of it. He explained the the whole plumbing system was a strange setup. That the radiators had been balanced to favour the upstairs and that maybe the valves were 'slightly on' . That the pump must have been working overtime to pump the water around the system and that the boiler was working incredibly hard heating up the sludge without a working thermostat (it was set on MAX inside the old boiler). We always wondered why the upstairs radiators were sometimes warm when the controls were only set to 'Hot Water' (there wasn't a 3 port valve to be found!!!!).Maybe the plumbing setup was all wrong when it was first installed back in the 70's.

Anyhow , it looks like my sister saved my parents, mine and any visitor's lives , because she noticed a funny smell from the old boiler. She called me and I told her to switch it off while I called a gas engineer. When he dismantled the old boiler , it was full of burnt sediment (and I mean really thick black stuff blocking the burner , all over the thermocouple , injector valves, blocking any channels to the chimney flue. When he cleaned it all up and put it back together (after 2 solid hours) he tested the CO level and it was 100 ppm , while an alarm sounded on his CO2 probe. So he condemned the boiler and told me , in his humble opinion, the boiler hadn't been serviced properly since its installation over 25 years ago (because of the level and thickness of the black sediment). Yet I have some of the receipts from 2 companies that my parents have been using for many years showing it has been serviced at least once every few years (the last being 2016). So it seems they were not servicing these old boilers properly and leaving them in a dangerous state that could have poisoned my family,myself and any visitors. I was wondering why our own CO monitor didn't alarm , but the engineer moved it a bit closer to the boiler and it went off ! He said because we had good ventilation in the hallway (where the boiler is), the CO concentration didn't reach a high enough level.

Needless to say, I have now sent an email to GasSafe and my local MP to raise this matter about inadequate servicing of old boilers.

barryfj

Well having read through this thread I think I will give BOXT a go, I have already played about on their website and am suitably impressed.
I have had one quote for 4.5k for a Viessmann replacement which I favoured, this included a powerflush, nest controller and a filter, the other 4 local companies for Viessmann and Intergas I have contacted have not bothered to reply so Boxt it is, no problems with Worcester Bosch but always thought them a bit expensive for what they are but this does not seem the case.
Oh and this is my first post on the forum although I have been reading it for several years now as well as using the energy site so none of this he is a newby.

barryfj

Just an update, still looking on the internet I came across Boilerhut whose site I had been on for information, they quoted me for a Viessmann's and matched the Boxt quote but added new TRV's and a twin rad.

Coming next Tuesday to fit it all.

HAz

Hi
Boxt are 49% owned by Worcester Bosch, they are trying to corner the market for boiler installation, The only thing is some are Installing boilers in under four to five hrs, that means there not carrying out the correct gas checks.
Very worrying, I think gas Safe should be looking at this type of company very closely.

JimmyChanga

Hi
Boxt are 49% owned by Worcester Bosch, they are trying to corner the market for boiler installation, The only thing is some are Installing boilers in under four to five hrs, that means there not carrying out the correct gas checks.
Very worrying, I think gas Safe should be looking at this type of company very closely.

How long should gas checks take in your opinion and what do they entail?

the_mandarin

barryfj wrote: »

Just an update, still looking on the internet I came across Boilerhut whose site I had been on for information, they quoted me for a Viessmann's and matched the Boxt quote but added new TRV's and a twin rad.

Coming next Tuesday to fit it all.

Can you please provide some details for your experience with the Viessmann boiler so far, and also about Boilerhut?

Sprocket147

A combi boiler is only as good as the mains water pressure coming in to the property. A 38 cdi will deliver around 14 litres per min of hot water, but if your mains pressure is less then the 38kw is too big. Also for boiler over 30kw the gas pressure has to be tested, especially when there are other gas appliances.

C_Mababejive

A domestic U6 gas meter will of coure deliver upto around 65 Kw. If it doesnt feed the boiler at the correct pressure then thats a network operator issue. Of course you may well need an internal pipework upsize.