Back boiler, old controls - heating water only but radiators are on upstairs?

weston800

Hi all,

Just moved into our first home.

We have a back boiler (behind an old gas fire) and a water tank (main bedroom).

I no longer wan't the heating to come on so I've changed the setting to 'Water Only' which is on the timer for twice a day, the thermostat is set at zero. However, when the timer kicks in to heat the water; all the radiators come on upstairs (they stay off downstairs)

The downstairs radiators do work when I have the heating on.

I've attached some pics

Any ideas how I can stop the upstairs radiators heating up and only heat the water? I can't turn my radiators off or down by the way as the knobs on each side no not turn.

Thanks
Emma

https://ibb.co/hL4A9H
https://ibb.co/f7MCOc
https://ibb.co/kgGOUH
https://ibb.co/in4XOc

Alex1983

I would guess it's a gravity hot water system, can you post some pictures of the airing cupboard and or pump/ valves.

If it is a gravity hot water system then you will get heat upstairs when you have hot water only because the heat will rise with gravity. A lot of these system had a gate valve, usually in the airing cupboard that was a 'summer valve' you would turn this off in the summer and it would stop the circulation around the radiators in the summer.

weston800

Alex1983 wrote: »

I would guess it's a gravity hot water system, can you post some pictures of the airing cupboard and or pump/ valves.

If it is a gravity hot water system then you will get heat upstairs when you have hot water only because the heat will rise with gravity. A lot of these system had a gate valve, usually in the airing cupboard that was a 'summer valve' you would turn this off in the summer and it would stop the circulation around the radiators in the summer.

Hi, thank you. Photos below (did you see the ones above as well? There is a label on a switch in the airing cupboard that says “this heater has not been used for many years”)

I can’t see a ‘summer valve’

https://ibb.co/jB1UKH
https://ibb.co/jqG76x
https://ibb.co/kv50Rx
https://ibb.co/mUD9KH

Thanks

Alex1983

Picture 1 in the 1st post and picture 3/4/5 in your next post are all to do with your immersion heater, the immersion is your electrical back up and has nothing to do with your back boiler or heating.

Can you see any pipes or valves in the back corner of the airing cupboard, behind the jacket.

weston800

Alex1983 wrote: »

Picture 1 in the 1st post and picture 3/4/5 in your next post are all to do with your immersion heater, the immersion is your electrical back up and has nothing to do with your back boiler or heating.

Can you see any pipes or valves in the back corner of the airing cupboard, behind the jacket.

Ah OK, that’s good to know.

There are like copper pipes in the bottom corner behind the jacket that go into the external brick wall but no valve. There is a tap on the pipe towards the top left of the water tank, not sure if you noticed it in the airing cupboard picture? Next to the towels on the left. It has a piece of blue cloth around it for some reason.

Debbie_Savard

I expect the J-cloth is there as the valve isn't 100% watertight. Also, I reckon that valve controls the water coming from expansion tank in the loft.

Not being funny, I'd be saving-up to replace that system sooner rather than later.

weston800

Debbie_Savard wrote: »

I expect the J-cloth is there as the valve isn't 100% watertight. Also, I reckon that valve controls the water coming from expansion tank in the loft.

Not being funny, I'd be saving-up to replace that system sooner rather than later.

We considered that before we moved in and did a lot of research but the majority of advice we’ve had is to leave it alone and only replace it when it breaks. After looking at costs, it would take years and years to actually gain any value from replacing it. Also, on the plus side, our pipes won’t freeze in the winter! So many of our neighbours struggled during this last bout of snow but we were totally fine. Apart from the issue I’ve mentioned in my post, the heating and hot water work brilliantly so really there’s no need to upgrade yet. Thanks for your input though.

FreeBear

At a guess, you have a Baxi Bermuda back boiler running a gravity fed heating system - Whilst these boilers are not as efficient as a modern condensing boiler, they are simple and fairly inexpensive to service & repair. I also have one of these systems, and the return on investment to replace it means I won't see any savings for at least 15 years.

What I have done is fit thermostatic valves on all bar one radiator in the system - During the summer months, turn the valves down to the frost setting. Fit a thermostat to the hot water tank (may need to upgrade the control for this), and this reduces gas consumption in the summer months.

Another avenue to explore is to convert the heating system from gravity to a C plan or fully pumped - However, this will involve some cost and if you have old imperial piping (very likely), the plumber is not going to enjoy the job.

There should be two valves (taps) in the airing cupboard - One will be from the cold water tank, the other from the smaller header tank in the loft. Do not be tempted to turn them off (probably seized up by now anyway) unless you have a leak or need to drain the system.

A picture saves on words, so this one should describe what I think you have..

stator

Have you tested how long it takes for the boiler to heat up all the water in the hot water tank? If you can reduce the time you have the boiler on, then there will be less wastage through the upstairs radiators. If you only have it on for 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes in the afternoon then you probably won't care about the radiators. But this depends on when you need really hot water, if you have baths in the middle of the day you'll want it on more often. The rest of the day warm water is fine for washing your hands etc. But if you've got a house full of people then you might need more than one tank full of hot water in the morning, which would make things more difficult.

If you insulate the hot water tank and also insulate the pipes that transfer heat from the boiler into the hot water tank using lagging, then this will mean it takes less time for the water tank to heat up, and so the radiators won't get so hot.

weston800

stator wrote: »

Have you tested how long it takes for the boiler to heat up all the water in the hot water tank? If you can reduce the time you have the boiler on, then there will be less wastage through the upstairs radiators. If you only have it on for 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes in the afternoon then you probably won't care about the radiators. But this depends on when you need really hot water, if you have baths in the middle of the day you'll want it on more often. The rest of the day warm water is fine for washing your hands etc. But if you've got a house full of people then you might need more than one tank full of hot water in the morning, which would make things more difficult.

If you insulate the hot water tank and also insulate the pipes that transfer heat from the boiler into the hot water tank using lagging, then this will mean it takes less time for the water tank to heat up, and so the radiators won't get so hot.

I haven’t tested it as I haven’t really needed to. It’s on the least amount of time possible (twice a day) to heat the water. We have the old controls as per the picture in my initial post, the controls A&B as well as C&D are touching so that they’re on the lowest setting for time to heat the water. It’s just over an hour each time (I can’t lower them anymore unfortunately) we have plenty of hot water on the current settings and haven’t run out as of yet (there’s only 2 of us)

datostar

FreeBear wrote: »

At a guess, you have a Baxi Bermuda back boiler running a gravity fed heating system - Whilst these boilers are not as efficient as a modern condensing boiler, they are simple and fairly inexpensive to service & repair. I also have one of these systems, and the return on investment to replace it means I won't see any savings for at least 15 years.

We still have a Baxi Bermuda with the 2 tanks in the loft and a hot water cylinder upstairs, but the radiator system is pumped, with a motorised valve which cuts off the radiator circulation when the switch on the downstairs timer is set accordingly. Absolutely no heating of any radiators when set to hot water only.