Help with swapping from storage heaters to central heating

aclarkson13

Hello all,

I am looking for some advice. My house has old storage heaters and an old water tank in the loft. It’s around 30 years old and is costing me a fortune to heat the house.

I would like to change to a boiler and radiators but have no idea where to begin, can someone please advise me on who I contact first and how I can get the ball rolling with this.

Many Thanks,
Ashleigh

Gerry1

Do you have gas?

Robin9

Please do not be tempted by electric boilers feeding conventional radiator systems or by panel heaters filled with magic dust - your present bills will pale by comparison.

When you say "costing a fortune" what do you mean ?  Give us some annual consumption figures in kWh please ?

macman

The 'water tank in the loft' will be for cold water most likely. Do you have an immersion heater and a hot water tank, which are usually found along with NSH's?

matelodave

If you want radiators and a boiler then you have to decide what fuel to use - mains gas is best and cheapest if its available. Oil is a possibility if you've got space for the tank in the garden, likewise LPG needs a big tank, using 47kg cylinders is more expensive than off peak leccy..

As Robin says do not even consider an electric boiler unless you want to bankrupt yourself

Your other alternatives are biomass, using wood pellets - the boilers are expensive, not everso reliable and you need some where dry to store the pellets which need manhandling to keep the boiler replenished.
You might contemplate a heatpump which can do the job BUT the system need to be designed properly, installed and set up properly and most of all used properly. They are very expensive to install although you can get the Renewable Heat Incentive payments for seven years which does help mitigate the cost a bit.

aclarkson13

macman said:

The 'water tank in the loft' will be for cold water most likely. Do you have an immersion heater and a hot water tank, which are usually found along with NSH's?

Yes I was mistaken, I have a hot water cylinder in a cupboard and the other one on the loft.

(Apologies for being so vague, I am absolutely clueless about all of this)

aclarkson13

Gerry1 said:

Do you have gas?

Yes, I do have gas.

aclarkson13

matelodave said:

If you want radiators and a boiler then you have to decide what fuel to use - mains gas is best and cheapest if its available. Oil is a possibility if you've got space for the tank in the garden, likewise LPG needs a big tank, using 47kg cylinders is more expensive than off peak leccy..

As Robin says do not even consider an electric boiler unless you want to bankrupt yourself

Your other alternatives are biomass, using wood pellets - the boilers are expensive, not everso reliable and you need some where dry to store the pellets which need manhandling to keep the boiler replenished.
You might contemplate a heatpump which can do the job BUT the system need to be designed properly, installed and set up properly and most of all used properly. They are very expensive to install although you can get the Renewable Heat Incentive payments for seven years which does help mitigate the cost a bit.

Thank you for your reply. It looks like gas will be the most cost effective so I will look more into that. Would I just contact Scottish Gas directly?

Gerry1

aclarkson13 said:

Gerry1 said:

Do you have gas?

Yes, I do have gas.

Great news, that makes it a complete no brainer !

It's just a case of shopping around and getting several quotations.  Don't even think of contacting Scottish Gas, British Gas or any other energy supplier, they will only outsource it to some anonymous outfit who may well be not very good and will undoubtedly charge a fortune.  Probably best to go for an established local company that has a reputation to protect.  Ask neighbours, search online, even ask on this forum for recommendations for your area.  Make sure you get written quotations and that you are comparing like with like, notably boiler output, brand, number and output of radiators.  Probably best to discount the highest and lowest quotations, and pay at least the deposit with a credit card to get S.75 protection.

Have a look at the Which? ratings for boilers so that you don't end up with an unreliable one that's difficult to maintain.

Gerry1

In the meantime, do make sure you are on Economy 7, are on a competitive tariff (unlikely with Scottish Power?) and that your immersion heater is on a switched E7 circuit so that it doesn't top up during the day.  Any Boost switch (usually for a second immersion heater halfway up the tank) should be left switched off unless you have run out of hot water in the day and have to resort to getting half a tank of expensive hot water at daytime rates.

Start comparing with Citizens Advice and 'Switch with Which?', using annual kWh consumption from actual meter readings, not estimates.  Separate suppliers are probably cheaper than dual fuel.  Consider tariffs with no exit fees so that you can switch again without penalties when you have GCH because your consumption figures will then be very different.

macman

Gerry1 said:

Do you have gas?

To avoid any ambiguity, do you have mains gas into the property with a meter fitted? What gas appliances do you already have?