powerflush

Avoriaz

It would probably be better if a c/h expert answered that as it is years since I did anything to mine but this is what I suggest.

Buy a c/h cleanser, a c/h corrosion inhibitor, a tank lid and a radiator bleed valve key. Have a suitable spanner or adjustable wrench for the drain plug.

Turn off the water supply, either at your mains stopcock or at a valve or tap on the c/h supply if you are lucky enough to have one.

Clean the tank as above.

Attach a drain hose to the lowest drain plug and run that to an outside drain. Use newspapers, old towels etc to protect your floors or carpets from drips and spillages.

I am not sure if it is best to completely drain the system and then add the cleanser and refill or just drain off a few litres and then add the cleanser and top up. It probably makes little difference. I would do a full drain down and refill but I am sometimes quite stupid.

Don’t forget to close the drain plug before refilling, and check it for drips and leaks.

Whichever way you do it make sure all the cleanser gets into the system and doesn’t just sit in the tank. Then let the cleanser do its job according to the instructions.

Drain down again, refill adding the inhibitor and you are done.

You do run a few risks working on an old system.

The drain plug or the tap on the supply may be old and rusty and hard to turn. The tap may not shut off completely. The drain plug may not tighten up again. All this should be fairly obvious when you look at them. If they look clean and ok they probably are but be prepared to maybe have to buy and fit a new drain plug etc.

Also you may have problems on refilling. Airlocks are notorious on c/h systems, especially if badly designed or badly installed. You will probably find that you have to do a lot of bleeding of radiators etc to get the system full of water again, and there is always the possibility that you will have one or two problematic air locks.

That is my experience anyway.

Give it a whirl. If you can’t finish it properly call in a plumber. You will have done most of the work anyway so you will still have saved a lot of money.

tim158

Avoriaz wrote:

It would probably be better if a c/h expert answered that as it is years since I did anything to mine but this is what I suggest.

Buy a c/h cleanser, a c/h corrosion inhibitor, a tank lid and a radiator bleed valve key. Have a suitable spanner or adjustable wrench for the drain plug.

Turn off the water supply, either at your mains stopcock or at a valve or tap on the c/h supply if you are lucky enough to have one.

Clean the tank as above.

Attach a drain hose to the lowest drain plug and run that to an outside drain. Use newspapers, old towels etc to protect your floors or carpets from drips and spillages.

I am not sure if it is best to completely drain the system and then add the cleanser and refill or just drain off a few litres and then add the cleanser and top up. It probably makes little difference. I would do a full drain down and refill but I am sometimes quite stupid.

Don’t forget to close the drain plug before refilling, and check it for drips and leaks.

Whichever way you do it make sure all the cleanser gets into the system and doesn’t just sit in the tank. Then let the cleanser do its job according to the instructions.

Drain down again, refill adding the inhibitor and you are done.

You do run a few risks working on an old system.

The drain plug or the tap on the supply may be old and rusty and hard to turn. The tap may not shut off completely. The drain plug may not tighten up again. All this should be fairly obvious when you look at them. If they look clean and ok they probably are but be prepared to maybe have to buy and fit a new drain plug etc.

Also you may have problems on refilling. Airlocks are notorious on c/h systems, especially if badly designed or badly installed. You will probably find that you have to do a lot of bleeding of radiators etc to get the system full of water again, and there is always the possibility that you will have one or two problematic air locks.

That is my experience anyway.

Give it a whirl. If you can’t finish it properly call in a plumber. You will have done most of the work anyway so you will still have saved a lot of money.

Thanks again for you advice

Kind regards

Tim

plumberian

Avioraz I'd say you've pretty much covered everything there.

One thing though Tim, buy a draincock of the same type as the one you connect the hose to.

There's always a chance that the washer inside it will have perished so you need one handy BEFORE you start. Jsut part of the preparation.

One thing to note. In the last 6 months I have done powerflushes for people who ahve added sludge remover to the system which (whether by coincidence or not) has seemed to make things worse.

In one case, BG added the stuff and within two days the whole system bar two rads had packed up. They advised a total replacement system (exc. boiler) for about £6k. I was able to get everything going to the customers happy satisfaction for just under £500 - price included new pump, valves and two TRV's.

dgwilliams

My CH system is 25 years old and has 15 rads connected with microbore piping. The rads have double entry valves on one end of each rad. 6 of the rads are not working. A plumber has taken the rads that are not working off and says they are not blocked and the blockage is in the pipe work. He has recommended replacing all the valves with ones on each end before power flushing. Says cannot power flush blocked microbore system with current valves. Estimate £1250. Do you agree?

Canucklehead

Hi

Start another thread ,you might get noticed!

Corgi Guy.

EliteHeat

dgwilliams wrote: »

Says cannot power flush blocked microbore system with current valves. Estimate £1250. Do you agree?

You cannot successfully power flush any kind of blocked pipework - not just microbore. You need some sort of circulation for the process to work. In addition, with your twin-entry valves it is possible that the internal pipe has broken off. You will only know this if the valve is removed completely. Replacements are not available.

Most heating engineers would probably recommend the removal of all microbore as the best plan of action.

plumberian

Eliteheat is correct. You cannot clear a completely nblocked pipe with a powerflushing unit...but you can use other things with a flushing pump that can remove complete blockages.

Microbore is not always as difficult to flush as some seem to find it. If you want some personal advice on that you will need to call me as the administrators on ths forum do not like links to websites included in replies. (01225-869036) Double entry valves are a real pain to sort out and really are best replaced. Have no thoughts on the price quoted as it depends on lots otf things. Again, call me and I can offer a more informed opinion or even a quote if you are in my area.

Bst of luck whatever you decide to do. Ian Pritchard

caleyles

plumb1 wrote: »

Maybe you would also like to edit your site again as not all boilers installed after April 2006 have to be Condensing, exception is OIL 2007.

Just to let you know that up here in sunny Scotland there is still no legal requirement to fit condensing, though I think it starts in April.:)

heating-eng

plumb1 wrote: »

Typical of BG, ripping people off, yes how do they know its sludged, they dont, but the person who did the survey gets a commision.

If you want BG homecare, and want it flushing then get someone else to do it, average £300.
You should have a lid on your tank, go to a plumbers merchant and ask for a By-Law30 kit.
http://www.plumbersforum.co.uk/forumdisplay.php?7-Powerflushing-your-central-heating

ps A lot of Household Insurance companys offer Homecare, shop around for prices.

i am a gas eng and have been for over 18years ..i also worked for british gas for a lot of years...
i can tell you for sure that over 95% of the boilers i used to checked that had been fitted by corgi reg eng had not been installed correctly and as for powerflushing ..
i would say that proberly 80/90 % of the jobs i went to by corgi plumbers where not flushed correctly..
the problem is that corgi dont check the installers very often and standards are very low...
i would say that as a rule bg would be more than any plumbers but you get what you pay for most of the time..bg give a lifetime service where if it needed doing again they would do it free..
when i go and buy deposit remover from plumbcentre they need to order me more as no body else buys it..
most people just do a mains flush and if its had a combi in before then this should be fine ..
if you have an old open system then i would say it would need powerflushing.
if you do get it flushed make sure the plumber is there all day flushing it and it would be a good idea to fit a magnaclean filter on afterwards
hope this helps.....i wouldnt say this is really a DIY job

mountainchrisriver

Only a year late for this particular thread... :rotfl: