Combi Boiler - hardly any hot water upstairs

Worrymerchant

Hi,

we are FTB just moved in to a terraced house. We have a new (less than 6 months old) Gloworm Betacom 30 combi-boiler with the Corgi Certs checked (just not received yet).

The heating works fine, radiators all get hot, the kitchen tap works well fairly good pressure & can generate scalding hot water. The problem is upstairs, the bathroom taps & bath have hardly any water pressure & hardly get above lukewarm temperature. Is this normal for a combi-boiler as we've never had one?

The bar on the water pressure gauge says around 1.5 is that good or bad, (sorry for the dumb question) do we need to get better pressure for upstairs or are you just stuck with it?

We have the details of the company that installed them for the previous owner do you think we should contact them, would they fix it for free do you think or is that taking the proverbial? Is it better just to get a new corgi plumber in? As it's a new boiler is it worth contacting gloworm?

many thanks for your help!

Luckless_2

Hi, first of all I'm no expert so forgive me if I give duff info. If you only have one pressure reading on your boiler it will be for the heating. The gauge should have indication for good working pressure, ie. black mark when its to low and red to high. 1.5 bar should be fine, if this pressure falls you have a leak on your heating system. There should be a valve (may require a key) to top up from the main (cold water). Your boiler will simply heat the cold water as it detects a flow which will happen when you open a hot tap. If the flow is to small it wont fire up, so open up your bath hot tap then go downstairs and see if the boiler is lit for HW. More likely is that the taps are not designed for combi. If this is the case the flow and press will be wrong and the water won't heat. Try cutting back on the tap so its say 1/4 open, water should after a little while get hot. You will get a feel for how far you can open the tap before it goes cold and I'm afraid its a case of replacing the taps or living with it. Also bear in mind if you have a shower it will need to be a pressure balanced combi shower, they start at about £100. If you have an elctric shower then that would be fine as they are cold water supply only, no HW feed.

Worrymerchant

from the sounds of it might be a plumbing issue after speaking to gloworm as the boiler does work in the kitchen.

Guess we'll have to get someone to look at it sigh, it's not going to be cheap is it

EliteHeat

Worrymerchant wrote: »

it's going going to be cheap is it

Well that's a relief for you anyway

Worrymerchant

Ah sorry I typed that wrong, it probably isnt going to be cheap I meant. It wouldnt surprise me that the owner/developer has done another botch job with it. Hopefully its something simple, fingers crossed!