Gas boiler advice

[maxman]

Our old Trianco gas boiler is at least 25 yrs old,while it has been very reliable and is still working ok,the time has come to look at a more efficient boiler..The house ha 13 rads with two bathrooms.
I did consider a combi ,but am put off with the pressure they work on and the possibility of leaks.Fitting a combi would involve more work(removing tanks from attic and airing cupboard) plus some electrics.The other option is just to replace the boiler with a similar type.
What's the thinking on boiler makes Baxi have boilers with 7 or 10 yr guarantee .Wocester Bosch have a 5 yr guarantee .
British Gas have an offer on at the moment for half price boiler,they quoted 3 grand for a WB boiler replacement with a Hive controler plus one year warranty on our existing system..
Any advice would be appreciated .

 

[Vornwend]

We were in the same position as you about 18 mths ago. Very old boiler (19 years) which was on a limited part availability list. That didn't worry me too much but the British Gas offer seemed to good to miss. We went with the Worcester option that you mention and took the Hive system with it. I took their estimates of how much we would save on efficiency with a pinch of salt but surprisingly they seem to have been right - in fact, as far as I can tell we are saving c50% compared to the old boiler so the payback will probably be less than 4 years. Quite like the Hive system although I think its quite expensive for what it is. Its fun being able to control the heating from anywhere in the world - I was in Peru last year and turned the heating off - much to my wife's annoyance :rofl:

 

[Ewazix]

Short answer, with the same scenario losing the attic tank (a good thing anyway) but keeping the hot water storage, the new Worcester Bosch combi has been using almost exactly half the gas, easy math

 

[ekimj10]

Worcester Bosch is highly recommended, ours is coming up to 8 years old and the technician who installed it, and checks it every year, says it is good for another 2 or 3 years at least.
All these guarantees are only effective as long as you have an authorised tech do an annual inspection.
I'd be very surprised if BG could match a local independent supplier/installer. Good luck.

 

[obewan]

Same position as the OP a couple of years back
Ripped out the old boiler/tank and fitted a Worcester Combi
Gained a new cupboard and vastly reduced gas bills
Do you know anyone that works for Siemens?
They have a family and friends scheme that allows them to order up to 9 (I think) Bosch/Worcester boilers and all fittings etc a year at almost half price!!
Not allowed to order for profit - you just need to provide the 'Corgi' number of the firm fitting it

 

[ben g]

I went for a Vallant combi in my old house, just before it sold, combined with a hive unit.

You're better off with a combi and you gain so much more space and efficiency over the old style systems. Well worth the upgrade.

British Gas will always be more expensive than a local heating engineer, so might be best to get a few different quotes. Ours cost £1100 less than British Gas' quote and it came with a 7 year warranty.

 

[ekimj10]

Ben g wrote:

'British Gas will always be more expensive than a local heating engineer, so might be best to get a few different quotes. Ours cost £1100 less than British Gas' quote and it came with a 7 year warranty.' Exactly what I would expect and there are benefits having a local agent come and service it annually. Incidently I pay less than £40 for my annual inspection, suspect BG would require more.

 

[cj10jeeper]

Best change I ever made to rip out the old header tanks and fit a Worcester Bosch. Been in a decade and flawless. Half the gas of the old Pottertom, mains pressure hot and cold across 3 storeys. Faster heating cycles
Indy was <50% of BG quote
Just do it

 

[Silverzedtom]

I’d only ever reccomend Worcester Bosch or Valiant. Not only are they the highest quality boilers on the market the parts are easy to get hold of Long after the ten year cut off. My preference is Worcester purely because they think about the engineer when designing.

Worcester Bosch warranties are based on a number of factors:

Standard warranty is 5 years across the board, but put a magnetic filter with it and they will extend it to seven.

Fit Worcester’s own controls such as Worcester wave or comfort RF and they will give you an even longer warranty up to ten years depending on what boiler you went for.

Your old boiler will not have a pump over run facility, where the pump continues to run after it’s finnished firing (to protect the heat exchanger), New boilers have to so to cut a long story short at the minimum the heating system will need a partial / full re wire and possibly another cable run from your wiring centre (probably airing cupboard) to the boiler if there aren’t enough spare cores in the cable. So a combi will involve far less electrical work.

You have three options on system type:

Conventional boiler - the one you have now. Gravity hot water system with gravity heating.

System boiler - pressurised heating system, small tank in loft goes. Hot water remains un changed

Combi - pressurised hot water and heating.

My own preference would be a system boiler. I have done hundreds of gravity to pressurised heating systems and it’s very rare that they can’t handle the pressure. It’s only 1 - 1.5 bar, nothing like some mains water can be. Your airing cupboard can stay as it is, or you could one day have a new unvented cylinder put in meaning your new boiler heats a pressurised hot water system, so you lose your tank in the loft, still have an immersion in case of boiler failure and get hot water at mains pressure.

 

[Nanu]

We were running a 20 year old Baxi which was running perfectly but we were paying British Gas £30pm to service and maintain it. We got a local independent to fit a new Worcester Bosch Combi for £2.5K (British Gas were going to charge £3.5K) and that includes an inline filter, 5 years of free annual servicing and a 10 year guarantee. Paying by interest free finance at £25pm. Already seeing the benefits of using less gas and paying £10pm less for the privilege.

 

[maxman]

Thanks everyone for your experience and valuable advice.
Nanu,The 3k BG quoted was minus the magnetic filter and power flush ,which would have brought it up to 3.5k

 

[Silverzedtom]

Thanks everyone for your experience and valuable advice.
Nanu,The 3k BG quoted was minus the magnetic filter and power flush ,which would have brought it up to 3.5k

A magnetic filter is worth every penny. It will save money in the long run protecting the boiler, pumps, valves and trv’s Etc

 

[buzyg]

We had a new Worcester fitted last May. That has a ten year gatentee as long as it's service correctly.

 

[Nictrix]

We had a Veissman boiler (condensing I think) fitted about 7 years ago and it has been faultless.
Had it fitted at the same time as cold water tank and hot water tank removal and replaced all radiators and pipework.
Only have 6 radiators but the cost was £3500 with a 5 year guarantee. Now that the guarantee is up the same company service and maintain for about £12 a month.
They left behind the old copper tank and pipework and I took that to the scrappies and got £150 back for it.
Get quotes from local companies.

 

[firebobby]

I would also say that a good inhibitor is essential in the system and make sure the strength is correct.

 

[Wildfire]

I do a lot of work with a plumbing company and we fit Vaillant, Viessman and Worscester Bosch. We have had issues with WB's customer service though.

 

[85genius]

I'll go against the grain here, heard a lot about Worcester Bosch so was going to get one, spoke separately to 2 mates who are plumbers and both said to avoid Worcester Bosch, they are overpriced and not to the same standard they used to be.

Both advised me to go for an Ideal logic + we did and it worked out over 50% cheaper than the Worcester Bosch and came with a 7 year warranty!

Also found Ideal's customer service excellent! Not actually a fault with the boiler but we thought it had a fault, or at least the moron plumber (both my mates were too busy to come and do it when the old potterton died so used a random) told us it had a fault and that this was the first one he had fitted that came faulty out of the box. We called Ideal service centre and they had their own engineer out to us the next day to "fix" it, moron plumber had not connected one of the wires up inside the boiler was fine.

Not sure on savings as its only been in 6 months but should be a lot cheaper to run than the old one, although we fitted hive at the same time so not sure where to attribute the savings, but I do know the new boiler greatly increased the pressure of our hot water making showers much more enjoyable

 

[TitanTim]

I went through the new boiler conundrum a while back. I currently have a gloworm which is 16 years old and runs touch wood perfectly. I have it serviced each year and chatted to the British Gas engineer last year who said I wouldn't be gaining much by replacing it except it would be shinier and more likely to break down as they are just not made to last. He said I might save a little on bills over a year but really not that much. He said wait until it packs up so for the moment will do that. I did think what's the point in spending a couple of grand when I have a boiler that works :?

Tim.

 

[maxman]

Wildfire and 85genius you have thrown a spanner in the works as I was under the impression that Worcester/Bosch were more expensive but ultra reliable.
Thanks again for all the information as that was the point of the post.
Tim ,I can see where your coming from,my boiler is at least 25 yrs old and on borrowed time ,a bit like me :
If it breaks down we don't want to be without heating/hot water for weeks and making a panic buy boiler which I will later regret.

 

[raymond.harper]

The thing I have against a combi boiler is that you would no longer have a hot water tank. In the event of the boiler going down you would not have the back up of the heated water tank. We had a glowworm boiler fitted 10 years ago and have had no problems with it.