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Would a useful stat be cost of heating per square meter of house space? Ours is a lot. 7p per square meter I think and heating to 18/19 ish but some rooms don’t get that high.
We had our windows replaced But they’re rubbish - the thermal break on them doesn’t seem to work and condensation forms on the bottom. Pretty sure the mitre joints at the corners leak air too.
Think I found a cold bridge in the basement
yeah, there’s obviously a sweet spot, but this changes according to conditions! I guess the whole point of OpenTherm on more modern boilers is that it works all this out automatically
I have fitted outside temperature sensor on ours (crazy they don't come with them as standard), and it modulates well. But it seems the return / rad temp setting overides things 🤷♂️
evidence presented suggests the EPC rating is bollocks…
Our last rented house had on its EPC that the windows were "fully double glazed throughout". I could squeeze my little finger through the gap around the bit of the window that opened on two of the windows, but it still counted 🙂
@joshvegas don't tell me that G4 is just sitting rotting away in your manky old basement 😭
basically yeah might chuck it in the skip now i think about it...
@joshvegas if you're serious I would gladly take it off your hands for up-cycling!
ha.
Its sitting waiting for a raspberry pi upgrade.
exactly what I'd do with one 😃 👍 Although I've had a G5 & G4 Quicksilver sitting around for years but not done anything with them yet 😂Its sitting waiting for a raspberry pi upgrade.
don’t tell me that G4 is just sitting rotting away
What's a G4?
The very distinctive shaped Apple Mac that's sitting on his shelf!
What’s a G4?
The only bit of apple tat i'd ever be seen dead with
The only bit of apple tat i’d ever be seen dead with
...and you picked the worst looking one they've done! 🤣
yeah, there’s obviously a sweet spot, but this changes according to conditions! I guess the whole point of OpenTherm on more modern boilers is that it works all this out automatically?
From my own experience it adapts to changing conditions very well. No direct experience with opentherm but with Vailants own version.....that I can't currently remember the name of 😀
A lass at mrs100th's work has been "frugal" with her heating. Pipes froze yesterday. That's going to be a pricey money saving exercise.
Water feed under the house has frozen. Just bought a cheap fan heater to stick under the floor to unfreeze it before insulating it. Looking forward to damp and not so cold this weekend.
tried turning the boiler flow temp down as suggested above, house was far colder this morning (13 degrees). I know its supposed to be more efficient but surely if you have to have the heating on much longer its going to be about the same?
No. Efficiency is about heat into the house (kWh) versus volume of gas burned. If efficiency stayed the same, it would make no difference if you burned twice as much gas for half the time. But burning twice as much gas in half the time will be less efficient, so more actual gas is wasted. Similar to how you use more petrol driving at 100mph than if you drive at 50mph, even though your journey takes half the time.
When you turn the flow temp down you are reducing the rate at which heat enters the house. If that is greater than the rate of heat loss, it heats up - and you can burn for longer but use less gas overall. The problem is when it gets cold and the rate of heat loss is the same or greater than the rate of heat delivered by the lower boiler temps. So you then need to turn it up when it's cold. Modern boilers (apparently) can be WiFi enabled and automatically do this depending on the current weather, it's called weather compensation.
Our issue is that where our thermostat is on the ground floor in the hallway is the least well insulated part of the house, so it cools down faster. So the rate of heat loss in the hallway is greater than it is in the rest of the house. So I can to set the main temp down to a lower temperature (16) in cold weather like this and the system works better, is on less, and all the rooms with TRVs are the same temperature. So when it warms up, as well as turning the flow temp down I will paradoxically set the hallway temp higher to make sure the rest of the house gets heating.
A lass at mrs100th’s work has been “frugal” with her heating. Pipes froze yesterday. That’s going to be a pricey money saving exercise.
I bet there are more than a few who have done this.
Also - money saving tip: You might find your UPVC windows don't actually shut properly any more - mine don't. Stick a piece of paper down behind the seal to find out. You can just stick tape over the gap though, it makes a big difference.
Re weather compensation - I am considering hacking my boiler with a Raspberry Pi to do this, and also turn the temp up when the hot water is scheduled.
Yes and no
More thicker insulation in the arric space, plus a few degrees lower down stairs prob means alot of homes with vented dhw will see burst pipes
Under the house, insulation with t rex tape on the joints will help.
Or farmers use trace heating wires wound round the pipes then insulation on top. Super low watts and enough to keep the pipe from freezing.
Water feed under the house has frozen. Just bought a cheap fan heater to stick under the floor to unfreeze it before insulating it. Looking forward to damp and not so cold this weekend.
happened to me in 2021.
under the slab as well - not because we didnt have the heating on - the pipe was outside the insulated envelope of the house. The main feed into the house was only 3ft down not below the frost line - it was -20 at the time , the diesel in the van gelled and wouldnt start - the coolant in the landrover had frozen - and it did start - albe it with a slipping fan belt as the fan was frozen solid.
the resultant claim was a nightmare - ended up doing the work my self as they were putting schedules of 9 months in place for a new floor/skirting and they wanted to reinstate the pipe under the slab - By digging out the slab no less.... like some sort of mental folks...... i brought it into the house on a different corner under the floor and put it deeper/lagged it.
Currently running our heating 24hrs with thermostat set at 17 degrees.
Working out about £10 a week more than my old timed on-off times, but house feels better. (1920s house with no cavity walls).
Dt78
Its all to do with boiler efficiency
Only do this with a modern, condensing boiler with internal modulation.
The return water temps being very low means a pick up in boiler efficiency.
So running for longer is actually cheaper.
You get the ch system up to say 55c, then use low flow through the rads to get the heat out the water so it returns at say 35c. A modetn condensing boiler then does magic with energy to heat the ch system back up to 55c very very effectively.
money saving tip: You might find your UPVC windows don’t actually shut properly any more – mine don’t
or adjust them properly
The unforseen consequences events costing more than the savings plays on my mind.
It's a 1920's house, suspended floor and roof tiles with no vapour sheet. All our timber is absolutely bone dry and in fantastic condition. not showing any signs of needing any investment. Air can get in the roof and under the floor. I've stopped the drafts into the bit we live in and insulated the roof to a reasonable standard.
I'm worried that any further well intended insulating projects I undertake will cause still air, eventually damp and end up costing me more than I save just by being a bit cold for a couple of months a year.
Despite all this talk of reduced flow temperatures for improvements in boiler efficiency, bear in mind that at its absolute best, with an optimised radiator system and the most versatile modern boiler, you're looking at 12% at best, when compared to an un-optimsed install. Most likely best case is closer to 6%. So, don't get in a massive tiz.
It's a low cost saving if you can do it though.
Just done a mid month meter read with octopus.
So, for the first 15 days of December i used 63kwh of electricity at £27.97 all in, vat and standing charge incl.
On the gas front its more than i was expecting 283kwh and £33.86.
So £62 or £124 for the whole month with usage rates projected forward at current rates.
I am running a wood burner pretty much daily but the wood is more or less free.
My ch comes on around 5pm then i cycle the boiler on and off for around 3 hrs, so its on for 15min then off for 30min.
Warms the rest of the flat nicely them its off from 8pm till 5pm the next day as most of the time im either working or out and about. Log burner goes on at sundown.
Ours had just kicked in, kitchen has dropped to 14C having been at 18C at 8am this morning. Was nearly -10C in the garden this morning. I filled bird baths with hot tap water at 8.30am and by 11 they had iced over!
I set 15C as the lowest I let it go unattended. If we're here in the evening, we manually bump it back up to 18 at around 5/6 pm...
EON is telling us we have used £172 worth of gas in the last two weeks since the last meter reading. Considering we never have it on all day only in the mornings and evenings for a couple of hours, I'm miffed. Though it could be an error as they have continually buggered up our last two bills. Our statment is page on page of credits, refunds and debits. It's all over the place. They have no idea what causes it all. I thought I'd never deal with a company as incompetent as EE, but EON are charging to the top.
"I filled bird baths with hot tap water at 8.30am and by 11 they had iced over!"
Hot water freezes faster than cold water. Because the hot molecules are moving around constantly the body of water will freeze as a body of water, rather than vreezing slowly on the outside surface and slowly penetrating towards the centre, as it does with colder water.
Using the heating a lot this last couple of weeks and the log burner in the evenings. Set to 17 during the day if we're in and all turned off upstairs as we seem to lose a lot of heat up there. Downstairs stays much warmer. Turn the rads upstairs back on before bed so we have an hr of heat in the morning. The bedrooms are chalet style so sit within the roof. The loft is insulated well but front and rear walls of the house seem very thin and flimsy with a hollow sound if you tap them. We used to have condensation run down these walls before installing a PIV as they are the coldest place in the house due to having triple glazing. The side wall of the house is cavity wall insulated. Any of you clever people know the best way to go about improving the insulation for this type of build?
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I'm toying with the idea of getting insulating wallpaper for the colder walls.
9C in the lounge when I got in from work so I've put the heating on for an hour, even though I'm probably going out later.
The folk in Shetland with no electricity age getting £30 /24hrs freezing their nuts off, must keep receipts for food made for them to get their money back yet the CEO of sse was paid £4000000 or thereabouts last year and probably a good few others in the company very well paid
I flushed the two downstairs rads, but I don't think it did much. I did however notice the TRV body on the cold one had gummed up, so I smacked it about a bit which I think freed it up a bit and it was subsequently much hotter.
The other thing I've just done is decrease the hallway temps for daytime and increase them at night, so now it's 16/15C. I think this will lead to less fluctuation in temperature which means the boiler can run for less time so it doesn't end up exceeding the set flow temp and short cycling.
In news from Tasmania;
We've just had our coldest december day on record with a high of 11ºc.
It's supposed to be summer & I've had the heater on.
Hot water freezes faster than cold water. Because the hot molecules are moving around constantly the body of water will freeze as a body of water, rather than vreezing slowly on the outside surface and slowly penetrating towards the centre, as it does with colder water.
Lol
I've fixed the short cycling.
The boiler was modulating down to 9kW but that was still a bit more than could be shed by the rads so the water got hotter and hotter until it hit the set temp of about 60C. When that happened, it started short cycling, but the hallway temp still wasn't high enough.
So I've moved the stat (it's wireless) about 30cm closer to the radiator. Now, it turns off quicker, but it's within the time that the boiler is able to run full blast. The boiler runs continuously for about 20 mins, but is still off for plenty of time.
It's an intricate set of variables that need to match up. The stat has a setting to adjust how quickly it turns off and on by changing the temperature gap, but it's already on +/- 0.5C which is the lowest. Moving the stat has had the same effect as reducing it.
"Lol"
Try putting an ice cube tray full of cold water and an ice cube tray full of hot water in the freezer (at the same time) and see which freezes solid first...
The Mpemba effect. Lots of possible reasons why it appears that hot water freezes faster then cold water
@inkster
Free Member
“Lol”
The effect is real (in some, quite specific circumstances) but your explanation is way off.
Crucially you need a high surface area to volume ratio. So you put a tray of boiling water in the freezer and a tray of tap water. Then enough of the boiling water evaporates quickly enough initially that there's a reduced volume of water left to freeze, so it does it quicker than the still full tray of tap water.
If for example you put two containers of water outside with lids on, the cold one would freeze first.
(also in the case of trying to demonstrate it in a freezer, the boiling water will trigger the thermostat so the freezer is actively trying to cool it down)
In the previous 7days I’ve managed to burn through 4 bags coal @ £12/bag and half of a £70 load of logs, stove has been in constant use 24hrs day, pretty expensive for a 1bed bungalow so this cold weather can **** right off, I’m getting rather pissed off at being cold all the time.
We've had the heating on 24/7 last few days due to the temperatures. Gone through about £8.50 of gas a day, or about 85 KWh per day. That's up from 50 earlier in the month.
Daughter's boyfriends parents haven't had the heating on due to a fault with the boiler - not had it fixed yet. They are running the wood burner in the lounge, but rest of house freezing, so much so, they had no water this morning - pipes frozen. It's just not worth freezing - colleagues have been sat at home in coats due to the cost.
The folk in Shetland with no electricity age getting £30 /24hrs freezing their nuts off, must keep receipts for food made for them to get their money back yet the CEO of sse was paid £4000000 or thereabouts last year and probably a good few others in the company very well paid
I don't really get the connection between what the CEO is paid and an unusual weather event wrecking infrastructure owned by the company. Would it make any difference if he was paid half as much, or worked for free?
The folk in Shetland with no electricity age getting £30 /24hrs freezing their nuts off, must keep receipts for food made for them to get their money back yet the CEO of sse was paid £4000000 or thereabouts last year and probably a good few others in the company very well paid
I don’t really get the connection between what the CEO is paid and an unusual weather event wrecking infrastructure owned by the company. Would it make any difference if he was paid half as much, or worked for free?
sounds like an improved situation over that of storm arwen in the north east of scotland .
It’s just not worth freezing
A lot of people I know have literally no choice at all. They live in rented houses which were the best they could get when they needed one, and they have terrible insulation and rubbish heating systems. They aren't doing it through choice.
No insulation in my housing association bungalow and ashp that’s been switched off since last January as it’s ****in useless, thank god I fitted a stove and took a can of compressed foam to the air bricks as my neighbours with the same system are using £20+ day for sod all effective heat as these bungalows just piss heat from everywhere, no insulation under wooden floors, no wall insulation, thin 30yr old double glazing and minimal attic floor insulation.
A question for those who don't have a thermostat controlling the 'constant' temp in their house, and are putting the CH on twice a day:
Do you have your rads turned up to maximum in order to max the heat output for the short few hours per day its on?
@fazzini even without a room thermostat, your boiler is thermostatically controlling the water temperature.
When your heating is on at the programmer your boiler will burn until the water temperature reaches a set temp, typically 70 deg. Then the burn will stop but the circulating pump will continue. As the radiators cool the circulating water, the boil will kick in again to maintain the set temp.
So if you turn your radiators “to max” your boiler will burn more fuel.
Thanks @goldfish24 I think I've reached sense-overload with trying to make sure I'm maximising the times it is on, so as not to waste money.
took a can of compressed foam to the air bricks
given your description of the general breeziness of the house I suppose this is unlikely to result in moisture accumulation and then damp.
Boiler condensate pipe blocked. The S bend was cakes with black gunge, the combustion chamber was full of slurry. I only found this out after I removed the cover and it poured everywhere. Should have freed up the drain hole first.
Now I have to try and unblock the drain pipe. It's behind the tiles, plasterboard, cupboard and worktop...
Then the burn will stop but the circulating pump will continue
Everything stops on mine when the tank is up to temp
I don’t really get the connection between what the CEO is paid and an unusual weather event wrecking infrastructure owned by the company.
In this specific case, there's virtually no relationship at all. More generally it's the continuing under-investment in infrastructure upgrades and robustness (and repair capacity) because they are maximising shareholder value.
Would it make any difference if he was paid half as much, or worked for free?
No, it's 100s of millions that they need to invest. Though, you'd probably end up with an even worse CEO. If that were possible.
Got up in the morning yesterday at 10c in the living room.
Today slightly less so at 12c ... I think I need to grow more hairs on my body.
Oh ya, my duvet is only 10.5 tog (I have 13 tog something but not used yet) synthetic stuff but I have this massive alpaca mixed with normal wool "bed cover" I put on my bed as bed sheet and that is actually warm to sleep on top of it. Bottom line is wool is much warmer so I shall invest in more wool stuff or grow more body hairs. LOL!
"Crucially you need a high surface area to volume ratio"
Erm... like with an Ice cube tray? Which divides am already small body of water into about 16 even smaller bodies of water?
Bottom line is wool is much warmer so I shall invest in more wool stuff or grow more body hairs. LOL!
I can't be the only one that saw this, and thought of this...??? 😜
Been interesting during the cold snap to test what temp we can get the house up to. Turns out it's around 17-18C with 0C outside. That's with everything flat out.
Also hadn't really realised, but with SMART TRVs, the temp you set seems to be the temp it reads sat right next to the radiator - so bears no relationship to the room temp. So you can set a rad to 21C and the room is still much below that.
Anyway, so we've used loads of wood the last week or so.
"I can’t be the only one that saw this, and thought of this…??? 😜"
Chewy's identity finally revealed, and the answer was there all along...
Zoning in on waste heat, I have to think about pipe insulation. Our newish boiler is in a small side extension (utility area) that doesn’t need heating. The pipes (3) with about a 6M run - going to the upstairs radiators are clipped the the wall (modern clips so very close to the wall) and pretty close together (clips butted up) so that the normal cylindrical insulation won’t fit.
Any ideas?
Shame to waste all that heat. Into walk and into unused room.
I’m actually wondering if all pipes below floors should really be lagged. Ridiculous heating the underfloor voids.
System is probably 25+ years old. Boiler recent.
Any heating experts?
Thx
so that the normal cylindrical insulation won’t fit.
Use a sharp knife to bevel an edge onto the insulation so that it butts up between pipes? Or just box it in. I've actually taken a piece of insulation off my pipes in a similar design to try to take a bit of an edge off the chill in the garage.
A question for those who don’t have a thermostat controlling the ‘constant’ temp in their house, and are putting the CH on twice a day:
Do you have your rads turned up to maximum in order to max the heat output for the short few hours per day its on?
Pretty much what we do, there is a room thermostat which cuts the CH at 18C and the radiator TRVs are fully open for the rooms we want to heat. Boiler is set to max flow temp (30+ year old non condensing model). Just heat the house up as quick as possible and then let it slowly cool off during the day / night. The thermostat will switch it back on if it drops below 14C during the day / night, which it has once so far this winter (when -10 outside) and that was only 1 hour before the evening slot came round anyway.
Also hadn’t really realised, but with SMART TRVs, the temp you set seems to be the temp it reads sat right next to the radiator – so bears no relationship to the room temp. So you can set a rad to 21C and the room is still much below that.
They apply an algorithm to account for that. In my set up (Wiser) they're all pretty accurate apart from the kitchen/diner (1 small rad for the space, and therefore underpowered I expect) where the room always tends to be 2-3c below what it states in the app.
Anyone else using radbot TRVs. I got some in the kids room, as I got divorced the rooms are only occupied half the week but the radbot learns occupancy. I've got my daily gas cost down to 5 or 6 quid, but using wood in the lounge in the evening.
Hi Flaperon thanks
The gap between the pipes and between pipes and wall is less than the lagging thicknesss. Any chance of a pic of your install so I can see what going on please?
N
Now I have to try and unblock the drain pipe. It’s behind the tiles, plasterboard, cupboard and worktop
Compressor or tubeless inflator on the end of the blocked pipe and blow it through?
Or explode the pipe. I managed to get about 3m of pipe cleaning spring in there but it still won't drain so there must be a blockage right at the end. Possibly frozen somewhere outside. But it's never frozen before and it's been this cold.
Re pipe lagging: the flow temperature on the boiler is 60C and the hottest the kitchen radiator can get (the furthest one) is 52.C
They apply an algorithm to account for that. In my set up (Wiser)...
Interesting, thanks. That makes more sense. Mine are Wiser too.
Perhaps our old cottage and the very low temps means the algorithm isn't quite right. All the radiators are a decent size, although they are the trad style downstairs.
I can’t be the only one that saw this, and thought of this…??? 😜
That would be good to save heating bill. LOL!
Chewy’s identity finally revealed, and the answer was there all along…
LOL! I asked my Finnish friend if I could buy some sami clothing to keep warm and she told me it would be cultural in appropriation. LOL!
Went to John Lewis earlier and bought a king size Devon wool duvet medium weigh 600g 10-14 tog. Discounted from £170 to £119 as it is the last one there. I don't think it is used ... hmmm ... but the carried bag is slightly tear at one side. The duvet is not that thick or particularly heavy but let see if it is warm enough.
Went to John Lewis
Unless I've got this way wrong on where you are, Bainbridge's not John Lewis 😜 (at least still in my mind)
Also bought it just in time for the temps to rise it's due to be 15 daytime and 8 night in the NW on Monday!
Interesting, thanks. That makes more sense. Mine are Wiser too.
I also have wiser. They are out by about 3 degrees against room temp. It's a regular occurrence going by the wiser forums.
Unless I’ve got this way wrong on where you are, Bainbridge’s not John Lewis
Ha, that's a blast from the past. Anyone else also remember Heelas in Reading?
(Mum's family from the Toon, I was born and brought up in Reading)
Also bought it just in time for the temps to rise it’s due to be 15 daytime and 8 night in the NW on Monday!
LOL! Temps to rise to 15c? That will be brilliant. My bedroom temp was 7.8c two nights ago which is freezing. My record was 4c but no fun as my back hurts after waking up in the morning.
Oh that's the most expensive duvet I have bought in my life! I have never bought a duvet beyond £50 to be honest. Damn the inflation!
Unless I’ve got this way wrong on where you are, Bainbridge’s not John Lewis
No idea if it was formerly Bainbridge but in Toon it is John Lewis.
Ha, that’s a blast from the past. Anyone else also remember Heelas in Reading?
(Mum’s family from the Toon, I was born and brought up in Reading)
You have become a softy Southerner you should come back to the cold NE to toughen yourself up. Feel the cold and freezing house. LOL!
Ha, that’s a blast from the past
Wait til I mention Binns and Farnons!! Memories to warm the cockles...just as well given the cost of CH 😬😳
Fitted a temporary drain pipe into the sink, heating works again but now delta T at the boiler is about 33C rather than 22C. So it seems like the heat is transferring more effectively without a litre of water in the heat exchanger. I could hear the dripping occasionally, didn't twig what it was.
It occurs to me that if my boiler was running backwards it would never have been condensing, except for a few seconds early on in the burn. So perhaps my drain has been blocked for ages and since I sorted it out it's just back filled the pipe. I can't see how to fix this; the pipe must go into the cavity and goodness knows where. I will just have to run a new pipe in.
Ha, that’s a blast from the past. Anyone else also remember Heelas in Reading?
(Mum’s family from the Toon, I was born and brought up in Reading)
I do! Born and lived in Reading till I went to Uni.
Bainbridges - just off Bigg Market; wow - decades ago.
Good to see that Fenwick are still going strong!
As for Binns and Farnons - I think my long dead mother is stirring in her grave.
My home town was Wallsend...
Wallsend born, Wallsend bred, Strong in the arm, Thick in the head - but can be modified for any location.
Educated and socialised in Newcastle.
Any memories of the Spit'n'Vomit opposite the Central?
Shudders...