Price for fitting Smart Thermostat and TRVs?

unless you have something mad going on i think your biggest issue will be getting someont to take on such a small job.

i fitted ours on Saturday - it took about 2 hours start to finish including fitting a 5 core cable to give switched hot water.

IF you were just doing a straight swap ill be surprised if it took an hour.

if anything the new back plate is super clear as to what goes where and much easier to wire up than trying to put inevitably too short wires into the back of the stat and get it all back on the wall without coming out.....

so far seems much better than my last forae into about nest about 6 years ago which was a shit show of a system - been using a salus RF 500 since then.

So you're saying "stop being a wuss and do it yourself"?

Maybe I could manage. I am just imagining being in the dog house if the boiler ends up out of action over Christmas, or something...

I've just fitted the combi-boiler one + 8 trvs, took me less than an hour all in. The longest time was waiting for the hub to introduce itself to our WiFi system. I am (amongst other things) a heating engineer though...

It's a piece of piss if you already have some kind of wireless heating hub and you're just switching wires round. If you currently have a wired timer and roomstat then I can see how it might be a bit daunting for a beginner. What's your current setup?

I fitted a Hive controller and TRVs.
In the end, the Hive CH controller was pretty much a straight swap using the existing backplate.
It took me a while to get the right controller (they have single channel and dual channel, with different wiring), but once I'd got the right controller it was only a 5 minute job to swap over.

I had existing manual TRVs and the Hive ones just screw on to the existing TRV base.
I haven't yet installed TRVs onto the remaining radiators that have dumb flow valves - I'll need to isolate ./ drain down to do that. Not a difficult job, but I'll do it in the spring when I've got more time.

I fitted a Tado thermostat myself and I'm pretty bloody useless at DIY. I even had to make some educated guesses on the wiring as it was different from the Tado guide for my boiler. But it all works and has done since August! Some TVRs are on the wanted list.

Thanks everyone, seems that maybe it's not all that hard to do. I'm relatively handy, just boilers and plumbing are a bit scary with regards to consequences.

I currently have a Worcester Greenstar 28i Jnr, it's a combi... and it's just got a heat dial on the control panel on the boiler itself with a digital timer/programmer for setting up a schedule. (that for some reason doesn't do Monday mornings, but that's a different issue).

Do a bit off googling, or just get it out the box and see, but it might be as simple as swapping the existing controller for the new one, just check the wiring if it's non-drayton as while most controllers share a UK style backplate, they don't all put the pins in the same order.

I installed a Drayton Digistat last night, which is smart-ish*. I was going to go the whole hog but the old LP522 died and I didn't want to make it too complicated in a hurry. Installing took 5 minutes. The "connects easily via the app" took 3 hours and more 4 letter words than necessary. Turns out as soon as you pair it (step 1 in the instructions) the unit is locked, no buttons will work. Nowhere in the bloody instructions does it tell you that to use the actual unit you have to turn the app off on your phone.

*it'll adjust timings in response to the weather forecast, can be switched off for holidays, etc. But lacks any wi-fi/internet access/geofencing. Says it's compatible with wiser, but I'm not sure how compatible.

If it's anything like ours it was a case of removing the timer which is on a universal base plate (just unclips) and then installing the (Hive) unit onto said base plate. As has been said, after that it's plugging in a hub to get the kit to talk to each other and the internet and setting up apps and accounts, if you're just changing TRV heads it's unscrew old and screw on new with the usual connection faffage.
I did a load or research about wiring and what goes where but it ended up being a lot more simple than I thought.

If you do it yourself you can justify spending the saved engineer spend on bike stuff.

Hmmmm.... That'll likely need a whole new set of wires running to and from the boiler then. Page 29 of the installation manual for your boiler has the electrical connection diagrams. iirc you can run L & N from the boiler to the Drayton backplate L & N, and use the Ls and Lr terminals on the boiler to go to 1 & 3 respectively on the Drayton backplate.

HOWEVER I believe getting to the wiring on the boiler involves taking off the front panel, which is a gas seal, and as such can only legally be done by a "competent person" such as a GasSafe engineer.

Hmmmm…. That’ll likely need a whole new set of wires running to and from the boiler then. Page 29 of the installation manual for your boiler has the electrical connection diagrams. iirc you can run L & N from the boiler to the Drayton backplate L & N, and use the Ls and Lr terminals on the boiler to go to 1 & 3 respectively on the Drayton backplate.

We've got the same (as far as i can recall) boiler. And like most systems all the interfacing with it is done via a connection box. All that was required to go from a dumb to smart-ish controller was to put a jumper across the thermostat connectors so it was always 'on' as the digistat did the timing and thermostat functions in one rather than two devices in series.

The Greenstar boilers aren't too bad. I've installed a Nest onto one without difficulty. I wouldn't be worried about removing the boiler cover on this as it's a hardly an air seal given that there's no panel on the bottom. Four screws hold it in place, two on the top and two in the bottom corners. The control panel is secured by a single screw and then flips down on a hinge for easy access.

You'll need some 4-core flex (L, N, E, SL) and all you need to do is take the connections from the existing L/N/E inside the boiler and add the switched live, which is the call for heat. It's worth grabbing the service/installation manual for your boiler because you will probably need to remove a wire link in order to bypass the existing timer that's built into the front. If memory serves it just pulls out anyway.

This video shows you how to do it (badly). Don't use a power drill to remove the screws, and don't use the green earth wire as your switched live. It'll work, but it's exceptionally lazy. There's an earth tether on the backplate for a reason. And I'd have added a backbox instead of just drilling a hole in the wall.

My thermostat didn't have the standard backplate and, although was wired to the boiler for control, was actually battery powered (i.e. no Live & Neutral from the boiler!) which wasn't a situation covered in the Drayton manual at all 😂 (can't 100% remember but think I ended up bodging the mount somehow, possibly it's only held on with 1 screw rather than 2 🤔)
Probably could've run power from the boiler to make it all neater but couldn't be bothered, so just wired it up like you would a lamp & powered it from a socket.

@jackhammer just to clarify, is your timer on the front of the boiler or a separate box?

If its like my WB combi the control panel is not accessed via the combustion chamber.
4 long machine screws hold it and its bottom hinged.
Wiring is tight but accessable. You might need to loosen up the pcb so ensure that you are isolated from the mains, then iirc, its 6 screws for access from a selection of 10 or so.

I fitted a Wiser system at the weekend I don't mind saying it took most of Saturday, everyone else seems to work at ninja speeds 😉 though I suspect they're not always accounting for getting tools together, extra parts they need, clean up, coffee breaks etc etc.

Our old thermostat didn't have power which the smart hub needs so I had to add a fused spur, the hub can go anywhere so the spur and hub are next to the boiler. The biggest issue was my phone kept disconnecting from the hub wifi during initial setup (kept reporting 'no internet' and connecting back to home wifi) but once I got over that it was fairly plain sailing.

Fortunately my old mechanical trvs were standard size so easy swap to smart though a couple were sticky and needed a bit of freeing up. With the hub next to boiler the signal was a bit spotty to some of the smart trvs, rather than move the hub I fitted a smart plug which doubles as an extender as well as operating a light. Ordered Prime on Saturday night, came Sunday afternoon. Nice.

Then probably spent a few hours messing with schedules. It's pretty neat you can have just one room heated for WFH, or remotely warm the house on your way home. The only disappointment so far is it's not holding a steady temp, over / under shooting a bit. Our last thermostat was a digital Honeywell that did a great job keeping the temperature in the lounge exact. Maybe it will learn. The other concern is the number of batteries the system needs, and it's a bit sensitive to rechargeables I read, we'll see.

I've done every rad but bathrooms which will need plumbing to adapt. I think they'll probably be worthwhile especially in summer I can just heat towels.

To give you a rough idea, I paid for my system to be drained, 3 radiators without existing TRVs updated to allow Wiser TRVs, and the Wiser system installed (hub and 7 TRVs). Greenstar 28i junior combi boiler.
Cost £400 (Bristol).

Tado heating controller & 10 TRVs swapped over - £80. S Lakes.
Really pleased with it so far, I'm sure it's paid for itself already!
HTH

No use to the OP, bit I've just discovered that a Bosch easy control thermostat plugs straight into my WB combi boiler on its EMS bus. Should be straightforward, and I can link Bosch smart trvs to the thermostat and control with an app.

I've had the boiler manual out and had a look at the instructions (page 29 as pointed out by TheFlyingOx), watched that youtube video and read all your comments and unfortunately it looks a bit beyond me to be honest.

So I've put an advert up on mybuilder, had an offer to fit/set-up, balance the system and fit a new lockshield (previous owner appears to have snapped the flat off) @ £275. Looking at the Prices mentioned above seems reasonable.

Next step is to go around insulating various parts of our old victorian house. Loft already has the ceiling lined with insulation (enough that it needed the XL loft legs to board out a portion). Think about insulating the roof itself with solid board insulation. We've got an extension that seems to bleed heat, so I'll see if I can access the roof space there and have a look if that can be done. I know the walls aren't insulated as the guys who fitted out backdoors said there wasn't any.