New house very cold and can't work out heating system (boiler and tank)

[Bakingnovice]

We just moved house. In our old house we had a simple combi boiler which heated water and radiators. In this house there is a boiler on the top floor and a silver cylinder tank on the middle floor.

The cylinder tank says 'Santon premier plus' on it. It is silver and there's pipes around it and a white flex wire which goes to a plug which is switched off. The tank is never warm. Does this mean the boiler is heating the radiators and water?

The upstairs warms really quickly but I can have the radiators on downstairs for hours and its still cold. I've invested in a door curtain and am looking at radiator foil panels. Any other tips to keep warm?

the flex wire will be for the immersion heater. Which may or may not work.

what are the windows like? Are the walls insulated? Have you found the instructions for the boiler? Do you have hot water?

Yes we have hot water so I think the boiler must be heating the water. We have the radiators on but the downstairs ones barely heat up. I'm going to try and buy a radiator key and bleed the radiators at some point.

There are huge windows and apart from the main hallway the house isn't particularly drafty. It's the first time in my adult life I've been wearing jumpers and socks indoors. I grew up in a v cold house so I hate being cold. I think I might have to start getting used to it.

Try turning off the valves to the rads that are working well. If the downstairs rads get hot let them run this way for a while before turning them all back on and see how you get on.

Check that the rad valves are open to each end of each radiator, cold ones.

It may mean you just have to balance system.

The radiators my be blocked due to sludge.

If by shutting off the hot rads you can get the cold ones hot then rebalance system

When you say the tank is never warm, I think you mean the insulated casing around the cylinder does't feel warm. If it did, that would mean your expensive heat was leaking out from the hot water in the cylinder inside the insulated casing.

I would prioritise the radiator key which costs about 50p.

a radiator which is cold at the top and hot at the bottom probably needs bleeding. A radiator which is hot at the top and cold in the middle is probably full of sludge. But a radiator which is cold when some of the others are hot might need balancing, or is turned off, or has a faulty valve, or a blockage, so turn off all the hot ones and see if the hot flow then goes to the cold ones.

If you have some cold radiators, and a cylinder, see if the cylinder is frequently and excessively hot.

Hot upstairs and cold downstairs sounds like a flow problem.

Blockages and sediment are especially common on neglected old radiators, even if a new boiler has been attached to them.

here we are Very similar to a Megaflo.

I thought they were all white, not silver. They can cost well over a thousand.

The radiators to the down stairs, is the pipework which feed each individual radiator just a pair of pipes which drop out of the ceiling.

If that is the case those down stair rads may be filled with sludge