Grant boiler (possibly) not working right?

[EnterFunnyNameHere]

Hi all,

I'm hoping some useful soul might know what's going on with our new Grant boiler. Basically, it's casing is hot all the time, and since we're on oil it means even now where the radiators haven't been on in ages and we only have showers in the morning, we're using a lot of oil!

I don't understand why the boiler is heating anything if no-one is there to use hot water and the heating isn't on... Surely even if it was clearing itself through occasionally daily it wouldn't be noticeably hot to touch and using up oil in a notable volume??

Any thoughts? TIA!

One feeble weekend bump, maybe the bank holiday will have brought the practical people online?

What Grant boiler is it? Regular boiler (separate hot water tank and external circulation pump) System boiler (separate hot water tank, internal circulation pump) or combination boiler?

The boiler, if a regular or system will only fire up if it's being told to do so from external controls I.e Zone Valves and or programmer.

As it's a new installation you need to get back in touch with the Installer.

Hi, it's a combination boiler, so no external tank at all... My DH thinks it just occasionally"cycles" but it's so hot all the time, it just seems over the top!!

If it were mine I would get a boiler engineer to it proto.

Our grant boiler has a small tank inside so it keeps a small amount of water hot so there isn't too much of a delay waiting for it to fire up when you run the hot tap. The whole thing doesn't stay hot all the time though and when we don't have the heating on and just use it for hot water the oil lasts aaaaaages.

Taybert - that's interesting. If you touch the boiler housing does it feel hot/warm?

I just checked, it isn't hot now. Is it firing the whole time? Is there stuff coming out of the vent at the back? How much oil are you using when the heating isn't on? I'd be tempted to get the installer back I think. Our watchman is on 2 at the moment and I'm happy it's that for now though I'll probably order some oil over the next couple of weeks and we won't need any more for months. I don't usually let it get down to 2 in the winter in case we couldn't get a delivery in time. The difference in consumption is huge.

It fires up periodically, I'd say less than once an hour. It's always hot though (I've never touched it and not found it hot)... We have a measuring tube not a decent gauge (going to get the tank replaced soon) but I don't think the oil usage seems much less than when the radiators were on to be honest.

The boiler is only a couple months old, I think I'll push back on the installer. The old (supposedly inefficient) boiler used negligible oil in summer, this one is supposed to be better not worse!

Yeah, we've just had showers and I still wouldn't say it's hot. There are some vague bells ringing for me about the hot water not being on "constant". Ours doesn't heat it at night (I remember sending DH out to the boiler house at 4am when I was in labour!)

Hmm, well this has decided for me that I need to get back in touch with the installer! Thanks!

Although I do feel better that it might be a setting thing not a fault thing (hopefully)!

so apparently the boiler has an internal tank that is kept warm 24hrs. It seems daft to me that you can't set it to only keep it hot for times when you actually want it, what use is that? So I might turn it off (assuming that still means hot water is generated when you turn on a tap, albeit presumably would take longer to come through)...

Argh! This new boiler was supposed to make things easier and more efficient!

Yeah, that shouldn't make it "hot" the whole time though and like I say, ours is the same and uses negligible oil in the summer. That said I think it is set up so it doesn't heat hot water at night so that might make a difference. Have you got it linked to a programmer? Try turning the hot water off at night and see what happens?

Unfortunately our timer only controls the heating, although I might try switching hot water to "timed" on the boiler and see if it picks up the heating times as a default...

I'm fast losing faith entirely with the installer. I might get a different company to come and give it a general once over for peace of mind. Maybe the firm who have quoted to replace the oil tank, might get a deal.

Feeling quite hacked off now though, after all that money spent upgrading it doesn't feel we're any better off!