Hello, Earlier this year we had problems with ignition on our Keston
Celsius 25 and British Gas took an unsatisfactorily long time to solve
the problem - the work was done on the maintenance contract and seemed
to involve an awful lot of trial and error - we were without the boiler
for about 10 days in all. BG seemed reluctant to get assistance from
Keston.

Yesterday the BG engineer arrived to carry out the annual service and
safety check and discovered too high levels of CO in the flue gases
which he could not resolve. As a result the device was switched off and
an "At Risk" notice attached. Today the replacement of burner and its
gasket and a couple of other "troublesome" (BG's words) gaskets has not
solved the problem and we are once again without the boiler for another
24 hours whilst other parts are collected and the trial and error
diagnosis continues.

What's the status of this "at risk" notice and is there anything we can
do to get the 'experts' called in to speed diagnosis and resolution -
not looking forward to a Christmas without water and heating.

Look forward to comments etc..
Colin
--
Colin Brook - Winchester (UK)

Fax:+44(0)8701641293 Mobile:07976258703

"Colin Brook" wrote in message
...
Hello, Earlier this year we had problems with ignition on our Keston
Celsius 25 and British Gas took an unsatisfactorily long time to solve the
problem - the work was done on the maintenance contract and seemed to
involve an awful lot of trial and error - we were without the boiler for
about 10 days in all. BG seemed reluctant to get assistance from Keston.

Yesterday the BG engineer arrived to carry out the annual service and
safety check and discovered too high levels of CO in the flue gases which
he could not resolve. As a result the device was switched off and an "At
Risk" notice attached. Today the replacement of burner and its gasket and
a couple of other "troublesome" (BG's words) gaskets has not solved the
problem and we are once again without the boiler for another 24 hours
whilst other parts are collected and the trial and error diagnosis
continues.

What's the status of this "at risk" notice and is there anything we can do
to get the 'experts' called in to speed diagnosis and resolution - not
looking forward to a Christmas without water and heating.

Look forward to comments etc..
Colin

BG have a very bad reputation on this newsgroup, specifically, for charging
through the nose for work and for condemning boilers needlessly ( "can't get
the parts anymore mate" etc ) . If you're on a maintenance contract with
them I guess you're at their mercy, unless you bin them and get an
independent in......

As for the "at risk" status, well, that's your call. There's nothing
stopping you turning it on at your own risk. If the boiler is a balanced
flue type, the CO will be vented outside anyway. Unless someone walks
outside gets a stepladder and breathes the flue gasses in for several
minutes what's the problem?

Understand I'm not suggesting you turn the boiler on, but because of the
health and safety laws a lot of minor infringements result in a condemned
system. My uncle had a gas fire but no specific air vent to bring air into
the room. He had plenty of gaps in his floorboards into his vented cellar
underneath, and a big gap under the living room door etc. One day a gasman
came to do some work on the fire, and after he had finished he noticed there
was no air vent and he slapped a condemned notice on the fire, with a dire
warning to my uncle not to use the gas fire as it wasn't legal and was
dangerous. My uncle knew that he had sufficient ventilation into the room
from many sources to provide enough air and just screwed up the 'condemned'
notice after the gasman had gone and lit the fire. He's still alive,
needless to say, and that wasn't a balanced flue gas fire!

My uncle understood that although his ventilation didn't meet the letter of
the law, nevertheless it was perfectly adequate in practise.

Andy.

In message on Wed, 13 Dec 2006, Andy
wrote
"Colin Brook" wrote in message
...

Details of earlier BG problem snipped

Yesterday the BG engineer arrived to carry out the annual service and
safety check and discovered too high levels of CO in the flue gases which
he could not resolve. As a result the device was switched off and an "At
Risk" notice attached. Today the replacement of burner and its gasket and
a couple of other "troublesome" (BG's words) gaskets has not solved the
problem and we are once again without the boiler for another 24 hours
whilst other parts are collected and the trial and error diagnosis
continues.

What's the status of this "at risk" notice and is there anything we can do
to get the 'experts' called in to speed diagnosis and resolution - not
looking forward to a Christmas without water and heating.

Look forward to comments etc..
Colin

BG have a very bad reputation on this newsgroup, specifically, for
charging through the nose for work and for condemning boilers
needlessly ( "can't get the parts anymore mate" etc ) . If you're on a
maintenance contract with them I guess you're at their mercy, unless
you bin them and get an independent in......

Hello Andy - I'm a BG cynic too but this Keston has been a lot of
trouble and although I've used an independent and very good engineer
before he wasn't prepared to offer an annual contact and I was keen to
have one. Hence BG, who at the time (three years ago) were the only
people I could find who would put the Keston onto a maintenance
contract.

As for the "at risk" status, well, that's your call. There's nothing
stopping you turning it on at your own risk. If the boiler is a
balanced flue type, the CO will be vented outside anyway. Unless
someone walks outside gets a stepladder and breathes the flue gasses in
for several minutes what's the problem?

Understand I'm not suggesting you turn the boiler on, but because of
the health and safety laws a lot of minor infringements result in a
condemned system.
Thanks for that input - rather what I thought was probably the case.

Regards, Colin
--
Colin Brook - Winchester (UK)

Fax:+44(0)8701641293 Mobile:07976258703

On 2006-12-13 06:31:50 +0000, Colin Brook said:


Hello Andy - I'm a BG cynic too but this Keston has been a lot of
trouble and although I've used an independent and very good engineer
before he wasn't prepared to offer an annual contact and I was keen to
have one. Hence BG, who at the time (three years ago) were the only
people I could find who would put the Keston onto a maintenance
contract.

As for the "at risk" status, well, that's your call. There's nothing
stopping you turning it on at your own risk. If the boiler is a
balanced flue type, the CO will be vented outside anyway. Unless
someone walks outside gets a stepladder and breathes the flue gasses in
for several minutes what's the problem?

Understand I'm not suggesting you turn the boiler on, but because of
the health and safety laws a lot of minor infringements result in a
condemned system.
Thanks for that input - rather what I thought was probably the case.

Regards, Colin


Some years ago, I went through a similar exercise of having a BG
contract on the naive assumption that it would be fixed cost and hassle
free in comparison to DIYing or using an independent fitter.

It did prove to be unwise for much the same reasons that you described
- basically incompetence and much titting around trying this and trying
that.

One example of that was BG's positioning in their marketing of being a
kind of 4th emergency service with implication of rapid response.
The contract doesn't specify a time but reasonably, one might expect
that to be next day,

At any rate, at about this time of year, in a rather colder winter, the
heating broke down and a call was made. The offer was 7 days time (5
working days) with all the excuses of staff of sick etc. On pushing a
bit harder, it was shortened by a day and there followed the excuses
that they had to prioritise families with babies and old people first.
While not wishing to be hard about this, I did point out to them that
they are not a social service but a commercial organisation and not
empowered to make such judgments. Really, they should staff
accordingly and/or subcontract to local fitters if they do have
temporary staffing problems.

This problem had also taken several visits for similar reasons to your
experience.

I did also consider contacting the manufacturer but decided not to
figuring that it would be a hiding to nothing.

In the end, I spent half a day escalating it in BG's organisation,
basically by making phone calls, getting the name of the next senior
person, speaking to them and so on. There were the usual excuses of
"so and so doesn't take calls' (speak to secretary, ask them to get
person on phone). Persistence resulted in reaching one down from
director level. Promise was made and kept to send a senior engineer
that afternoon with all conceivable spares.

So the short version is not to let them get away with it or be fobbed off.

Longer term, I changed strategy and now put a sum of money into a
domestic appliance (includes boiler) high interest account. Against
the boiler, that is proportionally higher and covers servicing.
Overall it seems to be a better strategy than lending BG money.

"Andy Hall" wrote in message
...
On 2006-12-13 06:31:50 +0000, Colin Brook said:

Longer term, I changed strategy and now put a sum of money into a domestic
appliance (includes boiler) high interest account. Against the boiler,
that is proportionally higher and covers servicing.
Overall it seems to be a better strategy than lending BG money.

Agree up to a point but £13/month or so is not bad for a housebound
householder with no practical ability, but for a working household the
inconvenince of repeat visits is a PITA which has to be costed. That said
the cost of spares is worrying and its not always straightforward to
faultfind without access to spares, just one of the reasons why the typical
repair man is so crap. Just done an excercise which shows the four or so
most expensive spares together cost about the same as the same boiler bought
discount. Maybe buying a boiler to canabalise is an option.

Jim A

On Wed, 13 Dec 2006 16:00:26 GMT, "Jim Alexander"
wrote:

|
|"Andy Hall" wrote in message
...
| On 2006-12-13 06:31:50 +0000, Colin Brook said:
|
| Longer term, I changed strategy and now put a sum of money into a domestic
| appliance (includes boiler) high interest account. Against the boiler,
| that is proportionally higher and covers servicing.
| Overall it seems to be a better strategy than lending BG money.
|
|Agree up to a point but ?13/month or so is not bad for a housebound
|householder with no practical ability, but for a working household the
|inconvenince of repeat visits is a PITA which has to be costed. That said
|the cost of spares is worrying and its not always straightforward to
|faultfind without access to spares, just one of the reasons why the typical
|repair man is so crap. Just done an excercise which shows the four or so
|most expensive spares together cost about the same as the same boiler bought
|discount. Maybe buying a boiler to canabalise is an option.

I refuse all *appliance* breakdown insurance. IMO the cost of paying for
repairs or an new item, if problems occur, is always less than the cost of
the insurance which includes a massive profit for the insurance company.
--
Dave Fawthrop dave hyphenologist co uk Google Groups is IME the *worst*
method of accessing usenet. GG subscribers would be well advised get a
newsreader, say Agent, and a newsserver, say news.individual.net. These
will allow them: to see only *new* posts, a killfile, and other goodies.

On Wed, 13 Dec 2006 16:00:26 GMT Jim Alexander wrote :
Agree up to a point but £13/month or so is not bad for a housebound
householder with no practical ability, but for a working household
the inconvenince of repeat visits is a PITA which has to be costed.

There was a fault on my mum's Celsius which I should have been able
to spot, but didn't. I was hoping to organise a callout from one of
Keston's own engineers but they referred me to a local specialist who
turned up and sorted it first time, all the spares he needed on the
van. Not cheap but convenient. In the past I have had similar good
experience of someone who was a Vaillant specialist rather than a
generalist.

--
Tony Bryer SDA UK 'Software to build on' http://www.sda.co.uk

On Wed, 13 Dec 2006 06:31:50 +0000, Colin Brook wrote:

In message on Wed, 13 Dec 2006, Andy
wrote
"Colin Brook" wrote in message
...

Details of earlier BG problem snipped

Yesterday the BG engineer arrived to carry out the annual service and
safety check and discovered too high levels of CO in the flue gases which
he could not resolve. As a result the device was switched off and an "At
Risk" notice attached. Today the replacement of burner and its gasket and
a couple of other "troublesome" (BG's words) gaskets has not solved the
problem and we are once again without the boiler for another 24 hours
whilst other parts are collected and the trial and error diagnosis
continues.

What's the status of this "at risk" notice and is there anything we can do
to get the 'experts' called in to speed diagnosis and resolution - not
looking forward to a Christmas without water and heating.

Look forward to comments etc..
Colin

BG have a very bad reputation on this newsgroup, specifically, for
charging through the nose for work and for condemning boilers
needlessly ( "can't get the parts anymore mate" etc ) . If you're on a
maintenance contract with them I guess you're at their mercy, unless
you bin them and get an independent in......

Hello Andy - I'm a BG cynic too but this Keston has been a lot of
trouble and although I've used an independent and very good engineer
before he wasn't prepared to offer an annual contact and I was keen to
have one. Hence BG, who at the time (three years ago) were the only
people I could find who would put the Keston onto a maintenance
contract.

Of the ones I have fitted a couple have needed new gas valves. This seems
to be the stock fault for this model. I have one in my own home and it has
been very reliable.

If the CO readings are high then I would ask what the CO2 reading are.
The gas valve or it's setup would be in the centre of the frame.



--
Ed Sirett - Property maintainer and registered gas fitter.
The FAQ for uk.diy is at http://www.diyfaq.org.uk
Gas fitting FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFitting.html
Sealed CH FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/SealedCH.html
Choosing a Boiler FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/BoilerChoice.html
Gas Fitting Standards Docs he http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFittingStandards

In article ,
Ed Sirett writes:
Of the ones I have fitted a couple have needed new gas valves. This seems
to be the stock fault for this model. I have one in my own home and it has
been very reliable.

If the CO readings are high then I would ask what the CO2 reading are.
The gas valve or it's setup would be in the centre of the frame.

I was thinking about this, and my guess was that the internal flue
might be split, resulting in recirculating combustion products through
the burner and reducing the available oxygen, which would produce
excess CO.

Measurements of CO from my Keston flue are about 40ppm at max load.
That level in air is perfectly safe for a healthy to breath for many
hours, and less than you are likely to be exposed to whilst operating
a gas grill in your kitchen for 20 minutes.

--
Andrew Gabriel

On Thu, 14 Dec 2006 19:23:54 +0000, Andrew Gabriel wrote:

In article ,
Ed Sirett writes:
Of the ones I have fitted a couple have needed new gas valves. This seems
to be the stock fault for this model. I have one in my own home and it has
been very reliable.

If the CO readings are high then I would ask what the CO2 reading are.
The gas valve or it's setup would be in the centre of the frame.

I was thinking about this, and my guess was that the internal flue
might be split, resulting in recirculating combustion products through
the burner and reducing the available oxygen, which would produce
excess CO.

Measurements of CO from my Keston flue are about 40ppm at max load.
That level in air is perfectly safe for a healthy to breath for many
hours, and less than you are likely to be exposed to whilst operating
a gas grill in your kitchen for 20 minutes.


I beleive that 50 ppm is maximum level that is considered safe.



--
Ed Sirett - Property maintainer and registered gas fitter.
The FAQ for uk.diy is at http://www.diyfaq.org.uk
Gas fitting FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFitting.html
Sealed CH FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/SealedCH.html
Choosing a Boiler FAQ http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/BoilerChoice.html
Gas Fitting Standards Docs he http://www.makewrite.demon.co.uk/GasFittingStandards

In message on Wed, 13 Dec 2006,
Ed Sirett wrote
In message on Wed, 13 Dec 2006, Andy
wrote
"Colin Brook" wrote in message
...

Details of earlier BG problem snipped

Yesterday the BG engineer arrived to carry out the annual service and
safety check and discovered too high levels of CO in the flue gases which
he could not resolve.

BG have a very bad reputation on this newsgroup, specifically, for
charging through the nose for work and for condemning boilers
needlessly ( "can't get the parts anymore mate" etc ) . If you're on a
maintenance contract with them I guess you're at their mercy, unless
you bin them and get an independent in......

Hello Andy - I'm a BG cynic too but this Keston has been a lot of
trouble and although I've used an independent and very good engineer
before he wasn't prepared to offer an annual contact and I was keen to
have one. Hence BG, who at the time (three years ago) were the only
people I could find who would put the Keston onto a maintenance
contract.

Of the ones I have fitted a couple have needed new gas valves. This
seems to be the stock fault for this model. I have one in my own home
and it has been very reliable.

If the CO readings are high then I would ask what the CO2 reading are.
The gas valve or it's setup would be in the centre of the frame.
Well thanks for all the input; the problem was the gas valve which had
been replaced back in May (and may never have been set up properly then
- which would help explain the most recent fuel usage being so much
higher than normal).

The input from this group helped me convince BG to get on to Keston
themselves (I'd already been in touch with them) and bring in a more
experienced engineer who recognised the need to adjust CO2 levels via
valve and then gas valve fault was discovered. New gas valve resulted,
after 'calibration?, in the CO levels reducing radically to acceptable
levels.

Now I need to get onto BG to get them to come back and sort out the
assortment of nuts and bolts lying on the floor beneath the boiler -
never a confidence boosting factor. I'll be happy to fit the case
securing screw which has been left out causing the case to boom terribly
on ignition.

Thanks for all inputs;

Colin
Currently considering who to move the service responsibility to now.
--
Colin Brook - Winchester (UK)

Fax:+44(0)8701641293 Mobile:07976258703