What would be a rough guess for the price to replace my old combi with
another one in same position? Just the fitting, as I am looking to get
a unit myself after looking around a bit more.

I currently have an 80k btu unit and would want to move up to a more
powerful one over 100k btu.
I am also considering getting one with instant hot water.

Any advice gratefully accepted.

I am in East Kent.



Steve....

I currently have an 80k btu unit and would want to move up to a more
powerful one over 100k btu.

Do you know if the current gas supply pipe is rated for the greater power?
If it was marginal upon original installation, it may need a new pipe, which
may dramatically affect the price.

A few other questions:

(a) Can you put a new flue straight out through the wall onto your own
properties, away from windows, doors and boundaries? If not, describe the
location and existing flue arrangements further.

(b) Can you provide drainage at the boiler location?

(c) Can you provide mains water supply at the boiler location?

I am also considering getting one with instant hot water.

For this add:

(d) Is there easy access to the existing hot water pipework at the boiler
location?

(e) Have you measured the flow rate of your mains water supply? What is it?

Christian.

Christian McArdle Mar 9, 9:20 am show options

Newsgroups: uk.d-i-y
From: "Christian McArdle" =AD; - Find
messages by this author
Date: Wed, 9 Mar 2005 17:20:28 -0000
Local: Wed, Mar 9 2005 9:20 am
Subject: Price of fitting combi boiler
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I currently have an 80k btu unit and would want to move up to a more
powerful one over 100k btu.


Do you know if the current gas supply pipe is rated for the greater
power?

****No idea!****


If it was marginal upon original installation, it may need a new pipe,
which
may dramatically affect the price.

A few other questions:


(a) Can you put a new flue straight out through the wall onto your own
properties, away from windows, doors and boundaries? If not, describe
the
location and existing flue arrangements further.

****Yes, no problem, already a flue there for current combi****


(b) Can you provide drainage at the boiler location?

****Yes*****


(c) Can you provide mains water supply at the boiler location?


****Yes, already there for current combi****



I am also considering getting one with instant hot water.


For this add:

(d) Is there easy access to the existing hot water pipework at the
boiler
location?

*****Yes, pipework already there****


(e) Have you measured the flow rate of your mains water supply? What is
it?=20


****No, but quite a powerful supply******


Christian.

"dog-man" wrote in message
oups.com...
What would be a rough guess for the price to replace my old combi with
another one in same position? Just the fitting, as I am looking to get
a unit myself after looking around a bit more.

I currently have an 80k btu unit and would want to move up to a more
powerful one over 100k btu.
I am also considering getting one with instant hot water.

Any advice gratefully accepted.

I am in East Kent.
£350 in SE London if there are no new pipe runs. Half a day's work, so
still
money for old rope.

Stuart Noble wrote:
"dog-man" wrote in message
oups.com...

What would be a rough guess for the price to replace my old combi with
another one in same position? Just the fitting, as I am looking to get
a unit myself after looking around a bit more.

I currently have an 80k btu unit and would want to move up to a more
powerful one over 100k btu.
I am also considering getting one with instant hot water.

Any advice gratefully accepted.

I am in East Kent.

£350 in SE London if there are no new pipe runs. Half a day's work, so
still
money for old rope.

Hmmmn....

Locate cold main stopcock & close it, locate suitable drain point for ch
and drain it (ideally having run system hot on old boiler to help flush
out), locate FCU for ch and turn off, locate gas meter and emergency
control valve and turn off[1]. Of course all these items are (a) present
(b) accessible (c) work.

Disconnect pipework & electrics, dismantle boiler & remove it. (Are we
leaving it with the customer or disposing of it, and if so how's it
getting to where it's going? Oh, and how did the new boiler get to the
customer's place: we didn't have to spend time in the pm picking it up,
did we?).

Lucky the new boiler can use exactly the same flue hole as the old one
or we'd have had to spend time putting in a new hole and making good the
old one.

Fit new boiler & flue to wall. Redo pipework. Just as well pipe
arrangements were standardised back in the mid 21st century - all that
faffing about jiggling flow, return, dhw, main, gas and prd pipework
between one boiler and another that our grandfathers had to do, what a
palaver eh?! Oh, nearly forgot the condensate drain.

Check the gas pipework. Reconnect electrics. They were correctly done in
the first place weren't they? nice heat-resistant cable etc. And a room
stat, and programmer (or prog stat). Good, no time wasted putting that
right then.

Can we reuse the existing filling loop arrangement? It does have 2
isolation valves and a double check as per current regs? And they all
work properly? And what about a scale inhibitor?

OK, good, ready to go: fill ch system (with flushing compound, of
course: not cheap stuff but lets not spoil the ship ... and it's
mandated for the benchmark anyway). Bleed the system, check for leaks.
Check boiler installation manual for anything else we need to do in
commissioning. And fire it up. Check operation - DHW working OK, CH OK?
Then get it all good & hot, and flush it out and refill again, this time
with inhibitor (not cheap either but ...). Bleed again, heat up again.
Seems to be generally working, so fill in the benchmark book. Need flow
& return temps, DHW temp rise at flow rate, gas pressure, gas rate. Test
operation of controls, etc etc as per mfr's instructions etc. Explain
operation of controls to customer & hand over. Job done.

Half a day's work, so still money for old rope.

Wonder what they do on planets with shorter days than ours?



[1] having checked what other gas appliances are connected, and that
they're satisfactorily installed because by restoring gas to them later
we'll be taking responsibility for them being in a safe condition to
leave with the customer

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 17:10:05 +0000, John Stumbles wrote:


money for old rope.

Hmmmn....

Locate cold main stopcock & close it, locate suitable drain point for ch
and drain it (ideally having run system hot on old boiler to help flush
out) [1.1]

, locate FCU for ch and turn off, locate gas meter and emergency
control valve and turn off[1]. Of course all these items are (a) present
(b) accessible (c) work.
[1.2]


Disconnect pipework & electrics, dismantle boiler & remove it. (Are we
leaving it with the customer or disposing of it, and if so how's it
getting to where it's going? Oh, and how did the new boiler get to the
customer's place: we didn't have to spend time in the pm picking it up,
did we?).

Lucky the new boiler can use exactly the same flue hole as the old one
or we'd have had to spend time putting in a new hole and making good the
old one.
[2]


Fit new boiler & flue to wall[3]. Redo pipework. Just as well pipe
arrangements were standardised back in the mid 21st century - all that
faffing about jiggling flow, return, dhw, main, gas and prd pipework
between one boiler and another that our grandfathers had to do, what a
palaver eh?! Oh, nearly forgot the condensate drain.
ROFL


Check the gas pipework. Reconnect electrics. They were correctly done in
the first place weren't they? nice heat-resistant cable etc. And a room
stat, and programmer (or prog stat). Good, no time wasted putting that
right then.

That's assuming that the old boiler was also a combi. So there won't be
any HW cylinders to drain & remove. S plan and Y-plan valves to remove.


Can we reuse the existing filling loop arrangement? It does have 2
isolation valves and a double check as per current regs? And they all
work properly? And what about a scale inhibitor?

OK, good, ready to go: fill ch system (with flushing compound, of
course: not cheap stuff but lets not spoil the ship ... and it's
mandated for the benchmark anyway). Bleed the system, check for leaks.
Check boiler installation manual for anything else we need to do in
commissioning. And fire it up. Check operation - DHW working OK, CH OK?
Then get it all good & hot, and flush it out and refill again[4], this
time with inhibitor (not cheap either but ...). Bleed again, heat up
again. Seems to be generally working, so fill in the benchmark book [5].
Need flow & return temps, DHW temp rise at flow rate, gas pressure, gas
rate. Test operation of controls, etc etc as per mfr's instructions etc.
Explain operation of controls to customer & hand over. [6] Job done. [8]

Half a day's work, so still money for old rope.

Wonder what they do on planets with shorter days than ours?



[1] having checked what other gas appliances are connected, and that
they're satisfactorily installed because by restoring gas to them later
we'll be taking responsibility for them being in a safe condition to
leave with the customer

[1.1] The drain points (on both flow and return) are of course nicely
situated over a gully outside, and in perfect working order and don't have
disintegrating washers that have fused in place. If
indoors they will of course be of the heavy pattern type with the spindle
O-ring in good order, and high enough up to get a tray under to catch the
odd drip or two.

[1.2] Call Transco to come and change the valve because it will only move
when a 12" wrench has been applied to it. You can probably still get the
old boiler out meanwhile until Transco have come - up to 4
hours for this category of fault.

[2] And that will most likely mean blocking up a 300mm sq. hole from the
old natural draught balanced flue. That means finding reasonably matching
bricks and making up mortar and doing a fair job. Inside you will have to
do something to stop the inner-leaf collapsing but ply and timber work OK.
You have all this gear and tackle with you.

[3] Bearing in mind that the new boiler wants to get its support from
more or less just where the old flue hole used to be.

[4] Also note that the instruction for the flushing stuff say that you
should leave it to run for at least 2 hours.

[5] Also the guarantee registration forms usually need to be at least
partly filled out with information from the fitter.

[6] Whoa there!. There's all those dust sheets we put down to keep
the customers new kitchen/hall carpet nice and new, despite the fact that
old boiler, was full of rusty water [7], weighed 75kg and was coated in
soot.

[7] It was not possible to drain the heat exchanger because the 3/4" taper
plug refused to move even when you applied 18" Stillsons to it, but that
did help to loosen the boiler from the flue and the wall.

[8] You got lucky because the huge cardboard box the new boiler came in
was taken by the kids and turned into wendy-house/inter-galactic
space-ship, saving you the trouble of chopping it up into manageable
squares with a bread knife and feeding it into _your_ dustbin at home.


--
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

"John Stumbles" wrote in message
...
Hmmmn....

Locate cold main stopcock & close it, locate suitable drain point for ch
and drain it (ideally having run system hot on old boiler to help flush
out), locate FCU for ch and turn off, locate gas meter and emergency
control valve and turn off[1]. Of course all these items are (a) present
(b) accessible (c) work.

Disconnect pipework & electrics, dismantle boiler & remove it. (Are we
leaving it with the customer or disposing of it, and if so how's it
getting to where it's going? Oh, and how did the new boiler get to the
customer's place: we didn't have to spend time in the pm picking it up,
did we?).

Lucky the new boiler can use exactly the same flue hole as the old one
or
we'd have had to spend time putting in a new hole and making good the
old
one.

Fit new boiler & flue to wall. Redo pipework. Just as well pipe
arrangements were standardised back in the mid 21st century - all that
faffing about jiggling flow, return, dhw, main, gas and prd pipework
between one boiler and another that our grandfathers had to do, what a
palaver eh?! Oh, nearly forgot the condensate drain.

Check the gas pipework. Reconnect electrics. They were correctly done in
the first place weren't they? nice heat-resistant cable etc. And a room
stat, and programmer (or prog stat). Good, no time wasted putting that
right then.

Can we reuse the existing filling loop arrangement? It does have 2
isolation valves and a double check as per current regs? And they all
work properly? And what about a scale inhibitor?

OK, good, ready to go: fill ch system (with flushing compound, of
course:
not cheap stuff but lets not spoil the ship ... and it's mandated for
the
benchmark anyway). Bleed the system, check for leaks. Check boiler
installation manual for anything else we need to do in commissioning.
And
fire it up. Check operation - DHW working OK, CH OK? Then get it all
good
& hot, and flush it out and refill again, this time with inhibitor (not
cheap either but ...). Bleed again, heat up again. Seems to be generally
working, so fill in the benchmark book. Need flow & return temps, DHW
temp
rise at flow rate, gas pressure, gas rate. Test operation of controls,
etc
etc as per mfr's instructions etc. Explain operation of controls to
customer & hand over. Job done.

Half a day's work, so still money for old rope.

Wonder what they do on planets with shorter days than ours?

Well I have watched the guy in question replace combi with combi on 3
separate occasions and 4 hours is about the average. Moved flue hole on
one.
That was at least another 10 minutes, plus another 10 to make good..
Sure, he has some running around to do in preparation for the job but very
few people start getting paid the minute they fall out of bed.
He has been doing this for over 30 years so I guess he's just got very
good
at it. Does boiler replacements freelance for the local water board etc.
He did tell me, however, that he has given it all up twice in that time.
Once because of a hernia, and again after being blasted with hot water in
a
block of flats somewhere because something that should have prevented it
wasn't functioning. Came back into it because of the CORGI gold rush


ld rush

You missed out the bit about making a hatch to get around under floor and 91 year old customer falling down it neck high. Yes it really did happen to me. Luckily whe was only bruised and was still friends with me after the flowers.

It's humping those back boilers and ideal e types that customers take so much for granted that bugs me.

No way can a square hole be made good in 10 mins. I remove old boiler day one, brick up hole using quick drying cement and return next day to get on with the rest of the job. How can you do it any quicker? What am I missing?

As the other guys have said, even if you didn't have pipework to alter how can you properly flush old system commission new boiler, flush again, refill with inhibitor (getting rid of all air and traipsing round every rad twice each time, once to open it for draining and second to open it for bleading, and check the other gas appliances and gas supply in less than 4 hours, another 3 hours for pipework adaptation 15 mins to drill hole (don't forget to aportion the capital cost of the cored drill and diamond core, which only do a finite set of holes). Don't forget to aportion the cost of the flue gas analyser/electronic manometer required to comission many modern condensing boilers properly.

Yes I'm happy to do it for £350 but it's not money for old rope. It is a good days work but I make more money pro rata from the Brittony II that needs it's pilot jet cleaning.

I was quoted around £350 for the same job in Birmingham but a couple of mates that work for british gas fitted it for me for £200
I thought it was a cheap price but considering they were gone by luchtime with a £100 each in their sky rocket they havn't done too bad have they

Long as you haven't now got a system full of debris and flux you've got a bargain.

coolblue wrote:
I was quoted around £350 for the same job in Birmingham but a couple of
mates that work for british gas fitted it for me for £200
I thought it was a cheap price but considering they were gone by
luchtime with a £100 each in their sky rocket they havn't done too bad
have they

And considering that you won't be covered by their CORGI registration
because they weren't doing the work through their employers books, have
no come-back against them, BG or CORGI if something is wrong, possibly
have voided the boiler manufacturer's warranty, have contravened
Building Regs by not using a contractor able to self-certify, and have
probably also conspired to commit tax evasion ...

Owain

"Paul Barker" wrote in message
...

You missed out the bit about making a hatch to get around under floor
We were talking about a straight combi replacement
another 3 hours for pipework
The last one I witnessed took an hour at most for the pipework, and that
included extending it up the wall by a foot and adjusting for the
different
make of boiler. I guess a lot of this comes down to experience. His pipe
bending seemed to be spot on every time, and all the pipework was pretty
elegant.
Yes I'm happy to do it for £350
But you'd quote more to start with?
but it's not money for old rope. It is a good days work
Plenty of people have to work a week for that, and not unskilled people
either.
but I make more money pro rata from the Brittony II
that needs it's pilot jet cleaning.
I used to use a guy that only did boiler faults. Nice clean suit and an
attache case. Knew his stuff mind, including the electronics. He'd
obviously
decided the physical stuff wasn't for him.

" Yes I'm happy to do it for £350[/i][/color]
But you'd quote more to start with?
but it's not money for old rope. It is a good days work"

No, normally go in at £300 which includes pipework and fittings, but sometimes do it for £200 depending on circumstances.

"Plenty of people have to work a week for that, and not unskilled people
either."

Been there done that worn the T shirt. Plenty of people urn less than me plenty earn more. So what. I shoose to do what I do now at the moment I have the choice to do something else later if I wish, I shall take into account earnings when I make my life choices, as must you. Is your point Gas fitters are overpaid? Rubbish, I'm a qualified nurse and made more money at that.

"I used to use a guy that only did boiler faults. Nice clean suit and an
attache case. Knew his stuff mind, including the electronics. He'd
obviously
decided the physical stuff wasn't for him."

Wish I could be that selective, up here where I work we take all comers. On the occasional day we get a combiswap we do well, but some days we drive around all over town and hardly make up the wages of the guy sitting next to us. Not asking for pitty, just trying to redress the balance. In no way is gas fitting in all parts of the country a license to print money.

On Sat, 12 Mar 2005 19:30:47 +0000, Owain
wrote:

coolblue wrote:
I was quoted around £350 for the same job in Birmingham but a couple of
mates that work for british gas fitted it for me for £200
I thought it was a cheap price but considering they were gone by
luchtime with a £100 each in their sky rocket they havn't done too bad
have they

And considering that you won't be covered by their CORGI registration
because they weren't doing the work through their employers books, have
no come-back against them, BG or CORGI if something is wrong, possibly
have voided the boiler manufacturer's warranty, have contravened
Building Regs by not using a contractor able to self-certify, and have
probably also conspired to commit tax evasion ...

and most possbly breached their contracts of employment with BG.

J

On Thu, 24 Mar 2005 17:01:31 +0000 (UTC), John_ZIZinvalid
wrote:

And considering that you won't be covered by their CORGI registration
because they weren't doing the work through their employers books, have
no come-back against them, BG or CORGI if something is wrong, possibly
have voided the boiler manufacturer's warranty, have contravened
Building Regs by not using a contractor able to self-certify, and have
probably also conspired to commit tax evasion ...

and most possbly breached their contracts of employment with BG.

I can confirm this situation exists. Our boiler broke down last month,
it was covered by an insurance policy (not BG!) so we duly had the
engineer out.

As he was attending to the fault we were having a chat. He said that
Mon-Fri he is corgi-registered thru his employer, but outside working
hours he isn't and he'd have to seek individual corgi membership in
order to do odd jobs.

Makes a farce of the legislation doesn't it? Next they will be passing
a law that says you are only qualified to drive to the shops between
the hours of 9 and 5.

Andrew

Please note that the email address used for posting
usenet messages is configured such that my antispam
filter will automatically update itself so that the
senders email address is flagged as spam. If you do
need to contact me please visit my web site and
submit an enquiry - http://www.kazmax.co.uk

Andrew McKay wrote:
... Next they will be passing a law that says you are only qualified
to drive to the shops between the hours of 9 and 5.

My local "shopmobility" only insures its invalid buggies until 4pm.
Anyone who doesn't return it by closing time isn't covered by insurance
-- big warning notice on door.

Owain