Uh Oh! Boiler down

Not IME.

Bank it up, shut the dampers and the room will still be warm in the
morning.

 

What awful memories.
Thank **** for gas. And fan heaters. And Little Devil propane space heaters.

 

Good old steam engine technology, eh?

 

I've just had a call from my tenant down south. The boiler in my other place
has just gone and the first quote is for €3500. Urk.

 

took a blunt brush and painted...

I was having a conversation with my BIL over Christmas about real fires and
chimneys.

Why don't they make chimneys a shallow zig zag shape? They would heat up a
considerably larger surface area of the wall and so be more efficient.

I know back boilers exist, but I'm not on about having the complexity of a
boiler and all its associated plumbing, just a wiggly chimney.

Ok, chimney sweeps would need to get their thinking caps on, but apart from
that.

<thinks>

The zig zag could run the width of the wall, with access panels (removable
bricks) at each "zag", that would solve the cleaning problem.

Would the savings in coal compensate for the increase in house build costs?

 

If it can repair a 30yo fuel boiler, then I'll go for it.

 

Checked up on the boiler scrappage scheme?

 

I have enough trouble with shite chimneys that the bloody Victorians
built without anyone from the here and now messing about with them.
The fire at the bottom burns nicely if you have a 'draw'.
This is the movement of air up the chimney caused by the fire heating up
the air.
Making the flue longer and bent causes the hot air to lose its heat (1)
and slow down its upward movement.
Not good.

1. Which you think is a good thing

 

Odds on its just the condensate drain pipe frozen outdoors.
Get them to locate said pipe and pour a few kettles of boiling water
over it to clear the blockage.
Then disconnect power, reboot, press a few buttons and away to go.

The guy who fixed next door's boiler this morning has been doing 30
callouts a day for the same problem, he just chops the pipe indoors
leaves a bucket under the cut end and shedules a proper pipe job
for later - IOW a quick bodge to fit as many as possible into a day.

 

Could be, but the boiler is over 30yo and apparently the parts can't be
got hold of anymore. It's a fuel boiler (I suppose it means parrafin)
and I knew it was going to give up the ghost sometime. IIRC, there
aren't any parts of the boiler outside, apart from the fuel line from
the tank to the house. It's not giving hot water anymore, which is a
problem, as the area where the house is in, is averaging -5°C to -10°C
each day.

 

Le scrappage de chauffage ?

 

A neighbour tried to market a system for absorbing the "waste" heat into
the central heating circuit. He went bust after a while. I suspect his
system was too efficient, so there was not a big enough temperature
gradient in the flue/chimney.

 

Doesn't apply in deepest France. :-/

 

"Move to a less parky area"

 

So stick a fan at the top.

God, do I have to think of everything?

 

I was having a conversation with my BIL over Christmas about real fires and
chimneys.

Why don't they make chimneys a shallow zig zag shape? They would heat up a
considerably larger surface area of the wall and so be more efficient.
[/QUOTE]

My parents have a real fire and have enough trouble with smoke blow back
with a relatively straight chimney run[1], gawd knows what it would be
like with a zig zag wotsit.

I do miss a real fire though :-(

[1] Tried lots of fancy chimney pots, in the end a bit of tasteful(!)
copper screwed to the lip of the fireplace helped a lot.

 

Unlikely to be the same problem then.
My comments above are specific to modern condensing boilers.

 

Russian stove, Katchelofen, Polish stove.
All based on that very principle and very efficient.
Design goes back centuries.

 

Not if it's properly designed, it doesn't. In fact you can run a length
of the flue upside down if you want.

 

Stoves can be made very efficient making proper use of primary and
secondary air, re-burning smoke and radiating the heat more effectively.

....but they're not open fires.