New model Vaillant in cellar replaces iron commercial
Today’s case study looks at an interesting house near Leatherhead, Surrey, UK. Outwardly, it looks like a chalet bungalow, but at the some point in the past, a massive cellar was excavated underneath with a swimming pool, games room and boiler room. This was some years ago and the present owner has no need for the swimming pool, which together with the associated boiler/plant room, was at the end of its economic life. The pool and house was heated by a large iron open flued commercial boiler with a pressure jet burner. There was masses of wiring in the cellar […]
Large Townhouse in Crystal Palace
Crystal Palace, South London, UK, was a Victorian haven for the well to do, formerly known as Sydenham Hill. The area has been named after the amazing glass and iron building designed by Joseph Paxton, which is no longer with us having been destroyed by fire in 1936. The ornamental gardens associated with the huge exhibition area live on in rather reduced grandeur; the two massive water towers which powered the ornamental fountains and survived the fire were dismantled in the 2nd World War because it was believed they were being used as bombing navigational aids. The area has […]
Outside boiler in Kent
Hello and welcome to our latest post. This job, undertaken during the Olympics, was on a listed property in Four Elms, Kent. It is an oil boiler (we seem to be doing lots of these at the moment), a Perrymatics Jetstreme MkII, and the owners of the property fancied updating it with a new high efficiency model, and relocating it outside the property. As usual, we were pleased to oblige! The Jetstreme was removed from the rear office area creating significantly more room, and also making the house quieter. The old boiler was an ‘open flue’ type so there […]
Viessmann Boiler upgrade and Honeywell EvoHome
Today we are removing a 12 year old Keston condensing gas boiler (don’t see many lasting that long!) and replacing it with a Viessmann WB1B 19Kw compact boiler. Our customer lives in Redhill, Surrey, and is what you would call an early adopter, as he understand technology and the benefits it can bring. He fitted a Trisave condensing boiler in the mid 80’s, then the Keston and now wanted a well made reliable boiler. Enter the Viessmann! He can’t believe how quiet the Viessmann is! We are also changing all the controls, fitting a few new radiators, and fitting […]
Replace oil AGA with new Heritage cooker
In my mind the AGA is a great cooker. It works on the principle of a large heavy mass full of heat, if you stick something cooler and smaller inside (such as the Sunday roast), heat simply transfers from the large heat mass to the small one. There is virtually no air movement in the oven so flavours stay intact, food stays moister. The design is thanks to a 1920s Swedish inventor, today it is still very similar to the original. Which means that energy efficiency is appalling (that is my description, AGA use the words ‘surprisingly economical’). An oil […]
An unusual warm air job using a Bosch Greenstar boiler
This is a house in a remote location near Maidstone, Kent. Some 200 years old, it was bought in a semi derelict condition over 35 years ago by the present owner, whose late husband was an architect. He remodelled and partially rebuilt the house, retaining all the period charm, but incorporating modern upgrades, including adding ducted warm air heating. The heating plant room was around the back of the house in an external cupboard, and the original warm air unit (oil fired) was replaced around 14 years ago by a local contractor. This 1990s unit, a Lennox oil fired cabinet, […]
Kidd boiler removed
The venerable Kidd Very High Efficiency (VHE) boiler is one of my favourites. Designed for Archie Kidd’s personal use in 1959, and then productionised in 1982, it has been the forerunner in condensing high efficiency technology in the UK for 30 years. Forget all the stories you hear about the Vaillant this, or the Worcester that, or the Baxi Bla Bla, the Kidd VHE was the first and last, the design is still current today, and 98% unchanged. OK, so you’ve got a Potterton Kingfisher and it is still going after 25yrs? Not a big deal. The Kidd was available […]
Oil boiler goes up chimney
OK. so we’ve covered a Worcester -Bosch gas boiler using an existing chimney, so here’s an oil boiler version. Sticking with Worcester-Bosch, this one is a Camray Greenstar 18/25 Utility model. We’re in a remote area south of Dorking, Surrey, accessed via a long farm track. The property had a Trianco oiler, made around 16 years ago, with a leaking heat exchanger. This is the end of the road for an oil boiler, because the heat exchanger is the whole metal frame of the boiler. Trianco have always been a budget boiler manufacturer, and have, as a company, seemingly lurched […]
Gas boiler goes up chimney in house
We’re in Purley, Surrey. Our customer has an old atmospheric Potterton Kingfisher II 100,000 Btu in the basement, connected to the internal chimney system. We could have resited the new boiler on the external wall but the flue outlet would have detracted from the external aesthetics of the house, so instead we discussed the option of connecting the new boiler to the old chimney system. This is always the more expensive option, because the new liner system has to be installed from the rooftop and comprises a large number of parts. However, in this instance, our customer wanted an ‘invisible’ […]
Warm air transformed and a new hot water system
Our customer has recently bought a property in the Esher area. Built around 25 years ago, it was heated by two separate Johnson & Starley warm air heaters, one per floor. For hot water, a 295 litre direct gas fired AO Smith cylinder was installed upstairs. There was also a large gas hob and a gas fire. When we totalled up the load for all these appliances, it was around 92kW. This would have been fine, apart for two key problems. The first is that the property had a standard domestic metered supply, which has a maximum design load of […]
