Our customer had very recently moved to a picturesque Oast House near Headcorn, Kent.

Oast House Headcorn. AGA chimney probably gone by the time you read this.

Oast Houses are typically found in Kent and although no longer used for their original purpose, retain the round towers and pitched roofs so beloved by picture postcards.

Our customer wanted to maximise their internal space, which is always at a premium in a round house and this meant the larder had to be vacated of a poorly maintained Firebird heat only oil boiler; and the bright yellow oil fired AGA also had to go. Sadly, oil fired AGAs are no longer desirable, being temperamental, old, inefficient things that require maintenance every six months. Many of our customers endure over heated kitchens all through summer as they fear turning it off would result in a service call when the thing won’t relight. Unless you are very lucky finding a buyer on the Bay of E, an oil AGA has only a value related to scrap, and contrary to popular myth, there isn’t much metal in there as you might think.

Firebird with unofficial fire cement combustion seal bodge

A further area of improvement identified in the house was the presence of a hot water storage cylinder in one of the bedrooms, and a very lacklustre water flow rate for showering and washing.

Boiler on its last journey
HPS Croydon deliver our equipment

Luckily, help was at hand in the form of a Navien LCB700 external oil fired combination boiler. This one unit could make the larder a usable space, and also make the water tanks and the hot water cylinder redundant.

Creating the raised plinth for flash flood protection

The Navien LCB700 is a new oil boiler that burns with a blue, rather than an orange flame. The flue gas harmful emissions are therefore reduced, in fact Navien claims their NOx levels are the lowest you will find in the UK domestic oil boiler market.

Compare this to the outgoing one

I’ve covered the fact that the interior of a Navien boiler is around 20 years ahead of anything else available on the market. The oil combi is more advanced still, featuring hot water flow and temperature dynamic control of a sophistication never before seen in the UK oil boiler market.

Metal Tiger Loop combi reservoir improves oil flow and prewarms fuel to burner

The most ideal place to hide our new boiler was on a small patio just outside the kitchen. This was less optimal for the boiler flue outlet, which had a number of windows nearby in what was a relatively small area closed in on three sides.

We took advantage of the long Navien flue lengths and fitted a vertical chimney system, terminating above gutter level. Both the air inlet and combustion air outlet are situated above the roof line, making the boiler extremely quiet and removing the exhaust out of sight.

Before flue system
New Navien flue
New boiler in position

We removed the hot water cylinder, making the bedroom cooler and also releasing more storage space.

As the AGA is going, we added a radiator to the kitchen

The Navien boiler used the Smart-Plus control system, which monitors hot water performance and heating levels, via a desktop panel and an app.

Weather compensation can be used for the heating.

Navien wireless Smart Plus controller
Navien Smart Plus WiFi and thermostat receiver module
Cupboard now has RCD, Magnaclean, and water mini expansion vessel – but no boiler
Just flue aperture to brick up now

We fitted the boiler on a slab plinth, to give additional protection against flooding.

Steam coming from Navien high level terminal

Finally we registered it with Navien UK for their full 10years parts and labour warranty.