Trying to get the heating working correctly

[thompa25]

Hi all, just moved into a new house (new for me, not brand new), and having a few issues with the central heating system. The bloke I was buying the house off did mention that sometimes the upstairs rads get hot, sometimes they dont. I was hoping it would just be a case of balancing the rads, or even as easy as bleeding them. I've since moved in and been playing around. The house is a bungalow but with an attic type room, which is the full size of the house. There are 3 double pannel rads upstairs and 1 towel rail in the en suite, and then a range of rads downstairs. The setup is a system boiler with a grundos pump on the outlet, then into a mid position valve, for either the heating, hot water or both. I attempted to balance the rads, but really had to shut lots of them in to get the rads upstairs working, to the point where i may struggle to heat the downstairs of the house. I tried bleeding them but they were fine. The grundfos pump was a ups 15-60 and looked very tired, so I changed it out for a grunfos ups2 15-50/60. The pump I removed was on setting 3, and the pump i replaced it with is now set to setting 3. Since changing out the pump it has made a difference, an have now got 2 of the double pannel rads upstairs getting red hot and the upstairs towel rail. I was able to open up a couple more rads downstairs and maintain this., however I am still stuck with 2 double pannel rads in the 2 spare bedrooms completely shut in, one of the 2 towel rails in the downstairs bathroom and a single panel rad in the hall shut it. I have also had to shut in one fo the upstairs double pannel rads as this was stone cold. Basically im not very experienced, and looking for a bit of guidance, will an uprated pump help solve my issue? The thing that is putting me off uprating the pump is the fact that it goes through the mid position valve after the pump, and also through the heating coil in the cylinder, which I dont want to over pressurise. The hot water side of things works fine, bar the fact that the separate hot water pump is controlled by a call for hot water by the controller, so not hot water if the hot water isnt switched on, but im going to istall a flow switch and control the pump this way, but thats a different story.


Sorry for the long winded explanation, hopefully someone can give me a few pointers.

Cheers

 

[ShaunCorbs]

I would do an S plan over a y+

 

[thompa25]

Ill get in contact with the bloke and get him round, hopefully it wont be a ball ache to change it out, how many hours labour do you think to convert that to an S plan?

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Ill get in contact with the bloke and get him round, hopefully it wont be a ball ache to change it out, how many hours labour do you think to convert that to an S plan?

Tbh about an hour more plus rewire

 

[thompa25]

I'll be doing all the wiring so just the plumbing side, thanks for your help

 

[thompa25]

Just one more question while trying to get my head around the system. So i have my main water inlet through the combination valve, and teed off to the expansion tank, then into the inlet of the cylinder. What is feeding the secondary pump? and why don't I get hot water unless this is running.

 

[ShaunCorbs]

Just one more question while trying to get my head around the system. So i have my main water inlet through the combination valve, and teed off to the expansion tank, then into the inlet of the cylinder. What is feeding the secondary pump? and why don't I get hot water unless this is running.

You should still get hot water might take 60 seconds but you should still get hot water

 

[thompa25]

I sometimes get warm water but only briefly, and sometimes luke warm, as soon as the pump is running, instant hot water, I'm just confused as to what is feeding the secondary pump if you have your cold water main coming in via the combination valve. My thinking is if i get my head around the system prior to the bloke coming round, we will spend less time messing about trying to explain things to me.

 

[ShaunCorbs]

I sometimes get warm water but only briefly, and sometimes luke warm, as soon as the pump is running, instant hot water, I'm just confused as to what is feeding the secondary pump if you have your cold water main coming in via the combination valve. My thinking is if i get my head around the system prior to the bloke coming round, we will spend less time messing about trying to explain things to me.

All the pump does is draw hot water from the tank (out the hot) to the furthest outlet and back again to the cold inlet

 

[thompa25]

Cheers shaun, but my knowledge is limited, so is the hot water setup like a ring main flowing out the cylinder, into some sort of manifold, which all the outlets are connected, then back to the hot water tank, via the pump, all the pum is doing is just circulating this hot water round the system, getting it to the taps quicker than if there was no pump? im guessing this is then the case so the pump isnt pumping against a closed system, over-pressurising the tank. Thanks for your help

 

[deg]

It looks as if the bronze pump is fed by the cold mains not the hot??

 

[ShaunCorbs]

It looks as if the bronze pump is fed by the cold mains not the hot??

pumping into the cold feed to the cylinder (cylinder doesn't have a secondary port/ tapping)