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**im reposting this because i needed to make some edits to the first thread i made and i cant because its been more than an hour since i first posted..this thread is the edited version***
hi i hope you are all well.
im after advice as to the best place to spend money to keep our house a bit more snug. we intend to be here for at least 15 years. bear with me, i will describe the house
ive moved into a new house (well, its far from new, the original was built circa 1920) and back in april, when we moved in and before i turned it off, the gas heating cost £170 for the first month.
the house has 3 parts, the original house has solid walls (flemish) but because of the 2 extensions, only 1 corner is now external (my sons bedroom and the room below it).
there is a 1960's extention which comprises the garage and my office on the ground floor and a 1980's extention which is our bedroom and the lounge beneath it.
there are 21 radiators. they are all steel and un-finned and pretty big
ive turned a lot of them off after the first months gas bill in may, before turning the heating off entirely until last weekend.
now its getting cold again....
our boiler is a condenser (british gas 330). i dont know how old it is but it has a sticker saying that inhibitor was added in 2007 so its a least 9 years old.
the immersion tank is old, and has almost no insulation. if i heat in the between 7 and 8.30 by midday the water is cold again.
the hot water and rad heating is vented
im looking at getting solar panels (2 x VKR 4000 Series 14 tube panel), a 300 litre gledhill tank and pressurising the radiator system. i want to leave the hot water vented as then im not at the mercy of the local water pressure - we have electric pumps for the showers.
the rhi payments are estimated to be about £2.5k in total which means that the new solar system will cost us, including the radiator changes detailed below, about £2k. i know roughly what hot water costs us because ive calculated it whilst the heating was off over the summer - about 65p per day. so it will take a while to pay back but the tank is knackered anyway and needs replacing, plus the rhi is going to dissapear by the end of the year so if we are going to do it, we need to do it asap.
im also looking at flushing (powerflush) the rad system as its definately sludged up
there are a number of obvious things to do which we will do once the roof is fixed:
theres virtually no loft insulation.
theres no felt under the roof (we are having the roof replaced next week as theres no felt and most of the tiles are delaminating)|
i was also going to replace about 13 of the existing radiators for new finned versions, and leave the rest off (theres 2 in the downstairs corridor, 2 on the upstairs landing and a few in toilets that probably arent worth bothering to change)
we've got some money to sort the house out but theres a lot needs doing - theres roof, electrics and heating...we dont have a limitless pot of money but im interested in doing things that will make the house warmer and reduce our bills.
ive looked at underfloor heating (most of the downstairs is suspended timber floors which could be ripped up, scalpings put down, screed and insulation etc put in) but i dont see from the research ive done that it will save much money. im not interested in how the radiators look, just how they function, how much it costs, and how warm the house feels.
i relaise that the bills are going to be bigger than our last house
so a few questions....
is it worth replacing the radiators...will it make much difference? ive been quoted £125 per (finned steel) radiator to supply and fit.
are aluminium radiators going to save any money?
i was looking at zoning - probably using honeywell kit - does this make much of a difference? there are 4 rooms upstairs, 3 of which we want to heat every night (the other is a guest bedroom) and 1 room downstairs i want to heat all day (my office as i work from home)
am i missing a trick somewhere - is there anything else i can do to spend the money more wisely to make a bigger difference?
thanks in advance for your help.
hi i hope you are all well.
im after advice as to the best place to spend money to keep our house a bit more snug. we intend to be here for at least 15 years. bear with me, i will describe the house
ive moved into a new house (well, its far from new, the original was built circa 1920) and back in april, when we moved in and before i turned it off, the gas heating cost £170 for the first month.
the house has 3 parts, the original house has solid walls (flemish) but because of the 2 extensions, only 1 corner is now external (my sons bedroom and the room below it).
there is a 1960's extention which comprises the garage and my office on the ground floor and a 1980's extention which is our bedroom and the lounge beneath it.
there are 21 radiators. they are all steel and un-finned and pretty big
ive turned a lot of them off after the first months gas bill in may, before turning the heating off entirely until last weekend.
now its getting cold again....
our boiler is a condenser (british gas 330). i dont know how old it is but it has a sticker saying that inhibitor was added in 2007 so its a least 9 years old.
the immersion tank is old, and has almost no insulation. if i heat in the between 7 and 8.30 by midday the water is cold again.
the hot water and rad heating is vented
im looking at getting solar panels (2 x VKR 4000 Series 14 tube panel), a 300 litre gledhill tank and pressurising the radiator system. i want to leave the hot water vented as then im not at the mercy of the local water pressure - we have electric pumps for the showers.
the rhi payments are estimated to be about £2.5k in total which means that the new solar system will cost us, including the radiator changes detailed below, about £2k. i know roughly what hot water costs us because ive calculated it whilst the heating was off over the summer - about 65p per day. so it will take a while to pay back but the tank is knackered anyway and needs replacing, plus the rhi is going to dissapear by the end of the year so if we are going to do it, we need to do it asap.
im also looking at flushing (powerflush) the rad system as its definately sludged up
there are a number of obvious things to do which we will do once the roof is fixed:
theres virtually no loft insulation.
theres no felt under the roof (we are having the roof replaced next week as theres no felt and most of the tiles are delaminating)|
i was also going to replace about 13 of the existing radiators for new finned versions, and leave the rest off (theres 2 in the downstairs corridor, 2 on the upstairs landing and a few in toilets that probably arent worth bothering to change)
we've got some money to sort the house out but theres a lot needs doing - theres roof, electrics and heating...we dont have a limitless pot of money but im interested in doing things that will make the house warmer and reduce our bills.
ive looked at underfloor heating (most of the downstairs is suspended timber floors which could be ripped up, scalpings put down, screed and insulation etc put in) but i dont see from the research ive done that it will save much money. im not interested in how the radiators look, just how they function, how much it costs, and how warm the house feels.
i relaise that the bills are going to be bigger than our last house
so a few questions....
is it worth replacing the radiators...will it make much difference? ive been quoted £125 per (finned steel) radiator to supply and fit.
are aluminium radiators going to save any money?
i was looking at zoning - probably using honeywell kit - does this make much of a difference? there are 4 rooms upstairs, 3 of which we want to heat every night (the other is a guest bedroom) and 1 room downstairs i want to heat all day (my office as i work from home)
am i missing a trick somewhere - is there anything else i can do to spend the money more wisely to make a bigger difference?
thanks in advance for your help.
