Heating a rural house (Survey Update!)

almoststew1990

almoststew1990

almoststew1990

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12 May 2011
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Southampton
We've viewed a house that we both like and it's in a small village. It has oil central heating and hot water, like the rest of the village. We've always had gas central heating so we're trying to work out if it is worth sticking with the oil (currently have no idea of the condition of the boiler or storage tank). Or if anyone has replaced the oil heating with an air source heat pump?

Is oil heating a problem/inconvenience in of itself? How long does a back garden tank usually last-is it weeks or a couple of months?
 
My folks used to have an oil system and they only had a it filled once a year. They've now changed to a wood pellet system, I have no idea if it's actually saving them any money or they just liked the idea.

The issue with air source is it doesn't get your radiators as hot as a fossil fuel system so you may need larger rads and also better insulation.
 
We have oil. It's fine. The boiler needs a service pretty regularly, or it gets clogged in some way and stops. I tend to just get it serviced whenever it breaks down (approx every other year): it's never been expensive to fix though, pretty much just the charge for a service.

Typical residential oil tank will hold around 1000+ litres. We use about 250 litres per month in December through February, but a lot less when it's just heating water rather than heating the house.

We had to replace the tank a couple of years ago as the plastic was beginning to crack from sun damage. Cost about £2K, but I expect that to last 15+ years.
 
apart from the recent price double oil is fine ,i like the fact i know exactly how much is in my tank ,i am pretty tight so 2 minimum 500 litre orders does me ok.
they are quite cheap to fix ,i put an oil pump and motor on mine (after some years the pumps weep and dry out the motor bearings) 100 quid in parts
i estimated a consumption of maybe 1 litre an hour on my old Worcester bosch
having said all this i would like to go greener and on very hot days my tank will get a bit smelly from the vent
 
Been on oil since early 80's - Then and now we only use about 1100ltr a year - My first load was 10p ltr -last load was 60p ltr - If you can have a hot water tank then you can get a basic boiler -I do hate my Combi
 
Yea we have oil it's fine.

I'd say the only real disadvantage is unless they've rigged up something with gas bottles, its electric to cook on, which isn't as good as gas.
 
on oil here as well and with a big old house its one of the better options, air source isn't likely to get hot enough for us without some serious insulation and rad upgrades which bring their own issues in older houses. We tend to fill a 1500L tank just over once a year but if you have an oil aga you can double that! As mentioned oil boilers are pretty much bullet proof, ours it outdoors in a steel box and we get it serviced once a year.

The one thing to double check is the tank, if its not in good nick the oil company can refuse to fill it, and you run the risk of a spill - a big spill of oil can cost you £20k + to get cleaned up due to the environmental damage! Tanks tend to be double skinned but if the outside doesn't looks great i'd get it properly checked in addition to your survey.

Oil at the moment can be a bit hard to get hold of, and is going crazy price wise which has caused some issues. Its also can be a thief magnet, but find a decent supplier and you should be fine.
 
Siliconslave said:
Oil at the moment can be a bit hard to get hold of, and is going crazy price wise which has caused some issues.
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We filled up just recently, just as this Ukraine thing was kicking off, I think it was .79ppl, last time was about .50ppl. I have heard from others this is now well over £1 a litre, in the space of 3 weeks maybe. Crazy.

We genuinely needed to fill up also, the neighbour mentioned about possible oil prices I wasnt really on the ball at all, but checked the tank and yikes, maybe 100l left. Lucky we filled up when we did.

Hopefully this is a temporary blip due to demand rather than long term pricing due to crazy demand, I mean to say, I am sure long term pricing is going to go up a fair bit, just hopefully not quite like it is right now.

EDIT Holy **** - just checked boiler juice oil prices, £1.70 per litre peaked a few days ago, jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez. The would have been an extra £1000 to fill up the tank! :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:

EDIT 2: we paid .67ppl litre on 28th Feb. LUCKY.
 
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As others mentioned, my parents house was bought new in mid-90s and they have an oil tank and boiler. Causes them no issues, my dad orders 500l at a time I think once or twice a year, can't remember.

Admittedly the prices have hiked up but they aren't far off gas prices either tbh. Wouldn't cause me any concern if you love the house/area otherwise.
 
Thanks for all the input. I think we'll hold off modernising the heating and stick with the oil assuming the price gradually (or rapidly) falls. but will probably add a "tank survey", assuming that is a thing, to the list of surveys should the vendor accept our offer.
 
Some other technical things to know about oil boilers and their servicing; make sure there's a fire valve, fuel filter and water separator fitted to the oil line. The fire valve is a device that has a thermocouple next to the boiler and shuts off the oil supply should there be a fire. The others are self explanatory and ensures you have clean oil going to the boiler. Ask when the jet nozzle of the boiler was last replaced, these are cheap at around a tenner and make a big difference to the efficiency of the boiler.

Also get in to the habit of checking the level of the oil in the tank. You can get an idea for how much you're using and also know if someone's pinched your oil!
 
We've had the survey done and they have identified that the oil tank and boiler has no service history or evidence of servicing, is ancient and potentially unsafe due to being a single skin metal tank. They found drip trays under the tank and it was completely empty so I assume it was deliberately emptied...

Does this raise red flags for you oil heating users out there? We are thinking of replacing the tank with a modern one.

The survey also raised a range of items we anticipated on a house of this age and were aware we would likely have to maintain or replace, but the oil tank issues we couldn't have been aware of from out visit to the property...
 
@almoststew1990 get a proper company to come in and take a look at the tank; you can at least get a quote for a replacement at the same time.

Need to approach surveys with a bit of caution; they overstate every little defect to cover themselves
 
almoststew1990 said:
We've had the survey done and they have identified that the oil tank and boiler has no service history or evidence of servicing, is ancient and potentially unsafe due to being a single skin metal tank. They found drip trays under the tank and it was completely empty so I assume it was deliberately emptied...

Does this raise red flags for you oil heating users out there? We are thinking of replacing the tank with a modern one.

The survey also raised a range of items we anticipated on a house of this age and were aware we would likely have to maintain or replace, but the oil tank issues we couldn't have been aware of from out visit to the property...
Click to expand...
Sounds like the tank outright needs replacing. Metal tanks are always single skin as far as I knew, though. Plastic ones more or less have to be double skin now, I think.

When metal ones start to leak, it tends to be just dripping, whereas plastic ones will split catastrophically and cost a lot to clean up (hence now needing double skin).

The boiler will have had to be serviced in some way whilst in use, as it would have just clogged up within a few years otherwise. Would be good to know if it works though.
 
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