Combi Boiler Condensation Pipe Freezing

kPATm

kPATm

kPATm

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Joined
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Greenock, Scotland
Well as you can imagine its been bloody freezing here the last few days. Now my Flexicom CX30 boiler has a condensation pipe running outside connected to the main drainage pipe. The condensation pipe has frozen a few times in the last couple of days and the boiler shuts off leaving the house freezing cold.

I understand that putting warm water on the pipe will sort it but the pipe is 20feet in the air and there is no way I can get to it safely with 3 feet of snow. Is it possible I can just disconnect the pipe from the boiler and have the condensation flow into a bucket directly underneath? Im not exactly sure how much water actually drains from the condensation pipe so this idea may not be practical if I have to empty the bucket often. Thanks
 
I'm glad my 'here' isn't the same as your 'here' (wherever that is).

AFAIK you're talking about a couple of litres per day.

Time to get that pipework insulated (and slap your installer). I was lucky and all of my boiler's pipework is internal.
 
The Boiler was installed before we bought the property unfortunately. Think I will just let it drain into a bucket for now. Thanks
 
had the exact same issue with my Baxi Platinum yesterday, as i only had it fitted the week before, the installer came back out and put an internal pipe on that drains into a bucket, only took him ~10 mins to get it all working again
 
A big bucket should be fine as long as you keep an eye on it, if you can route it to a sink or bath that would work better, in fact I think my combi boiler condensation pipe routes from the loft down into the bathroom and into the bath waste pipe which may be a useful thought for yourself in the future.
 
kPATm said:
Well as you can imagine its been bloody freezing here the last few days. Now my Flexicom CX30 boiler has a condensation pipe running outside connected to the main drainage pipe. The condensation pipe has frozen a few times in the last couple of days and the boiler shuts off leaving the house freezing cold.

I understand that putting warm water on the pipe will sort it but the pipe is 20feet in the air and there is no way I can get to it safely with 3 feet of snow. Is it possible I can just disconnect the pipe from the boiler and have the condensation flow into a bucket directly underneath? Im not exactly sure how much water actually drains from the condensation pipe so this idea may not be practical if I have to empty the bucket often. Thanks
Click to expand...

This is exactly what I did yesterday. My boiler is on the second floor and I'm not buying a ladder just to attempt to defrost the pipe. You should be able to see the flexable rubber sleeve that connects to the condensation pipe. Just pull it off and catch the water with a bucket. There should be about a litre or so when you first disconnect the pipe and another couple of litres of accumulated water per day.
 
Had to help my dad earlier clear the condensate pipe - last night had what we can only assume were gas supply issues (pipe was clear then) this morning the pipe was pretty much frozen solid.
 
Couldn't you just disconnect the condensate pipe and pour some boiling hot salt water down it?

Little at a time until it cleara
 
I've woken to the same issue this morning. I've got things going again but certainly will get the condenser pipe re-routed so it doesn't have to go outside. It's pretty extreme weather we're having here at the moment and like the OP, the house came like this.

Thankfully there are a ton of people who are here to point out the obvious.

Gawd bless GD!
 
You're lucky it's condensing! So many people run their boilers at too high temps, thinking that it'll make their houses warmer, and therefore they have little to no condensation occurring in their boilers.
 
Don't think you can disconnect this one inside - there is a service port on the outside before the run to the drain fortunately - not really space beneath it to drain inside anyhow.
 
Im in the same situation, i have cut the plastic pipe and have it going into a bucket, i will just reconnect once the cold spell stops.
 
Facebook is currently swamped with people having the same issue. If you can't reach it then disconnect it and put a bowl under the boiler. If the pipe cant be discunnected then it's a case of either wait it out or cut the pipe and have someone fix it later.
 
Yeah my FB feed is full of it as well - I know we've not had that much in the way of real cold weather lately but seems a bit poor they are implemented in such a way in this country it only takes a couple of days of reasonably cold weather to cause problems.
 
if you're going to be adjusting the pipework yourself then be careful with the water, my installer said it has chemicals* in it that can burn the skin
*cant remember what he called the chemical
 
The main central heating loop has inhibitors in it, but do you think regulation would allow multiple thousands of boilers around the UK to be pushing out chemical laden water onto the ground via the condensate drain pipe, think about what the line is for?
 
cainer said:
if you're going to be adjusting the pipework yourself then be careful with the water, my installer said it has chemicals* in it that can burn the skin
*cant remember what he called the chemical
Click to expand...

Quick google says its only very slight - as long as you don't rub it in your eyes or something shouldn't be an issue.

Firestar_3x said:
The main central heating loop has inhibitors in it, but do you think regulation would allow multiple thousands of boilers around the UK to be pushing out chemical laden water onto the ground via the condensate drain pipe, think about what the line is for?
Click to expand...

From the same quick google as above seems that while its very minor from an individual house country wide it is starting to become a problem that no one seems to want to discuss/address :s that is just from google though.
 
It is such a minor acidity problem it really isn't an issue with regards to burning your hands, the main central heating loop has chemical in it however and i'd hazard a guess thats what the plumber was talking about.
 
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