Gas central heating

Merlin5

Merlin5

Merlin5

Soldato
Joined
17 Aug 2009
Posts
18,780
Location
Finchley, London
So I'm having GCH installed in a few weeks. I've had a quote of £2700 for 4 rads, small heated towel rail, combi boiler, 5 x 22mm pipes (flow & return, gas, hot & cold). People tell me that's a decent price. It would be a MAIN Combi boiler, £650, that's the cheapest decent combi boiler apparently. I've got another guy coming over to quote me and he said he wouldn't recommend MAIN as a combi boiler. I said to him "well you fitted me a brand new MAIN water heater 4 years ago and it's been fine". He said "yes but it's different with combi boilers for central heating". He recommends Vaillant. What do you think, anyone here got a MAIN combi boiler? However, someone on this link reckons they're good. http://www.mybuilder.com/questions/...ombi-boiler-overall-for-value-and-reliability

He says
"Hi,
We have fitted over 50 Main eco25kw gas combination boilers this year and recommend these due to they are priced well at £660 Inc vat & very reliable.
Our supplier sold 500 last year with no come backs where as the year prior they sold ferolli and had over 200 complaints where boilers were failing from start.
The main boiler is part of the Baxi group & is user friendly. Ecoten can also offer an extra years guarantee on top of the standard 2.
Check out there spec and you will see they rival the likes of valiant and are way above the bottom end Market with the likes of ferolli & Biasi"
 
Main aren't the worst. As you quoted, they are part of the Baxi group now so mostly use quality parts and just cut a few corners to keep the cost down. You could do worse, but you could also do better (at a price). I would spend the extra personally.
 
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main are the same company as baxi, a british company, they're great to work on, parts are cheap and if you look after it they dont give you any trouble..

ive been fitting these compi's for years and they've been spot on, really..

customer service is very good..
 
I work in a heating merchant and deal with Baxi customer service daily, They are brillant. Never on hold ( If i am its for 1-2minutes ) and they are always very helpful.

Worcester Spare's are the best out there however.
 
Thanks for the replies guys. Seems from what you're saying, MAIN are ok. Just had the guy over who fitted my MAIN water heater and while he said doesn't generally recommend MAIN he said they're not bad combi's, but he would recommend Vaillant and Worcester. He also said Potterton are decent but in the same league as MAIN with MAIN being a bit better. He's going call me with quotes for a MAIN combi, and a Vaillant Pro, both 28kw, as he said 28kw would give me better water pressure from hot taps. At the moment, if I adjust my water heater setting to get more pressure I get less heat and vice versa. So I want more pressure and more heat at the same time.

To stay in my budget which is £2600, it looks like it'll be a MAIN. He 'might' be able to work something out with a Vaillant Pro, but it's looking unlikely for my budget. He also said he might be able to get me 3 to 5 year guarantees, probably longer guarantees on the MAIN.
 
I spec boilers all day long, would never spec a MAIN. We've had too many breakdowns with them. Baxi - don't like. They have a very dodgy history (Baxi Bermuda, replace the board every year). Potterton are great with great customer support, Vaillant are also great now although the old models were trash, Worcester Bosch are great but if it does go wrong - raid a bank.
An extended warranty is a good idea on any make - you don't really want to be stuck in the middle of winter with a £500 bill for fixing it. And don't be fooled by the "Potterton own Baxi" type stuff, it's like saying Aston Martin own Lada - the make their boilers to a price, and that comes with it's good bits and bad bits. And they buy and sell each other's names about 3 times a year.

If I was buying - Vaillant.

Source - I spec boilers for all the small Government buildings in N. Ireland.
 
Oh, and you'll get much better results if you leave him a crate of beer and tell him that what he doesn't drink, take it away - "Spec me a crate of cheap lager?" - and have endless cups of tea or coffee on tap. If he says he's going outside for a smoke, tell him he can smoke inside - BEFORE he gets to the gas bit. Tell him you don't really like the smell of smoke but it goes away pretty quickly. Be good to him, he'll be good to you!
 
petterton main and baxi may all make their own boilers but in the end they all use the same parts so does it really matter if they're all made in different factories ?

if you fit an inhibitor into heating system the mains work perfectly, they wont block up, this is the main thing i fix a lot with these boilers, blocked up heat exchanges, but like i say, if you look after the boiler, it'll look after you..

other thing is air pressure switch breaking down after a year or 2, part costs 25 quid but i think they've started fitting the updated airswitch in the new ones anyway..

i honestly cant fault the main, like any boiler, if you dont look after it, it'll break down, service it once a year and have it fitted properly and ive seen the old ones last a very long time, 10 years easy..

you cant really compare a back boiler to a combi, baxi bermuda back boiler..

i think vailant boilers are fine, i prefer baxi but to compare an old baxi to a new one is like comparing an old vailant to a new one.. all the old boilers wernt all that good
 
You chaps above who spec and service boilers, can you answer me this. My builder got his central heating friend in last week to quote me for the central heating, and the builder said that I need 5 pipes (flow & return, gas, hot & cold) all in 22mm instead of the 15mm I have now, and that my hot water pressure would be stronger. The central heating guy didn't seem to say anything about not needing all 22mm pipes.

The guy that came over today said I only need 22mm for the gas, (flow and return too I think but I could be wrong) but that I didn't need more than the 15mm pipes I have for hot and cold water, and that in fact 22mm could make things worse. He said it's about the combi boiler needing to give out more power, which is why he recommends a minimum of 28kW. Plus I believe there's a pump in the combi boiler. So is that right, just stick with 15mm pipes for hot and cold?
 
The Vaillant in my old flat is still going strong, after 15 years! That's why I like them, and the parts are cheap and easy to replace.
I'm still running a 20 year old oil boiler - could get gas but it's so reliable, anything that goes wrong with it someone mechanically minded can fix. Love the Kabin Pak boilers they do now, but when mine works OK it seems daft to spend money to replace it.
It's like the mechanic's car, always a ****heap.
The cook in our restaurant used to be a plumber, servicing oil boilers every year - we had a laugh the other day, since he lost his job when the construction industry died, he's a chef. Hasn't serviced his own boiler or even cleaned the flue in 5 years... I haven't touched mine except to bleed it in nearly 10, and it was secondhand when I bought it!
 
Merlin5 said:
You chaps above who spec and service boilers, can you answer me this. My builder got his central heating friend in last week to quote me for the central heating, and the builder said that I need 5 pipes (flow & return, gas, hot & cold) all in 22mm instead of the 15mm I have now, and that my hot water pressure would be stronger. The central heating guy didn't seem to say anything about not needing all 22mm pipes.

The guy that came over today said I only need 22mm for the gas, (flow and return too I think but I could be wrong) but that I didn't need more than the 15mm pipes I have for hot and cold water, and that in fact 22mm could make things worse. He said it's about the combi boiler needing to give out more power, which is why he recommends a minimum of 28kW. Plus I believe there's a pump in the combi boiler. So is that right, just stick with 15mm pipes for hot and cold?
Click to expand...

I normally spec 28mm for gas, 22mm for your flow and return hot and cold or heating, then 15mm to each radiator. 15mm all through can be noisy as you will hear the flow if you have to turn the pump up - and for all the difference in price - stick in bigger pipes and insulate them well. He's right about the 22mm needing to give out more power (heat), but you probably want that option, and it does no harm to have extra capacity. "Better looking at it than looking for it" as every plumber will have heard and said a million times.
Oversize your pipes, insulate them well, and get the right boiler - you won't go wrong.
 
Merlin5 said:
You chaps above who spec and service boilers, can you answer me this. My builder got his central heating friend in last week to quote me for the central heating, and the builder said that I need 5 pipes (flow & return, gas, hot & cold) all in 22mm instead of the 15mm I have now, and that my hot water pressure would be stronger. The central heating guy didn't seem to say anything about not needing all 22mm pipes.

The guy that came over today said I only need 22mm for the gas, (flow and return too I think but I could be wrong) but that I didn't need more than the 15mm pipes I have for hot and cold water, and that in fact 22mm could make things worse. He said it's about the combi boiler needing to give out more power, which is why he recommends a minimum of 28kW. Plus I believe there's a pump in the combi boiler. So is that right, just stick with 15mm pipes for hot and cold?
Click to expand...



the bigger the pipe the better the flow rate, so gas is under little pressure and flow and your boiler will be pulling a lot of gas, so 22mm is a minimum for 28kw, depending if you have more gas appliances you may even have to fit a bigger pipe for the gas..

for central heating, depending on how many radiators you have, you can sometimes get away with fitting 15mm pipe but 22mm pipes running into the core of the building and reduced down to 15mm for each radiator is a better job and it'll reduce one radiator getting a lot hotter than the other, they all should heat up equally together and at the same time


cold water, you should have a good water pressure and flow rate to even think about fitting a combi boiler and if you have it'll provide enough for a good hot water flow rate using 15mm pipework
 
And wait for the "teeth-dryer" suck when he says "Well, mate, it's gonna cost around 'sucks air through teeth'" an extortionate amount.
And never ever use British Gas - they outsource their fitters on comission, so go to your local, old-fashioned plumber's merchant and ask him who he uses!
 
Recently had my old back boiler replaced with a Worcester Bosch 30CDi

Cost was £2500

New Boiler
7 Rads
6 TRV's (Drayton TRV4's)
Furnox TF1 System filter
All piping/fitting
Chemical flush (Powerflush wasn't needed)
Inhibitor

Additional instalaltion of a towel radiator I had already bought.

The other local guy wanted £3800

I also had a quote from SSE, they wanted £3200 just for the radiators, no boiler no installations nuthin, they got told where to go :p

We used a few bits of copper pipe (from gas meter to boiler) the rest was pretty much all plastic (JPG Speedfit). Despite plastic not leaking heat as much as copped we also insualted the pipes. Because the carpets and floorbaords were up also we replaced the underlay with could 9 11mm stuff and my god the house is so much warmer.

The boiler itself was a lot smaller than I thought, seems a lot of money for something so small :p It's been placed in a purpose built cupboard in a rear bedroom but even standing next to it with it on full blast its a very quiet beasty.

I can recommend a local fitter to me (North East) or if you do decide on a Worcester boiler they have a section on their website to find local approved fitters, this provides an additional 2 year warranty on top of the standard 5 year.

As for your other choices I know potterton were recently used by a local council up here and they were terrible for breakdown.
Veissman and Vaillant were also brand I ahd been recommended.
MAIN? Never come across them in my research and I did look at stuff in depth.
 
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