LPG to Oil and Hot Water

ristac

ristac

ristac

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We’re soon to be moving to a rural property, I’m estimating a 70s build, it has Calor Gas supplied from an outside tank. The boiler is around 15 years old, possibly a bit older, the hot water is supplied by a large tank on a timer.

As we might soon need to replace the boiler, what are the best options.

I’ve read LPG is more expensive than Oil, I’m assuming it’s not cost effective to switch to oil.

Would switching to a combi boiler be relatively easy, we hate the thought of running out of hot water, it’s a 5 bed house three adults two children we all like to shower in the morning and at least two baths in the evening.

There are 10 solar panels on the roof, no battery, FIT payments are made but minimal from what I understand. I believe the hot water can be boosted on electric.

Options and thoughts please.
 
We're rural and off the gas grid, we went with tank LPG gas, when i ran the numbers 8 years ago it was about the same price as oil but you could bury the gas tank and people can't steal gas where there is a lot of theft of heating oil so those swung it for me.

We've got a LPG combi boiler and it works exactly the same as a mains gas one, gas is mega expensive, think it's like 90pence per litre currently..
 
sovietspybob said:
We're rural and off the gas grid, we went with tank LPG gas, when i ran the numbers 8 years ago it was about the same price as oil but you could bury the gas tank and people can't steal gas where there is a lot of theft of heating oil so those swung it for me.

We've got a LPG combi boiler and it works exactly the same as a mains gas one, gas is mega expensive, think it's like 90pence per litre currently..
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At present we’re edging towards the combi boiler replacement
 
If you are ripping out an existing LPG install for something else, a heat pump is likely to be the cheapest option and most importantly, have lower running costs.

There is £7,500 of free cheddar to do that at the moment.

PS, what ever you do, don’t get rid of the water tank, you’ll regret it. A hot water cylinder is 100% the right choice for a big property. A combi boiler can’t supply mains pressure hot water to multiple outlets at once.

You are not limited to filling the hot water by a timer, particularly when using fossil fuels, just refill it as you need/use it, it’s not a once per day kind of thing. The heat loss on a modern cylinder is negligible, we are talking 1-3kWh/day depending on size.

Hot water cylinders are required on low energy systems like heat pumps, they are very much here to stay so definitely don’t get rid of it in any case because you’ll be putting it back in the next time you’ll need to replace the boiler and you can no longer buy one.
 
Seeing as your rural have you thought about a biomass boiler? The new fangled gasification boilers are meant to be really efficient and also burn the wood down better to produce less ash and are easier to clean. It's what I'll be considering when it's time to replace our old wood biomass non-gasification boiler.

It's cheaper energy than oil or gas and is renewable but you'll need somewhere to store the wood pellets or logs. However, if you have any Greta sorts in your family they really won't like it.
 
I went from oil /hot water tank to new (old)house and fitted oil combi boiler - I regret it to this day -13 yrs ago when we did it I had so much to do that renewing existing hot water tank system was to much but now I certainly wished I had.
Burning wood in this day and age is certainly not cheap by any means. 1cubic metre is now £140 here.
 
DXP55 said:
I went from oil /hot water tank to new (old)house and fitted oil combi boiler - I regret it to this day -13 yrs ago when we did it I had so much to do that renewing existing hot water tank system was to much but now I certainly wished I had.
Burning wood in this day and age is certainly not cheap by any means. 1cubic metre is now £140 here.
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Can't you just go out and cut some trees down?

I guess it's not the done thing.
 
Oil is generally cheaper and I think with LPG you get tied into a contract plus paying for the tank rental. LPG boilers are more efficient probably but I doubt that makes up for paying more per litre, they are cheaper to install though.

I went oil and its an outside boiler so none of the noise and smell of indoor oil burners.

If starting from scratch though id seriously consider a heat pump.
 
BUDFORCE said:
Can't you just go out and cut some trees down?

I guess it's not the done thing.
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That tends to annoy the owner of the trees you cut down (to say the least).

Oil:

Free to shop around suppliers when you need to order
You pay the market price. Which can be good (when it's cheap) or bad when it's expensive (obviously!). In eight years, we've paid anything from 26p per litre to 71ppl. The average is 44ppl.
Risk of theft from your tank

LPG

Tied into a contract (typically two years IIRC)
If the supplier has delivery problems, you might be in trouble. There's stories of suppliers like Calor having delivery problems and backlogs during some of the lockdowns.

We also have bottled LPG for the hob on our range cooker. The 47kg cylinders last ages for us.
 
DXP55 said:
I went from oil /hot water tank to new (old)house and fitted oil combi boiler - I regret it to this day -13 yrs ago when we did it I had so much to do that renewing existing hot water tank system was to much but now I certainly wished I had.
Burning wood in this day and age is certainly not cheap by any means. 1cubic metre is now £140 here.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't recommend a log burning boiler unless you have the time, space and inclination to cut and split it yourself. I got 20T from the forestry commission and did this but it's hard work.

The modern way is a wood pellet boiler and with a good hopper it's almost automatic but take a lot of storage space. I don't know how the cost of pellets compares to other fuels though.

If only the technology for ground source heating would catch up and reduce in cost.
 
Our house had an LPG tank and boiler when we moved in. We replaced it all with an ASHP, plus solar panels few years ago. It's been great, plus it's nice not have a whacking big gas tank sitting in the drive.
 
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I just purchased a rural property which needed a very old oil to warm air system replacing.

After a lot of consideration and discussion with various folks, I went for ASHP + Solar. I found that the companies wanting to keep oil were really only recommending it because it would be a quick job for them.

Channeled the floors out downstairs for wet UFH and rads upstairs.

The 7.5k gov grant is certainly welcome.
 
PAz said:
I just purchased a rural property which needed a very old oil to warm air system replacing.

After a lot of consideration and discussion with various folks, I went for ASHP + Solar. I found that the companies wanting to keep oil were really only recommending it because it would be a quick job for them.

Channeled the floors out downstairs for wet UFH and rads upstairs.

The 7.5k gov grant is certainly welcome.
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What was the total outlay after the grant if you don’t mind me asking
 
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For the heatpump (16kw), cylinder, rads and wiring up the UFH it came to 9k [after the grant]. That included the pipework btw.

UFH channeling / pipework / manifold etc on top was 4k
 
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