House in the sticks, new install, Gas or oil?

[Trophy Husband]

We have 2 Worcester Bosch Oil fired boilers (very old (1780) large, odd shaped property). One boiler heats the living areas and the other the bedroom areas. We spend roughly £120/month on oil averaged out throughout the year and our boilers are 10 years old so much more efficient ones out there by now. You need to factor in the fluctuations in oil prices Summer/Winter and try to top up in Summer depending upon tank size. The biggest problems with oil is that it gravity feeds to the pump in the boiler, the tank will need periodically de-sludging, you will always have water in your delivery so this needs draining off every few years to ensure it doesn't reach the boiler.

Remember OPEC have agreed to halt/slow down production so prices on the up!

[whoami]

Trophy Husband said:

We have 2 Worcester Bosch Oil fired boilers (very old (1780) large, odd shaped property). One boiler heats the living areas and the other the bedroom areas. We spend roughly £120/month on oil averaged out throughout the year and our boilers are 10 years old so much more efficient ones out there by now. You need to factor in the fluctuations in oil prices Summer/Winter and try to top up in Summer depending upon tank size. The biggest problems with oil is that it gravity feeds to the pump in the boiler, the tank will need periodically de-sludging, you will always have water in your delivery so this needs draining off every few years to ensure it doesn't reach the boiler.

Remember OPEC have agreed to halt/slow down production so prices on the up!

Interesting.

I've never had either the tank "de-sludged" or water drained off.

[Trophy Husband]

whoami said:

Trophy Husband said:

We have 2 Worcester Bosch Oil fired boilers (very old (1780) large, odd shaped property). One boiler heats the living areas and the other the bedroom areas. We spend roughly £120/month on oil averaged out throughout the year and our boilers are 10 years old so much more efficient ones out there by now. You need to factor in the fluctuations in oil prices Summer/Winter and try to top up in Summer depending upon tank size. The biggest problems with oil is that it gravity feeds to the pump in the boiler, the tank will need periodically de-sludging, you will always have water in your delivery so this needs draining off every few years to ensure it doesn't reach the boiler.

Remember OPEC have agreed to halt/slow down production so prices on the up!

Interesting.

I've never had either the tank "de-sludged" or water drained off.

Had to do it several times in recent years after failure of the system (unless I'm being blagged by the service company!).

[V8RX7]

whoami said:

Interesting.

I've never had either the tank "de-sludged" or water drained off.

Steel tanks particularly are prone to condensation.

I drained mine when I moved it - I doubt it had ever been done in 20+yrs, there was very little sludge but around 40 litres of water (or at least high water content oil mix) were at the bottom.

The tanks should have a gradient AWAY from the take off which in my case, means there is 100 litres in the tank when it is "empty" however the drain being in the bottom wall of the tank (rather than the bottom sheet) means the drain doesn't work in a meaningful way as at least 20l is left in the bottom when it is "drained"

[Mothersruin]

Not sure if this helps but we have oil heating but in the kitchen we have an oil fired Rayburn, a gas hob and double electric oven. The original thinking was that even if there was a power cut (we have them regularly) and either the oil or gas happened to run out at the same time, we'd still have at least one way of cooking and heating water.

The gas is supplied by two bottles outside on a switch over valve that goes red when the bottle is empty.

[Blue62]

If you can't access mains gas then my advice would be to go oil, we have lived in our current house for 17 years and I have seen prices go from 9p per litre to 65p, then back down again, but throughout this period i've fared better than my neighbours, one has a gas tank and the other has biomass. The guy with the propane tank has converted back to oil and the biomass lady is in too deep to back out, but wishes she hadn't made the change, costing her more than oil, more hassle but it is a bit warmer. HTH

[Johnnytheboy]

Blue62 said:

...and the biomass lady is in too deep to back out...

[Paul Drawmer]

I think you should consider solar thermal for domestic hot water. Modern evacuated tubes are very efficient, and if you design the system from scratch to take advantage of them, you will make considerable savings over oil or LPG.

Lots of help here:
http://www.navitron.org.uk/forum/index.php/board,6...

[bimsb6]

whoami said:

Interesting.

I've never had either the tank "de-sludged" or water drained off.

Me neither , tank is 25 yrs old and in my workshop if that makes a difference .

[Buzz84]

Paul Drawmer said:

I think you should consider solar thermal for domestic hot water. Modern evacuated tubes are very efficient, and if you design the system from scratch to take advantage of them, you will make considerable savings over oil or LPG.

Lots of help here:
http://www.navitron.org.uk/forum/index.php/board,6...

For some reason I got the suggestion the OP cannot do solar - that might just be PV though so I never mentioned it but our hot water tank is connected to a Solar Thermal and even to this day the pump is kicking in and its our sole source of hot water (our LPG supply hasnt been installed yet so my boiler is only for show currently) we haven't had to turn the immersion heater on at all yet and its impressive to hear it "harvesting" heat from the panel even on overcast days.
well worth a look to suppliment oil or LPG. not too bad to install for us as part of the whole new heating and water system

[sidekickdmr]

Buzz84 said:

For some reason I got the suggestion the OP cannot do solar - that might just be PV though so I never mentioned it but our hot water tank is connected to a Solar Thermal and even to this day the pump is kicking in and its our sole source of hot water (our LPG supply hasnt been installed yet so my boiler is only for show currently) we haven't had to turn the immersion heater on at all yet and its impressive to hear it "harvesting" heat from the panel even on overcast days.
well worth a look to suppliment oil or LPG. not too bad to install for us as part of the whole new heating and water system

On the side of a steep hill and in a forest so not much sky/sunlight hits the house.

[Blue62]

Johnnytheboy said:

Not sure what you mean by your response, if you're challenging the validity of my statement then I can only re-iterate that she has spent a bomb on a boiler and hopper and now regrets her decision but can't justify changing. If there was some other intention then it's over my head, I'll wait for my youngest to get home from school to explain.

[Johnnytheboy]

Blue62 said:

Johnnytheboy said:

Not sure what you mean by your response, if you're challenging the validity of my statement then I can only re-iterate that she has spent a bomb on a boiler and hopper and now regrets her decision but can't justify changing. If there was some other intention then it's over my head, I'll wait for my youngest to get home from school to explain.

I imagine her literally too deep in "biomass" to get out.

Nothing more sinister I assure you.

[andy43]

V8RX7 said:

Peanut Gallery said:

Random thought,

Wood burning glass fronted stove but with a backboiler attached to the central heating system?

A quick google gave me http://www.stovesareus.co.uk/all-stoves/boiler-sto... - that sort of thing.

Yes, initial heat up from freezing will take a while, how you circulate the water (convection or electric pump?), how often you have to keep feeding the rather small stove, any backups are an issue! - on the positive side, you will have a nice fire to look at!

One of these was fitted to my house.

The issue was that obviously you want heat before you get up so they are generally run in parallel with a conventional boiler and integrating them in isn't cheap - the other option is having two separate heating systems - which also isn't cheap.

We've got a boiler stove which feeds a 300l thermal store, small in the scheme of things, but if you load it up last thing when the rads kick in in the morning there's enough stored energy left to stop you freezing while you reload the stove. Also linked into the system is a gas boiler and solar thermal - so I'm cheating really, but I wouldn't want to solely rely on logs as it is very labour-intensive, particularly if trying to just use free wood - as most of the free stuff I can get is softwood the stove does eat it quite quickly. But it gives fantastic warmth in the winter months when it's been on a couple of hours

[V8RX7]

andy43 said:

We've got a boiler stove which feeds a 300l thermal store, small in the scheme of things, but if you load it up last thing when the rads kick in in the morning there's enough stored energy left to stop you freezing while you reload the stove. Also linked into the system is a gas boiler and solar thermal - so I'm cheating really, but I wouldn't want to solely rely on logs as it is very labour-intensive, particularly if trying to just use free wood - as most of the free stuff I can get is softwood the stove does eat it quite quickly. But it gives fantastic warmth in the winter months when it's been on a couple of hours

I just went with a woodburning stove.

I would have cost a couple of thousand to incorporate the back boiler which would have taken around 10 years to pay back.

[Stickyfinger]

Wood Burner, back boiler with Cast Iron radiators on a thermal syphon system.....ideal in a small cottage.

[bernhund]

This is probably not top of your priority list, but do consider theft! No one's going to nick your gas but oil is stolen quite regularly in Kent, so I imagine it goes on everywhere. Someone I know filled his tank with £800 of oil and it was gone the next day.
Oil smells horrible and when things go wrong it can cause a lot of damage if absorbed into the fabric of the building. I've seen plenty of that in the past when I worked on commercial heating systems for the MOD etc.
Personally I favour LPG for the above reasons irrespective of cost, We currently pay 31p per litre with FloGas.

[anonymous-user]

We were in exactly the same position with our build 6 months ago. We bought a chapel with no heating or mains gas and the biggest headache by far was the decision how to heat it.

We initially looked at ground source heat pumps and were drawn by the governments heat grant which effectively pays you for the whole setup plus a bit by paying you a quarterly grant for 7 years. Unfortunately the cost was as much as we had for the whole build so it was discounted.

After looking at electric underfloor and lpg we eventually decided on oil simply because after research we were told that it was least likely to put off prospective buyers in our area. The property has a range and electric induction hob and most properties in our area like this also have oil. There were also fewer regulations about placement of our oil tank compared to gas and so it was easier to hide the oil tank.

Unfortunately it was also a fair bit more expensive. We have an external Worcester bosh combi which is great as space is a premium inside, 7 radiators and fitting cost £7000. We had quotes of £6500 up to £7800 all including vat. I think that included the oil tank. Hope this helps

[Foliage]

Neither, id stick with electric, perhaps looks at wood/coal with a back boiler for heating in the worst months.

More modern solutions would be better, firstly insulated the fk out of your home, new electric central heating, then looks at viability of method's to supplement your electricity via wind or solar, ground source etc

[jmsgld]

I am not sure if we were just unlucky, but previous experience with a 3 year old Grant oil combi boiler means that I would never choose one. Heat exchanger needed cleaning or changing every few months and even when working at it's best, dreadful performance compared to gas combi boiler.

We had a Grant oil system boiler installed and moved + pressurised hot water cylinder, kept old oil tank, was circa £8k.
Can't fault it, 200m2 old drafty solid walled single glazed house, girlfriend works from home and likes it warm = 1300l per year = about £450 at today's prices (but seems set to rise).

Modern electric fan assisted rads are a world better than night storage heaters, suspect running costs may be a tad higher though.

I like the pressurised hot water cylinder, consider a hot water loop as well if there are long runs of pipework; can save a lot of wasted water / time waiting for it to get warm..

Edited by jmsgld on Friday 30th September 14:06