GEC Nightstor / Central Storage Heating

[geekymonkey]

Hi all. Keen to hear thoughts from the collective:

I'm looking at a house purchase at the moment. It's a 4 bed place with about 12 rads. The property has a pair of G&C Nightstor 100 storage heaters, running on what looks like a dedicated three phase supply. Each one of the Nightstors is the size of a refrigerator.

I'm guessing they were installed when the house was built in 1985, so they're knocking on a bit - but not sure that means they immediately need replacing... Equally, not sure how expensive they are to run.

A bit of bumf off some other forum:
"The GEC nightstor 100 is a wet system boiler. It weighs nearly a ton and has 168 bricks inside which heat up during Economy 7 period. On a full charge the core can reach 1000c, when the occupier wants heat a fan starts and draws heat from the bricks and and puts it through a heat exchanger then a pump circulates it round the radiators therefore it only uses about 150 watts per hr to run the fan and pump, so it is very economic and faster than oil or gas and never needs servicing"



Nightstor '100'

Input Element Rating- 19.2kw (Off-Peak) + 9.6kw (Boost)
Output at Full Charge- 22kw
Approx Weight- 750kg
Width(mm)- 610
Depth(mm)- 596
Height(mm)- 1664

I'm trying to budgeting what needs doing to the house. The place can't get mains gas.
Is it a foregone conclusion that this system needs to be removed and replaced with something a bit more 2015, or could they roll on efficiently for another 25 years?

Cheers.

Edited by geekymonkey on Saturday 10th January 22:41

Edited by geekymonkey on Saturday 10th January 22:44

[Simpo Two]

'Brick souce heat pump'!

[Gingerbread Man]

I'm sure one of these has come up on here before. I think they can be repaired by the manufacture still if they break but aren't still manufactured.

I'd go the central heating route. Oil, LPG, electric boiler.

Also, a thousand degrees!?

[caziques]

Interesting.

You need to sit down and work things out.

I see a number of alternatives.

1. Leave it
2. Oil
3. Heat pump
4. Wood boiler of some sort
5. Combination

My initial thoughts would be leaving the heat store in place - and fitting an air sourced heat pump in parallel.

Install something like http://www.wharfplumbing.co.uk/shop/air-source-hea...

This should do perhaps 75% of the work, leaving the night store to do the rest. Good combination of capital and running cost.

[Henryheat]

Hi geekymonkey - did you manage to solve your GEC Nightstor issue? I'm trying to get hold of an old GEC Nightstor or GEC Compact boiler. If you or anyone else happens to have one they're trying to get rid of could you let me know? (It doesn't need to be functional - I'll sort that out)

Thanks!

[geekymonkey]

Hi Henry

They're still here at the moment, and still live in production.... Having extended the house and with the wife who could get hypothermia in a sauna, they don't quite have enough capacity - so I imagine they will be decommissioned in the coming months.



Not sure if that helps with what you're trying to achieve...

Cheers
Andy

Edited by geekymonkey on Thursday 3rd May 12:58

[Henryheat]

Wow they are big units! If they're going to get decommissioned in the next couple of months and you're looking to get rid of them would you mind letting me know? I'd love to get hold of them. Thanks.

[geekymonkey]

If you're happy to decomission them then you'd be welcome to take them... Drop me a message and let's get in touch. Cheers

[guindilias]

Those bricks would make for a great outdoor pizza oven!