What sort of Central Heating Boiler

Is it minimum 30cmfrom a corner?  Some places are saying 30-60cm, so may vary from boiler to boiler.  

I presume your utility room is in one corner of the house?  Even so, by the time the thickness of the outside walls are taken into account, you would be at least 30 cm from the outside corner?

I find the delay of my combi boiler in supplying hot water one of the most frustrating aspects. I'd go back to the "old fashioned" system tomorrow.

The only time we have a "delay" in getting hot water is during the times when the central heating is not running, as the heat exchanger needs to be hot first ,but as it is mostly during the times we are away in the caravan it is rare we notice

Yes, our son, unwisely in my opinion, when he got a new (oil fired) boiler decided to get a combi as that was what they had in their previous house.

However, they now live in a sprawling old farmhouse with the kitchen away one end , the boiler about halfway along , and 2 of the 3 bathrooms away almost at the other end of the house, so trying to get HW even in the kitchen takes ages.

They are also planning to install another shower room when the children get bigger, it will be right at the far end of the house, so even worse.

The 2 showers they currently have are electric, so at least they get HW quickly, but they are old and do not produce a decent amount of HW in the winter.

Trying to fill the bath means running off a tremendous amount of cold water first, and being in an agricultural property they apparently have a water meter.

Add to that the fact that the pipework and radiators were from the 60s so the advice was they might not be able to take the water pressure.  So in the end they pretty much had to pay for a completely new CH system.

We had the old boiler removed and a new combi fitted and not looked back on efficiency. The only problem is the boiler is in the garage (as was the original) and it is a long way for the hot water to get to the shower upstairs and we do run off a lot of cold water before the hot arrives! We did consider having the combi moved when we were having some building work done but the cost didn't make economic sense so we grin and bear it!

What the "cold" shower first

One point no-one has mentioned yet, is that boiler manufacturers will guarantee the availability of spare parts for "only 10 years" after a boiler model goes out of production and is replaced by a new model. We were unlucky and two years after installation Glow worm stopped production of my model, so now after only 12 years some necessary replacement parts are no longer available.

So the lesson of my story is, if having a new boiler fitted, try to find out how long it has been in production, also try to assess how long production will continue, but the manufacturers probably don't want you to know that.

A good friend of mine also had a new boiler fitted at the same time I did and his is still being made, so his 10 year time limit hasn't started yet.

Nuggy

I get a warning at every service that some parts are no longer available!!!

David

David, are you with British Gas? I am and at the last service this is the warning I was given. I wonder if other repairers would use or have access to different stocks of spare parts. How hard would BG try to search, as they would no doubt prefer me to invest in a new boiler. It is just another dilemma with no real answer. 

Me too, as well, also.

On the positive side (I think), my dishwasher and clothes washing machine are both 'cold fill' (aren't they all these days?) so no losses there as there as they don't have to wait for the hot water to arrive and there isn't any hot water left cooling down in the supply pipework. Not sure how costly the electricity is to heat up the cold water though.

When I were now't but a lad we had an instantaneous Ascot gas water heater over the sink that worked a treat.