Gas Boiler - Water Leak

MugMugs

Hi All.

I came home this evening to find that my kitchen worktop was soaking wet. I traced the water back to my natural gas boiler located directly above. I found that water was lodging directly below the boiler on the shelf of the kitchen press covering it. I ran the boiler for about an hour after this and monitored it closely but could not find a further escape of water.

I set the timer for this morning for about an hour before I got up and when I checked again there was a small pool of water lodged on the shelf below the right hand side of the boiler. All of the pipes going into the boiler were bone dry.

The pressure of the boiler is about 1.5 and the temprature is about 60degrees. Does anybody have any ideas what the problem could be here ? I am finding it very difficult to get a plumber out the week that is in it and I am quite worried that if I dont heat the house I will gain a split pipe somewhere but dont know if it is safe to run the boiler.

C.O.Y.B.I.B

Hi ,

This might be way off the mark and might sound obvious , but I made the same mistake . I had an identical situation , water everywhere , but boiler apparently working fine . First guy to look at it said it needed to be replaced , but I decided to get a 2nd opinion as I didnt trust him . Turned out that whatever way the wind had been blowing , forced the rain into the vent and that was what I found on the worktop . Ended up putting a hood type device over the vent and that sorted it . Could be melting ice . Worth checking out .

MS

Bull76

Hi,

Has this water leak just occured or has it been happening over the last few weeks? Have you had to top up the boiler water pressure? If so then maybe a leaking heat exchanger. Easiest way to clarify if an internal leak is to remove the outside cover with the boiler off. Should be pretty obvious if there is a leak present.
You really have to find the source of the leak so as to rectify it. Hope it helps.

MugMugs

Thanks mscull..... I should really hood the vent anyway so hopefully that is the problem...

Bull76, The Leak only occured last night when i got home. I havent topped the system up in over a year as the pressure is sitting perfectly at 1.5 and the boiler wasnt really used during the summer months. I did take the internal cover off the boiler and I ran my hand over all pipes I could reach / shined a torch in and could see no evidence of a leak. I stood up on the worktop and shone the torch down and couldnt see where the water was coming from either.

I am going to run it from cold this evening when i come home and see if I can identify where the leak is.

sullzz

mscull wrote: »

. Ended up putting a is hood type device over the vent and that sorted it .

i hope by saying vent your not reffering to the flue , you dont want to cover the flue

lisao80

same thing is happening to mine recently.. its leakin a brown dirty water not very much but covers the shelf and has once or twice leaked down onto my counter, the pressure seems to keep dropping aswell and i keep having to vent it to boost the pressure again so it comes on.
very annoying.

C.O.Y.B.I.B

sullzz wrote: »

i hope by saying vent your not reffering to the flue , you dont want to cover the flue

It is the flue , but its not covered , its just a plastic semi-circular device to stop rain water getting in as the flue was flush to the wall before , now there is a canopy over it extending about a foot from the wall. Havent had the water problem since .(2yrs)

Bull76

lisao80 wrote: »

same thing is happening to mine recently.. its leakin a brown dirty water not very much but covers the shelf and has once or twice leaked down onto my counter, the pressure seems to keep dropping aswell and i keep having to vent it to boost the pressure again so it comes on.
very annoying.

Where is the water leaking from? Down through a wiring access point? What make is it? Have you removed the front of the boiler when it's not been running to look for the source of the leak. I had a Vokera boiler and it was leaking, water down through the wiring access point. t was brownish as there is a little lip on the shelf and the water would gather and then leak over it. It was the heat exchanger that was leaking. Pressure was dropping off and would have to be topped up. The combustion chamber fire proof insulation was saturated through and had to be replaced. There was rust from the galvanised lower shelf, had to be cleaned up, this was turning the water brown.
You really need to get it looked at.....

MugMugs

Folks, thanks for your help here.

Called a mate of a mate out to take a look and he tightened the white valve which he said was the "dump valve" for draining the system and said it was loose and just needed to be tightened. No water since.

Happy Christmas

TskTsk

mscull wrote: »

This might be way off the mark and might sound obvious , but I made the same mistake . I had an identical situation , water everywhere , but boiler apparently working fine . First guy to look at it said it needed to be replaced , but I decided to get a 2nd opinion as I didnt trust him . Turned out that whatever way the wind had been blowing , forced the rain into the vent and that was what I found on the worktop . Ended up putting a hood type device over the vent and that sorted it . Could be melting ice . Worth checking out .

I was standing in my kitchen this afternoon when I started hearing water dripping out of the boiler on to the kitchen counter. The boiler hadn't been on since about 5am. I popped the fuse from the wall plate, turned off the gas and turned the two valves on the water pipes a quarter-turn each. After opening the front panel (it's a Vokera Mynute 14se) I could see that all of the pipes were dry, but that there was a drop of water coming out of the main boiler unit itself (sorry, I don't know the proper name) every 20 seconds or so. It's a couple of hours later now and it's still dripping, although less frequently than before.

Given the very strong wind and rain yesterday, is it most likely that this is just rain that was blown back in the vent/flue? The pressure is down to about 0.2 bar, but it was always quite low anyway. The water dripping from the unit is not discoloured, but I did have the system drained and refilled a couple of months ago (had a radiator moved) so I'd expect it to be clean. Luckily, a plumber has agreed to come out tomorrow morning to take a look, but is there anything that I should suggest that he checks?

Also - the boiler itself is about 10 years old now. Should I expect to have to replace it soon anyway?

Thanks in advance.

Goodne

A few years ago I had a similar problem on the exact same boiler as yours. It turned out to be rain water coming in through the flue. The flue was ridiciously short so it replaced it with a longer one & solved the problem. On new years day last year when I got up I found water all over the worktop & the boiler kept turning itself off. The fella who services it came straight out & luckily he had the part to fix it, can't remember exactly what it was but think it might have been the heat exchanger. Anyway, it didn't cost a whole lot to fix, so hopefully yours will be easily fixed.

TskTsk

Cheers! The gas fella came over tonight and confirmed what you said above... the heat exchanger had corroded and sprung a bit of a leak. I had the system drained about two months ago and there was no sign of rust in the water at that stage. I also added inhibitor when I refilled the system, so I'd be surprised if the rust had appeared since then.

TentCrasher

Think i have similar issue with a pottern system boiler. The Flue is falling back to boiler and have noticed the boiler sounds like its full of air. Ive vented all rads and found no air just water. Ive vented pump and a couple of vents in hotpress. The water pressure hasnt dropped over the last week and i was wondering could rain water traveling back down the flue be causing this noise?

prieb

I too have a Potterton Boiler, and last night for only the second time in a month, water dripped from the boiler about 4 hours after it was switched off, I was in bed and heard the Main MCB fuse pop - Then I realised if elec is off the Freezer is off "don't want to eat anymore food" - that got me out of the bed. Water had dripped on power supply beside the PC.

Anyway From the Previous comments It sounds like like it could be the weather all right blowing water back down the vent. Will have a look later when the Alcohol leaks out of my system.........:D

prieb

Yes, I'm glad to say that was the problem, Snow thawing coming back down the vent pipe causing water leak under boiler, Phew No bill this time... :D:D

KrisMiranda

glad also that you have sort it out..cheers to you my dear! No payment bills is just a big relief!