New Insulated Copper Cylinder...Is it hot??

britie

I plan on replacing my old copper cylinder with a new preinsulated cylinder. Is there any device that will allow me to tell if and how much hot water is in the tank. I presume the new cylinder will be cold to the touch even if boiling hot underneath.

Its the only disadvantage I can identify in replacing my old cylinder and its lagging jacket that you can slip your hand under to tell how hot the cyliner is!

Brian

Micky Dolenz

Touching the pipe that exits the cylinder at the top will tell you how hot the hottest water in the cylinder is.

Davy

Dont forget running the tap

britie

Davy wrote: »

Dont forget running the tap

You must be a very :rolleyes:successful plumber!!!

Davy

britie wrote: »

You must be a very :rolleyes:successful plumber!!!

Well it works though, and is a valid answer imho

You aren't going to go to your cylinder all the time to check for hot water. And generally by the heat of the water, you can get a fair idea how much hot water is in the cylinder.

yoshytoshy

Not sure how accurate it would be ,but maybe getting one of those room temperature displays with in and out.

Stick the outdoor probe into a part of the cylinder (cut out a piece of foam size of probe.)

I can check this out myself as I have one of these displays ,I also have a proper digital stat on the cylinder ,so I should be able to figure out how accurate it is.

Sparkpea

The proper answer really is no theres no accurate way of telling how much hot water is left in the cylinder with a pre-lagged tank. At least non that I've come across.

This is the only drawback. But the pro's definitely out-way the con of that. I liked being able to put my hand under the jacket and say yeah I've enough water for a bath but now I can't do that with my new tank, however I've never ran out of hot water in my new house (3 months or so now). We have the HW only set to come on for hr in morning and an hr at night to top it up and we can bath whenever we want. Sometimes theres 3 baths taken in the morning and the last bath obviously wouldnt be as hot as the first but its still hot enough to bath in. Its only a 36x18 cylinder but its not like the baths are being filled to the top each time. Plus, and I don't know if this makes a difference or not but we run our baths with hot water first then add cold so we are not mixing the hot and cold together.

Moral of the story is after a while you will be able to work out roughly how much hot water you need and how often you need to have the oil/gas/hw etc. on for to achieve what you need.

Davy

Sparkpea wrote: »

T
This is the only drawback. But the pro's definitely out-way the con of that.

I had my new boiler running on first test on a thursday, went to the hot tap on a saturday morning, water was still warm from the cylinder and the boiler hadnt ran since the thursday. They are a great improvement over the lagging jacket.

Sparkpea

good news davy thats what you want!

ntpm

britie wrote: »

I plan on replacing my old copper cylinder with a new preinsulated cylinder. Is there any device that will allow me to tell if and how much hot water is in the tank. I presume the new cylinder will be cold to the touch even if boiling hot underneath.

Its the only disadvantage I can identify in replacing my old cylinder and its lagging jacket that you can slip your hand under to tell how hot the cyliner is!

Brian

If you are planing to replace the cylinder get the plumber to fit a cylinder thermostat and motorized valve if you don't have one already. This will give you a general idea of the temperture. Might take a couple of days to set it up to your ideal temperature but then you can forget about it.
The stat should be wired to the motorized valve which stops the boiler water from passing through the cylinder.
This is called zoning hot water. Boiler is capable of heating the cylinder to over 80deg ( way too hot), the cylinder stat is normally set to around 55 to 65deg. Saving on energy and money on fuel bills..
Look for zoning and updrading heating and hot water controls if possible.

yoshytoshy

Sparkpea wrote: »

The proper answer really is no theres no accurate way of telling how much hot water is left in the cylinder with a pre-lagged tank. At least non that I've come across.

This is the only drawback. But the pro's definitely out-way the con of that. I liked being able to put my hand under the jacket and say yeah I've enough water for a bath but now I can't do that with my new tank, however I've never ran out of hot water in my new house (3 months or so now). We have the HW only set to come on for hr in morning and an hr at night to top it up and we can bath whenever we want. Sometimes theres 3 baths taken in the morning and the last bath obviously wouldnt be as hot as the first but its still hot enough to bath in. Its only a 36x18 cylinder but its not like the baths are being filled to the top each time. Plus, and I don't know if this makes a difference or not but we run our baths with hot water first then add cold so we are not mixing the hot and cold together.

Moral of the story is after a while you will be able to work out roughly how much hot water you need and how often you need to have the oil/gas/hw etc. on for to achieve what you need.

What thermostats are you installing sparkpea ?

Have a look

britie

Many thanks for everyones opinions...some good ones as well

Will pass them onto my plumber

Britie:)