What does this microswitch actually do?

Cabaal

So I've had issues with the heating in my house, when I first moved in it physically wasn't connected, then I noticed it actually wasn't heating the water and never had and when this was fixed it broke again after a number of months.

All three issues have been fixed by the builder however this time its been fixed I noticed the plumper removed the microswitch from ontop of the valve in the hotpress.

Since he removed it my water is being heated when the heating is on and the microswitch is still powered but it appears to be doing nothing other then being switch on sitting ontop of the pipe going into the tank.

The microswitch is wired to a small junction box which you can see on the floor, the while cable is connected to the switch on the wall and it also goes to a temp controller on the front of the tank.

So questions are what does this switch do and why did he remove it, will it do harm to leave it removed and what was the actual problem that caused him to remove it? Surely if it was installed it was installed for a reason.

See picture below:

handydandy

That is an actuator, it is usually controlled by a thermostat / timer. It is basically a motorized valve, open to allow hot water from your boiler to heat your cylinder and close to stop heating the water.

There can be more than one on a heating system, e.g. for different heating zones, upstairs rads, downstairs rads, hot water cylinder.

I can't say why the plumber left it off but I could speculate and say he couldn't be arsed to sort it out for you!!

You can manually open and close the valve with a pliers.

Cabaal

Ah ok, so would I be right in thinking that if the power switch on the wall is on the actuator allows the tank to heat upto say 60c (if the thermostat is set to 60c) and then closes off the valve to stop the tank heating further (overheating?).

If I turn off the switch on the wall the tank will be totally powerless as will the actuator and my heating will heat the rads but won't heat any water.

So I'm thinking the downside here is without the actuator the thermostat is useless on the tank also the water could be overheated which would waste oil etc?

So is it worth me getting onto the plumber again to get him to actually finish the job and fix the issue instead of just doing a "workaround", also won't this waste loads of oil as my water will be constantly heated even if I don';t want it to be.

There are two other actuator's that I've seen down in the utility room near the heating timmer and two power switches, I've tried turning off these switches and my rads all over the house appears to heat regardless...surely this shouldn't be?

yoshytoshy

If the valve is not wired back to your boiler ,I wouldn't bother with it to be honest. At this stage ,it's pointless putting in actuators on systems without an interlock.

Maybe turn your boiler down a little ,so that the hot water won't get too hot. Or get your plumber to balance the water down to it's minimum.

EDIT: I notice by the way ,that your sensor is far too high up the cylinder. It should be down near the bottom. You probably had very little hot water.

Cabaal

yoshytoshy wrote: »

EDIT: I notice by the way ,that your sensor is far too high up the cylinder. It should be down near the bottom. You probably had very little hot water.

I assume by sensor your refering to the thermostat and the cable holding it going around the tank?

We have found at times that the hot water doesn't last as long as we expect it to with baths, showers etc.

yoshytoshy

Cabaal wrote: »

I assume by sensor your refering to the thermostat and the cable holding it going around the tank?

We have found at times that the hot water doesn't last as long as we expect it to with baths, showers etc.

It's way too high cabaal ,your essentially heating the water to the level of the thermostat. So you're only ever going to get water from the top down to the sensor.

Sparkpea

yeah the sensor should be down about 2/3rd from the top of the tank