motorised valve need advice!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

dfall

In my hotpress I have flow pipe form the boiler going into the heating cylinder and it also T's into the flow pipe of the heating circuit, where it T's into the heating circuit there is a motorised valve fitted. The motorised valve gets it eletric supply from the boiler ie when the boiler is switched on it opens the valve and when it is switched off the valve closes. The motorised valve stopped opening so I have taken it off and manually opened the circuit and the heating works fine. Is there actuallly a need for the motorised valve given the fact that it opens and closes with the power of the boiler and is in no way controlled by heat/stats etc??????

Billy Bunting

No. If you have no roomstat controling it then like you say, it not required, just leave it manually open, if you decide at a later date to fit a room stat then you can just replace the valves actuator and away you go.

dfall

there is a thermostat in the hall way ...dunno if that was controlling it ,dont think so.any suggestions? cheers in advance

Billy Bunting

If you had a roomstat then presumably it controled the valve. Did you use the roomstat ?? was it set at some temperature ?? If you did and it was then leaving the valve on manual will put heat on constant.

dfall

oh yeah and the plumber i called on the phone said it was a pcb in the boiler was he trying to rip me??

Billy Bunting

Over the phone! Mmmm!!

Well done for finding the manually lever and getting to grips with the problem. Maybe you could change the actuator yourself ??

dfall

would i bother or will i just leave the valve on ..i wonder might it air lock the system or something?

Billy Bunting

Not a problem other than you may cook

dfall

cheers bb love been toastie

FoxT

If you leave it open all the time then you will have to walk round the house & manually turn off all the rads when the weather is warm & you just need hot water.

Your gas bills will be higher as (human nature being what it is) there will probably be situationss when rads are left on unnecessarily. I expect that the room stat sends a signal to the boiler which in turn will turn on the valve when needed.

It it was me, I'd fix the problem..Either fix the boiler cct board ( or get a quote) or look at getting a controller + timer. Systemlink.ie seem to be good here - I am not associated with them, nor am I a pro plumber, but I have one of their controllers which I installed myself - and have found to be v. good.

Merch

Sorry to hijack, not sure if I should start a seperate thread?
I'm in a similar situation, but I just have a electro-mechanical timer(has 30 min intervals) and no thermostat, sick of running around the house to turn down rad valves and having the heating being too hot or cold and having to constantly adjust the boiler stat, My boiler feeds into my hotpress, tees off into rads and hot water, but I have a manual valve to turn off the rads. Want to fit a motorised valve to control, 3 position?
I dont think (but cant say for sure if the piping is split into upstairs and downstairs zones, but if it is, its under the floor) I'd be happy to have some more auto control then I have now, so upstairs downstairs zones doesnt bother me now as I'd have to rip up the floors for that.

What other controllers/programmer (makes) are good? I looked in B&Q and most of the stuff was out of stock, plus not much info on it, I've gotten plumbing bits and pieces in my most local Heat Merchants (partly to not constantly feed B&Q but also to maybe get a better price) but I found them very unhelpful/bordering on being hostile as I'm not a plumber.

DoneDL

Merch have a look online, Pulsar direct etc for heating controls and SEAI for grants to update your system if its been in over 3 years.

DFall, as Billy says it might be worth changing the valve or valve motor and stay away from anyone who says PCB without testing the other components or controls. Roughly 90% of PCB`s that are sent back are fine