Cold radiators and water heating

MJohnston

Hello, this is probably the most FAQ on this forum, so I'm sorry for repeating things, but I wanted to get help on the specific setup we have in our house, so I'm going to include some photos.

First, the situation is that we moved into this place (renting) a few months ago, haven't really needed the heating at all until this week. For water heating, we were told by the landlord to just use the immersion and we've kept that on for about 12 hours of the day (switch on overnight, switch off in the morning). This week, it obviously got a lot colder, so we tried the heating (gas) however most of the many radiators in the place only got to about what I would describe as lukewarm and now they're not even reaching that. I have tried to bleed some of the radiators, however none of them needed it as the water started to come out as soon as I opened the bleed valves.

Here is a photo tour of our heating system:


This is the gas boiler, Mynute 20e, pressure currently sitting just over 1 bar


The heating timer below that, there isn't a thermostat anywhere, but I don't know if those are needed (presumably not).


Heating valves below the boiler

The above boiler is in the downstairs kitchen, then upstairs in one of the bedrooms we have this:



with the three main pipes also leading up slightly above the photo to this:



Here's a closeup of the valves and controls near the top of the boiler (again the pressure here is just about 1 bar):



So, presumably this is a common setup, but I have no idea how to solve the two problems:

• Heat water without using immersion (fine if not possible)
• Heat the radiators properly

Can anyone help? Thanks!

Outkast_IRE

Your renting ........... so why are you trying to sort this, ring the landlord and tell him , there might be something simple he knows about.
If you go messing around with things in a rented house the landlord could try and pin the problem on you.

Get him to sort it now before the real cold nights hit. This is why you pay rent so such issues arent your problem.

MJohnston

Outkast_IRE wrote: »

Your renting ........... so why are you trying to sort this, ring the landlord and tell him , there might be something simple he knows about.
If you go messing around with things in a rented house the landlord could try and pin the problem on you.

Get him to sort it now before the real cold nights hit. This is why you pay rent so such issues arent your problem.

Well, mostly I'd like to know exactly what the issue is so that I'm in full possession of the facts before contacting my landlord - when we contacted him before about the water heating, he said to just use the immersion. I'm not sure that's the normal way of things so I'd like to know.

gdavis

im not being funny but did u check that the rads are turned on at rad valves?the set up looks like when u do get the heating working it should heat ur hot water indirectly too.

MJohnston

gdavis wrote: »

im not being funny but did u check that the rads are turned on at rad valves?the set up looks like when u do get the heating working it should heat ur hot water indirectly too.

Yeah the radiators are definitely on, at the thermostatic valve anyway.

aujopimur

I'd say the pump is stuck from lack of use, as you're renting, call the LL

K.Flyer

Hi MJ, while I understand where you are coming from, as has been advised above, do not go near it without contacting your landlord first.
It might be something simple, and it might not!
But if you start on it and make it worse you could find youself landed with the bill for fixing everything, I have seen it happen!
Under normal tenancy agreements the LL deals with these issues, you make the call to him, he sends someone out, it gets fixed.