Boiler cycling every few seconds - gas engineer diagnosis?

[mctrials23]

Hi,

We have an ideal classic se15ff boiler which I belive is quite old now. How old I have no idea because it was in the house long before we were.

We had noticed that it was constantly cycling on and off every 10s or so and have just had a gas engineer in to have a look. He said that its doing that because its not taking in enough oxygen to successfully maintain combustion and when he cracked the front cover to allow air in another way, it was working fine and not cycling. That all makes sense.

He then suggested that we replace the boiler as its old essentially. I asked if he could could do anything to keep this one running and he said that it could be cleaned which would take a few hours but he couldn't guarantee that would fix the issue.

Does this seem reasonable advice? He suggested the cost of a new fitted boiler would run about £2k and the other options is ~£200.

 

[ianmcd]

£200 to service an Ideal Classic ? Think you need a different engineer, most on here know what the fault most likely is but site rules prohibit us from giving out gas advice

 

[mctrials23]

Yeah, I understand that you can't give specific advice on gas faults. I'm just trying to weigh up the pros and cons of servicing vs replacing an old boiler.

I'm trying to figure out what the costs could be going forwards with an old boiler vs installing a new one. Then there is the question of moving to a combi instead of a heat only boiler and the savings over time that would give us etc.

What should I be getting a quote for from other engineers? Just explain the issue and see what they say. Obviously every time someone comes out to look thats another ~£60 so I would rather avoid getting a load of people in to tell me the same thing.

 

[ianmcd]

your boiler is the best and most reliable boiler that Ideal ever made, I changed a fan on a 20 year old one on Monday and it was like new inside, the deciscion to move to a combi all depends on your HW requirements, you wont get that swapped for a combi for £2000

 

[mctrials23]

your boiler is the best and most reliable boiler that Ideal ever made, I changed a fan on a 20 year old one on Monday and it was like new inside, the deciscion to move to a combi all depends on your HW requirements, you wont get that swapped for a combi for £2000

Yeah, £2000 was for a "like for like" replacement. If the boiler isn't likely to be on its last legs and can be repaired I am more than happy to pay to do that. I'm just aware that much like cars, you can throw a lot of money at things of a certain age and get little value in return.