Vaillant ECOmax S24, S28 & S30 - no consistent supply of hot water

J

jtonthebike

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Hampshire
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Hi all,

Hopefully, you may be able to help. We've got the above-named boiler (it's an 800 series, 824 iirc) and it's behaving a little strangely.

The central heating system works well (considering the radiators/pipework have been installed poorly (this is slowly being corrected as and when time allows)) and there are no significant issues with this side of things - there is a small leak on some pipework which equates to the heating system requiring topping up every week or so, I appreciate this will contribute to the overall problem, especially as we have hard water where we live. I'll be replacing the plastic pipe section with copper in the next few days all being well (thank goodness for some holiday time).

There is, however, an issue with the DHW side of things.

Opening the hot water tap fully, we get very hot water for a short amount of time (maybe a couple of litres) and then water cools to a luke-warm temperature. The tap symbol doesn't appear on the boiler display but the boiler fires.

Pressing the 'i' button when drawing hot water, has shown status messages of S.24, S.28 & S.30.

Closing the hot water tap, the system appears to continue running/firing and has, inconsistently displayed a water temperature of 84°C, when opening the hot water tap, I can believe water temp is about that as it's steaming hot.

If I open the hot tap approximately halfway, water temp remains quite warm and usable.

Lastly, I understand that I can't (or want to) touch the gas side of things, but I'd like to try and understand why the boiler is misbehaving. We've limited experience of trades in our area and have been burned by a cowboy outfit once already (a roofing firm).

Any help or guidance would be very much appreciated.

Regards, J.
 
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all trade people are not all rip off's but appreciate having your fingers burnt thou , if you get a heating engineer ( REPAIR ENGINEER ) that solves the problem with no issues ,then keep the same engineer/ his number and pay him right and a cup of coffee and you'll have someone you can trust/rely upon . don't just go on price because thats when you can get your fingers burnt just for saving a couple of quid .

that temperature is not the hot water temp that your seeing its the heating temp,
it sounds like you've got pre heat running for your hot water which is the reason why your only getting a little bit of hot water and its only heating a set amount of hw.

as for your problem , you need an engineer to attend but it should be only a quick job . your not getting demand recognised for HW but you can't open the boiler as for your safety
 
Agreed, not all trades are here to rip people off! Because I don't have the time to learn how to fix it nor am I really allowed to, I'm at the mercy of an industry where pricing transparency is seemingly taboo.

I always offer tea/coffee/biscuits/cake and payment is always fair and on time! People should have a right to earn a fair wage!

I've looked on checkatrade & ratedpeople, hopefully someone will be here in the next 24-48hrs to sort it out. I'll update this thread with the results.
 
;) we're not local to the area in which we live, so most family/friends are at least >200 miles away. The only neighbours we've spoken to don't have details of anyone.

So with that in mind, if you can recommend anyone in Portsmouth, that'd be v.handy!
 
so one dude suggests 'flow sensor' + major service, the other suggests 'hot water heat exchanger'. Another dude wants £80 as a call out cost (which i can understand) but i'm a little cautious on how best to proceed. If anyone has any thoughts on how best to move forward, it'd be very much appreciated!
 
British Gas one-off fee + maintenance contract set up, as an annual cost, it worked out cheaper than their (or other engineers) potential day-rate/costs and we're covered for the year without any surprises.

£99 + £22pm, it makes getting it fixed affordable today and someone should be here tomorrow morning. Cheers all!
 
hmm. That didn't go well. I think, reading between the lines, the main burner seal(s) have gone/perished, so they can't put it on contract. My own fault for not having the boiler serviced in the 3yrs we've owned the house. So i'm quite likely going to see about replacing the boiler itself. Any recommendations for boiler brands and fitting companies? I'm a student at the moment so something on the never-never would be preferable.

ta.
 
jtonthebike said:
hmm. That didn't go well. I think, reading between the lines, the main burner seal(s) have gone/perished, so they can't put it on contract. My own fault for not having the boiler serviced in the 3yrs we've owned the house. So i'm quite likely going to see about replacing the boiler itself. Any recommendations for boiler brands and fitting companies? I'm a student at the moment so something on the never-never would be preferable.

ta.
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Intergas boilers are great :-) if you go through Flow Energy it'll be fitted by an accredited Flow Brand Ambassador and they can offer you finance options

Having said that, it might be worth investigating a Fixed Price Repair from Vaillant first - at least see how much it might be
 
Yeah, fixed-price repair was £299 from Vaillant, on a >=10 y/o boiler. Flow Energy looks good, i'm calling them in about 2mins, thanks!

oh fudge. No one available in Portsmouth to survey, it would seem we cannot get an Intergas boiler through flow energy.
 
My own Vaillant is nearing 10 years old and still going strong. I'd tend to agree the £299 fee is not a bad option.
 
had another chat with Vaillant, £49 a month for 6 months, billing starts in Feb. I asked what happens if they open the boiler and 'open a can of worms', i.e. if it's just a washer that needs replacing or 90% of its internals, the lady i spoke with said it's covered upto the value of £1500, whatever needs fixing will be fixed.

hopefully this sorts it out!
 
hehe... British Gas have just been out for a quote, how nice of them. Supply & install a Worcester Bosch Greenstar 30i, the boiler would be moved about 6' along a wall and mounted on an adjacent wall - all pipework runs along this wall so would simply require re-routing right instead of straight on.

They've rocked in a price of £3,139.75 which includes 50% off of the boiler itself, a HIVE unit and Boiler IQ. Or we can pay on the never-never £72 a month until I'm ready to carve my own gravestone.
 
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