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Central Heating Problem

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  • 08-12-2009 4:42pm
    #1
    sobs
    Registered Users Posts: 39 ✭


    This may be a silly question but I would like some info on circulatory pumps. I moved into a house recently but when I turned on the heating, it was not good, the rads only barely warmed up. The burner seems to be working fine. When I looked a the circulatory pump I noticed that it was not connected. From what I can see it was connected to something else that was controlling its operation. Does this make sense? Could it have been connected to a thermostat? Anyway I wired up the pump directly and plugged it in. The rads heated up well but went cold after a few mins so I guess the pump is ok but needs something to control it? Sorry for all the waffle. Any help welcome.
    Thanks


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    #2
    ART6
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,632 ✭✭✭ART6


    sobs wrote: »
    This may be a silly question but I would like some info on circulatory pumps. I moved into a house recently but when I turned on the heating, it was not good, the rads only barely warmed up. The burner seems to be working fine. When I looked a the circulatory pump I noticed that it was not connected. From what I can see it was connected to something else that was controlling its operation. Does this make sense? Could it have been connected to a thermostat? Anyway I wired up the pump directly and plugged it in. The rads heated up well but went cold after a few mins so I guess the pump is ok but needs something to control it? Sorry for all the waffle. Any help welcome.
    Thanks

    The pump should come on when you turn on the heating and should stay on. The boiler should then cut in and out on a thermostat (normally on or in the boiler casing). The boiler thermostat should normally be set at something like 65 degrees, but can of course be lower or higher as suits you. If the pump is running when the heating is turned on and the boiler thermostat is set correctly, but your rads are not holding temperature then my best guess would be that the bypass valve on the hot cylinder coil is too far open, so circulating all the heat past the boiler and causing it to cut in and out without heating the radiators. If you don't already know, the valve in question is the one that connects the two side pipes into the hot cylinder, generally about a third of the way up from the bottom and a third of the way down from the top. Alternatively the coil valves could be simply too far open and diverting all the heat through the coil. Lots of hot water but no central heating!

    Why the rads initially heated up when you rewired the pump, but then cooled down again is odd. Is there a thermostatic valve on the hot cylinder? Maybe if that is set too high and the system isn't balanced, that might be the cause.


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