Building regulations for SEDBUK ratings

garyh3

Hi

Are there are building regulations for new houses in Ireland for a SEDBUK rating for the boiler. I have a new house and the rating is D for the boiler which I think for a new house the standard shoud be an A or a B rating.

Comments welcome

Garh3

patrido

As far as I know there are no such regs in Ireland yet. They've only just come in in the UK. Expect all the junk boilers that can't be sold in the UK any more, to be dumped on the Irish market.

garyh3

typical..

You buy a new house for nearly half a mill yo yo's and you try and be efficient and buy electrical appliances with good ratings and then you find out that the main heating system is sh**e and illegal in the UK.

So how about if your buying a new house SNAG the boiler with a D rating as being out of date and not upto EU standards !!!

shame on you builders !!!

Garyh3

patrido

well if you have a big gaf (or even if you don't), it would probably be worth your while to throw out the old one (or sell it) and buy a nice A rated condensing boiler.

garyh3

Hi patriod

What would a condenser boiler cost for a GAFF of about 1700 sq ft.. to buy and install?

As the one I have is broken I might speak to the boiler guy when he comes out to fix it !

patrido

erm.... i'm not a plumber so i'm guestimating here

you'd probably need a 90k BTU (or maybe 120) boiler for that size house (get a plumber to calculate it accurately)

a quick look at heatmerchants site and they seem to be about 2500 yoyos !! Jaysus, I might be needing a 150k BTU jobbie... I need to lie down... The same boilers seem to be substantially less in the UK (1100-1400 sterling)

These should be up to 95% efficient though and will probably drastically reduce your fuel bills, and pay for itself in a short time.

garyh3

Thanks patriod,

Thats what I was thinking, groing from a 78% efficeint boiler to 95% should pay for itself in a few years.

Garyh3

gregos

Don't be so sure about the efficiency. We had another thread on this a while back that you might want to look at. It depends a lot on the temperature you're running the system at, and while condensing boilers are very efficient for under-floor heating, you won't get the same return from a hotter radiator-based system.

garyh3

Thanks gregos

I would be happy with a rad boiler that has at least 90% which I believe most A rated boilers are. If I have a D rated boiler now anything is going to be better.

thanks

Garyh3

patrido

Yeah, I'm just going by the SEDBUK ratings which have A rated at 95% - it's hard to imagine that they would be as good as that all the time or in every application.

For a large house that will have intermittent heating, different zones, hot water only in summer, max heating in all zones + DHW in winter, would it be better to have 2 smaller boilers (say 2 X 75kBTU) instead of one big one ??

ednwireland

you have to watch sedbuk ratings because they automatically downgrade non condensing boilers. unless you have underfloor heating the return temp of the water means that the water temp is returning higher than the dew point of water negating any efficiency improvements but that said boiler like grants multipass have higher efficiency heat exchangers rather than three baffles.
sedbuk actually cpas the efficeincies of non condensing boilers at 92% under full load. even if they are more efficient. although condensing boilers claim that they stilll run more efficient on a normal radiator system. you pay your money and take your choice.

read more here
http://www.modbs.co.uk/news/fullstory.php/aid/284/The_hot_topic_of_water_heating.html

Alun

As I read that article you referenced, it was stating that the main ineffeiciencies occurr only when using the same boiler for indirect heating of water in the cylinder, i.e. when there is relatively little heat loss because of the requirement to keep stored hot water above 60 degrees or higher. Surely if you remove that from the equation, either by using a combi boiler or installing a separate system for heating hot water that no longer applies. What would the typical heat loss be in a typical radiator system in a house?

ednwireland

good point - i'm a bit focused on the best option for replacing my own boiler which has a hot water tank (which is normally at about 60 c lowest setting on my thermostat) but i guess with a combi boiler you would gain efficiencies