Draining a combi system.

[Pingwing]

Hi people.
Can you help? I need to drain my heating system to fit a vertical deaerator & dirt separator on my combi boiler as I keep having problems with the heat exchanger causing the hot water to run cold & hot. I was told to fit this as a cheaper option to having the system power flushed. Do I need to turn the gas off to drain and do I use an inhibitor, like Fernox ,on refill or not on a combi system. Cheers.

 

[bengasman]

Before you do this, which will not solve your problem, get some advice from a proper heating engineer.

You have a soiled system which needs cleaning; funnily enough an air-separator is used to get air out of the system, not dirt.

If you are not quite sure how to drain the system, I would strongly recommend you get somebody to do the work for you as you are likely to do more harm than good.

 

[kevindgas]

seconded

 

[bengasman]

Don't agree with me too much Kev, you got a reputation to keep up

 

[Pingwing]

Thanks Gasman.
Actually the bit I wanted to put in was a Spirovent Dirt separator and aereator. If that didn't work I was going for a power flush which as you know is quite expensive.

 

[bengasman]

Spirovents, magnacleans and all that are great to prevent problems, but I have got my doubts about solving problems.
A medium sized system with average corrosion would fill the magnaclean literally 100 times, IF the muck came out.