PUMA 80

[essence1010]

Hi someone please help me!!!!!

just moved in to a house with a PUMA80 heater.

gone to turn the Central Heating, no response.

No heres the thing - do the two taps underneath the boiler (red and blue) need to go on. only i turn them on all the way last night and got a leek that lasted about 3 hours! its fine with hot water.

Do you need to turn the taps or not for the hot water to flow.

Any help much appreciated - don't fancy forking out for an engineer if its a simple thing.

cheers

Mark

 

[kevplumb]

pressure gauge under boiler should read 1 to 1.2 dont leave valves open or hose connected

 

[essence1010]

what are the valves the red and blue ones. if they are off surely the ventral heating doesnt flow then. I need to turn them on to get the CH to work it doesnt work otherwise


by the hose do you mean the silver ones?

sorry

i am dense at these things.

 

[essence1010]

sorry silver one that should have been

 

[kevplumb]

read this

 

[kevplumb]

read this//www.diynot.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=6026

 

[essence1010]

Ok point taken:

1) Boiler make / model (gas or oil)

Potterton Puma 80

2) What is / is not happening

No central heating. when blue and red tap underneath both turned on, heating works, pressure goes right up, eventually leaks for a couple of hours.

3) Has ANYTHING else been done / changed recently

Not apart from trying the above for the CH to work

4) When did it (problem) start

when central heating was tried to start

5) When does it happen? eg, heating coming on or going off

when taps (red and blue) are turned on. prssure goes up.

 

[kevplumb]

ok two red and one blue taps?

 

[essence1010]

no one red one blue,

labelled ch flow (red) (goes out from the user manual)
labelled ch return (blue) (goes in according to the user manual)
one silver one labelled cold water in..

problem seems to be the blue one. if it is on , then the pressure goes up, buit heating works as long as red is turned on as well.

if red is on and blue is turned off - no pressure rise but no heating either!!!

help!

 

[essence1010]

silver (cold water in) one i havnt touched

 

[kevplumb]

from your description would think the heat exchanger is screwed try turning the silver one off then see if pressure rises

 

[essence1010]

from what you said and looking at the diagram are you talking about the (and I quote) 3 way diverter valve, above the CH flow and CH return pipe. is it expensive to do, how long would an engineer take

thanks for you help pal, appreciate it.

 

[essence1010]

silver one IS off already by the way.

 

[kevplumb]

turn the mains supply to the boiler off if the pressure dont rise then i rest my case if the pressure does rise then im right if it does im in the manure
turn the stop cock off wait an hour and see if the pressure rises
dont run the heating or hot water
hard working blind

 

[brumylad]

Hi,

I have worked with one of these combination boilers about 10 months ago. In order for your heating to work both the red and blue valves need to be open. With either one of these valves closed the water can not flow through the boiler, the water can not heat up and can not flow through the radiators.

When you run the system with the valves open as they should be, the entire volume of water in the system gets hot. when water gets hot it expands. This expansion is normally accomodated by the expansion vessel at the back of the boiler (flat red metal disc thing). It sounds like this is failing to happen with your system, instead the pressure shoots up and the system starts to leak (like the hull of a submarine diving too deep).

The membrane inside the expansion vessel may be damaged or just that the vessel needs precharging.

I do not feel comfortable to advise you on how this is done, but it is a simple process. A search of the forum for precharge or expansion vessel may be useful as I have seen this discussed on here before.