Repair or replace boiler quandry

[eviltoad]

Folks,

I've not heard of ATAG or Intergas. I've heard of WB, Vaillant, boxi (admittedly I know nothing and those three are the more well known brands). I don't mind upping my budget and paying good money for a good boiler, provided:

*It's correct and appropriate for my home
*It's efficient & reliable
*It's got a good warranty period and cover (inc. failures are quick and easy to get resolved & parts are not expensive or difficult to source)
*It isn't going to cost a bomb for annual service (which warranties seem to require)
*Once the warranty period ends I'm neither struggling for an engineer for service/reapirs or for parts that might cost a packet.

Based on that (which let's be honest is what most people should be considering), which companies should I be looking at or comparing?

Something I missed off this earlier, don't know how relevant it is:
*This is a 1950's semi, 3 bed, one bathroom, 5x type 21/P+ 1200mm rads, 3 x type 21/P+ 600mm rads.
*Would like (dream) to be able to run a shower and not turn cold when someone fills the sink downstairs.

v.much appreciate your time on this folks.

Simon

 

[bernardgreen]

Based on that (which let's be honest is what most people should be considering), which companies should I be looking at or comparing?

Look at some of the lesser advertised manufacturers, these companies, some are unknown to the general public, often have a very good reputation which brings business to them rather than them having to advertise for customers.

*Would like (dream) to be able to run a shower and not turn cold when someone fills the sink downstairs.

Then avoid a combi boiler, instead have a heat only boiler and a hot water cylinder to provide as much hot water as you need.

 

[denso13]

Then avoid a combi boiler

I have a combi and the shower doesn't go cold when another tap is opened?

 

[dilalio]

Simon,

The subject has been discussed many times before...

Ultimately, it's down to you which product you buy for your home.
Brand leaders spend big bucks promoting their products direct to you, the consumer!
A hefty part of the money you pay for one of their boilers was used to sell it to you, in the first place, I.e: you are paying their sales costs! Rather than improving the design, engineering and quality of materials of the product!

As engineers, we see many different boilers from various manufacturers and we take note when we see something good or bad - purely from a design/build/performance standpoint!

When we see a brand leading manufacturer changing things inside their products to something inferior to what was used before, we ask ourselves 'why'!

Beauty is not only skin deep!

 

[dilalio]

Then avoid a combi boiler

I have a combi and the shower doesn't go cold when another tap is opened?

+1
We have two showers which both perform very well off of the ATAG - there is obviously a downshift but that's physics and the pros far outweigh the cons.

 

[muggles]

Folks,

I've not heard of ATAG or Intergas. I've heard of WB, Vaillant, boxi (admittedly I know nothing and those three are the more well known brands). I don't mind upping my budget and paying good money for a good boiler, provided:

*It's correct and appropriate for my home
*It's efficient & reliable
*It's got a good warranty period and cover (inc. failures are quick and easy to get resolved & parts are not expensive or difficult to source)
*It isn't going to cost a bomb for annual service (which warranties seem to require)
*Once the warranty period ends I'm neither struggling for an engineer for service/reapirs or for parts that might cost a packet.

Based on that (which let's be honest is what most people should be considering), which companies should I be looking at or comparing?

Something I missed off this earlier, don't know how relevant it is:
*This is a 1950's semi, 3 bed, one bathroom, 5x type 21/P+ 1200mm rads, 3 x type 21/P+ 600mm rads.
*Would like (dream) to be able to run a shower and not turn cold when someone fills the sink downstairs.

v.much appreciate your time on this folks.

Simon

Just because you've heard of something, doesn't mean it's any good. Similarly, just because you haven't heard of it doesn't make it rubbish. I'd rather use a manufacturer that spends their money on R&D and better quality components, than one who spends it on advertising.

Based on your requirements, I still say Intergas, and you don't even have to spend more money as it's cheaper than the Germans, and it'll be cheaper to run as well. Cheaper to service too - a full strip and clean can be done in about 20 minutes as all parts are very easy to access. Vaillants need a new burner gasket if you strip them down to clean the heat exchanger, Worcesters have just about the worst servicing access of any boiler out there, some require new gaskets when stripped and some also have a rubber gas pipe internally that has a habit of perishing and splitting after a few years, leading to some rather interesting combustion characteristics. Baxi are OK, certainly better built with more metal components, but the cheap ones are noisy and the expensive ones have the world's most confusing control panel and a PCB that has been prone to failure in the past (although to be fair they seem to have possibly ironed this out). They're not particularly intelligent either - they won't accept communications from the most efficient controls out there, so in real world running terms they aren't as efficient

 

[eviltoad]

Just been looking at the intercool site. Whats the difference between the ECO RF's and HRE's. They look incredebly similar in spec and with the ECO RF's having a longer warranty why would anyone choose the HRE? where's the catch?

Unless it's the £200 price list difference?

 

[dilalio]

Just been looking at the intercool site. Whats the difference between the ECO RF's and HRE's. They look incredebly similar in spec and with the ECO RF's having a longer warranty why would anyone choose the HRE? where's the catch?

Unless it's the £200 price list difference?

Intercool?

 

[eviltoad]

Sorry dilalio, I meant intergas, was having a conversation with the misses at the time and got distracted. My bad

 

[muggles]

Just been looking at the intercool site. Whats the difference between the ECO RF's and HRE's. They look incredebly similar in spec and with the ECO RF's having a longer warranty why would anyone choose the HRE? where's the catch?

Unless it's the £200 price list difference?

The RF has a longer warranty and a wireless module built into the board so it'll communicate with Honeywell wireless programmable thermostats and Evohome without the need to wire a receiver in. It'll also connect to an app in the very near future so you can control it on your phone. Other than that, it's identical to the HRE, but a bit more expensive because of the extra features.

 

[eviltoad]

From reading up a few dozen reviews and comments on intergas it does seem to polarise people, both customers and installers. It seems when it goes wrong Intergas can be troublesome to contact/respond or accept responsibility, and the reliability of some of their parts appears far from that stated. What's been your experience?

 

[Razor900]

My experience with Intergas is awesome but then I do work for them!!

Most of the negative reviews are from a couple of years ago. We used to use service agents and some of them were very good and some of them unfortunately weren't and the companies rep suffered in the uk as a result.

We now have an include service team covering England and Wales. Scotland is slightly different because of the driving times so we still use some very good agents up there although we have plans for direct labour engineers this year.

Almost all of the other calls are handled by the direct team within a day or so.

 

[Razor900]

If budget is tight the Rapid performs fantastically as most of the components are the same as the rest of the range. The Eco RF with the built in module is well worth the extra for the ten year warranty and because the receiver is built into the board it's covered by warranty - wireless receivers are notorious for only lasting a few years.

And when incomfort is launched very shortly the option will exist for remote control of the heating and your installer will be able to monitor your boiler from anywhere!

 

[Razor900]

@dilalio you make some very balanced posts. If you're interested in seeing the Intergas boilers for yourself we run training courses at gas logic in Luton and Greenford near you or if you're busy on the training days we can arrange a one to one session to go through them. You can contact me through my profile.

Nothing against ATAGS I've never even seen one although they are a very small company in Holland it's the whole supply situation that would make me cautious right now after they stitched up the uk guys and shut the Chichester plant down!

 

[muggles]

From reading up a few dozen reviews and comments on intergas it does seem to polarise people, both customers and installers. It seems when it goes wrong Intergas can be troublesome to contact/respond or accept responsibility, and the reliability of some of their parts appears far from that stated. What's been your experience?

As Razor has said, there were issues with getting warranties sorted a few years back with the service agents but it's much better now. My experience has always been great - boilers extremely reliable, of all the ones I've fitted I've had a warranty issue once with a slightly noisy fan that was sorted very quickly, and once I'd managed to be hamfisted and dislodge a cable from its mounting, causing the boiler to vibrate, thought it was a boiler fault so called it in and our very own Razor attended very quickly (didn't find out it was him until long after the call) - turned out to be my fault but still got sorted at no cost to me. Can't say fairer than that. Vaillant, by comparison, apparently now take your card details before they'll attend and pre-authorise a £90 call-out fee, which is then taken from you if they deem the call-out to not be covered by the warranty.