Saunier Duval SD620F - on last legs?

[akbmcf1]

Hi guys (and gals), thanks in advance for any help you can give!

My tale of woe is as follows:

Saturday night/Sunday morning (4:30am) - get woken up by pipes banging and banging and banging nice and loud. Sounded like someone was chained to them and trying to escape (there wasn't, honest). Temperature gauge on the front of the boiler was right up near 100. Noticed the pressure was down as well, so gave a slow feed from the filling loop to bring the pressure up to 1bar. Banging noises continued, so switched the heating off and went back to bed (just to lay there thinking, crikey, my boiler's knackered).

Tried firing it up again yesterday morning, and the banging stopped, but the upstairs radiators were getting really hot, and of the 4 downstairs rads, 2 got warm and the other 2 were stone cold.

Took the front panel off my wonderful (haha) Saunier Duval SD620F and noticed that around the pump, there was a leak that must have been slightly leaking for a bit as it shows signs of crusty water deposits.

Suffice to say that the heating is now off, thankfully we still have hot water, but the house is now cccccooooooolllllddddd. Brrrrrrr.

Whaddya reckon? Pump gone? Worth replacing? Can I do it myself?

Or is it:

New boiler? I could do without spending the money as I am going to Australia for 4 weeks in 10 days time, but would this be the sensible move?

Thanks again
akbmcf1

 

[Agile]

It certainly sounds as if the pump has failed.

They cost about £136 I think and are difficult to change.

We would never touch them because of their propensity to leak.

Most people would be fitting a nice new boiler. At least one model has four of the five pipes in the same order.

Tony

 

[akbmcf1]

Thanks for your reply, Tony. Would you have any advice on brands of replacement boilers to look at? I don't mind spending out a bit extra if it would be worth it in terms of reliability or efficiency.

I had a feeling when we bought the house last year that the boiler would need replacing at some point, so this has maybe just hastened that process!

Andrew

 

[Agile]

Your boiler is overdue for replacement as its probably well over 10 years old. Most house surveys would warn the boiler is old.

Every installer has his favourites. I suggest you choose a CORGI installer and see what he suggests ( as long as its not Sonya Duval which are now the same as many Glowworms ).

Tony

 

[akbmcf1]

Thanks for your advice yesterday. Having made some enquiries, it seems a repair is completely out of the question as it just doesn't make sense to throw good money after bad.

I'm gonna have a look around for a replacement, and I have helpfully found out that my wife's uncle is happy to fit it (he's a builder that ahs fitted a lot as he has done house renovations) and he has a CORGI heating engineer friend to commission it for me (yippee).

So if I'm going to take the plunge and decide on the boiler myself, what advice on brands would you give? I would like to make sure that I get something that is going to last a decent amount of time and not cost an arm and a leg if it should need repairs later in its life! (don't want much, do I??)

Quick question as well - at the mo, the Sunny D is running off a Honeywell 7-day timer, a room stat in the hallway (which is jiggered) and TRVs on all radiators - do I need to replace the room stat, or can I just use TRVs?

Thanks again!!

 

[Agile]

The SD already has a 24 hour timeclock.

You can use the TRvs, room stat and timeclock if the dogey installer knows how to connect them.

I would never recommend a builder to fit a boiler!

Its illegal for a CORGI to sign off a boiler that he has not dealt with the key points.

Tony

 

[Slugbabydotcom]

Sunny D

Thats too ironic for these.

I think SaD is a better acronym

I'm with Tony on this one even though I normally strive to keep them going. Don't waste any money fixing it.