Should I give up on my cast iron boiler?

[BAD_BOB]

Getting big quotes to fit a new £600 boiler in place of my archaic Ideal Standard cast iron floor mounted boiler that I can not afford.

Could I look to getting the old fella fixed? (igniting pilot circuit doesnt work, cracked leaky sight glass, sooty smelly flue...) and seeing if I can get another few years out of it? Its so simple in concept - depending if I can find the bits to fix it mind! Is there a 'specialist' antique part supplier out there?

Thanks for any advice.

Bob

 

[croydoncorgi]

Whatever else you do / get done, FIX THE FLUE!!!
If it's sooty and smelly, then the boiler is almost certainly in a dangerous state and must not be used at all until the flue's overhauled and the cause of the soot found and fixed.

 

[BAD_BOB]

I havent used it in weeks for this reason... It wont go back on till it is a brand new white shiny one or the existing one is overhauled - if that is possible.

 

[oilman]

Sooty and smelly is not enough air. This is air in and flue gases out as croydoncorgi says, fix the flue first.

The cracked glass is trivial. You should be able to find someone who will fix your boiler, just be suspicious of people who tell you it's had it and you need a new one. If you WANT one, fine, NEED is another matter.

 

[ollski]

Have you tried to get it serviced, I can appreciate that not many engineers will want to touch it because the spares are obsolete, but it will solve your incomplete combustion problem.

 

[2scoops0406]

Have you also considered the savings you may make in fuel? A new boiler is likely to be more efficient than your old boiler. If you intend to stay in your house for some time (you'd had to estimate how long that may be) then you could well save the cost over a number of years. Also take into account that you will be spending money on an old boiler that may only give you a couple more years service, then you'll have to fork out for a new one. It could be a case of chucking good after bad, obviously this is your call though.

Oh yeah, fix the flue, if it is sooty, this indicates imcomplete combustion which leads to the production of carbon Monoxide, I would guess in its present state that any heating engineer would condemn it until fixed.

 

[oilman]

A new boiler is likely to be more efficient than your old boiler.

See my earlier post. Boilers 15 years ago are only a few % worse than current boilers. In the end it's only the losses up the flue, as all the rest of the heat must have come into the house, so it's the house you need to fix, not the boiler. If the boiler is in a garage or boiler room, then heat losses are significant. If you are using the boiler in the summer just to heat water, stop using it and use an immersion heater.

Your boiler is simple and so reliable and fairly cheap to fix, today's are complex relatively unreliable and relatively costly to fix. If they wern't there wouldnt be so many queries on this forum.

 

[2scoops0406]

Were cast iron boilers still made in the late '80's / 90's ?

 

[ChrisR]

They still make them! A Suprima's cast iron! But if you mean floor standing things weighing more than 100kg for 50.000 btu/hr, no.
Most of the main mfrs still do heavyish floor standing boilers, like Kingfishers, at smallish outputs, but they are much lighter than they were.
They have fans for efficiency, so fan proving circuits etc, electronic ignition, and Suprimas now have a flow switch. Good-oh - more to go wrong!

 

[BAD_BOB]

Thanks chaps. If i can get a replacement igniter for it (or a hinge on the sight glass for me matches ) and have someone check out the combustion and give it the once over I see no reason to give up on it now. It's simplicity must be a bonus - no PCB's or flue fans to stick.

If it's 5% less efficient than the newer Ideal Mexico CAST IRON offspring then that's fine by me! [Mine must be at least 20yrs old 'Ideal Standard E type series 2 RS'.] 'Wasted' heat dries the towels too

Also, longer term I'm thinking of a stronger boiler to replace it (rads never get too hot to touch) I cant guage its output as although it is marked as a 40/60 the BTu tables it has cross ref to various different gas presures to give the actual heat output possible. The higher the gas supply pressure the higher the heat? Does that make sense? Seems a bit odd to me - do gas pressures vary that much? (22mm pipe all the way...)

Bob