When buying a new house and installing a new bathroom there is one really important question – how is the water heated? There are many ways of heating water and each way has its good and bad points. The usual rule of thumb is that if the system is expensive to install, then the cost of heating the water is low and the quality of the hot water is high. The very best system to install in my opinion is a Gas Central Heating System – Indirect – with a Pressurised Cylinder which is listed last in this blog. Always contact a qualified gas professional about your installation and only ever allow a qualified gas professional to work on your system, install a new system or make any changes at all to your system.
Cylinder Immersion Water Heater
This is in the form of a cylinder, usually copper and is usually in a cupboard. It works in a similar way to an electric kettle. It has an element inside the cylinder and the element heats the water. The heated water rises, and the cold water remains at the bottom of the tank. When a person turns on the hot tap, the water is run off the top part of the cylinder. At the same time, new cold water is fed into the bottom of the cylinder. Continually running the water through the tap will make the water temperature slowly drop until it becomes cold. This is because the element cannot heat the water as fast as it is run. These immersion heaters are expensive to run. It is important to keep them lagged, or to buy a pre-lagged cylinder as this will save a lot of money on heating the water. This type of water heating system is usually found in rented accommodation or single person flats. Landlords often install new bathroom suites but leave the cylinder as it is. The cylinder can be linked to a timer to turn on and off automatically. The only real wear and tear is the element, and this is inexpensive and easily replaced. If there is no water in the cylinder, for example if there has been a leak elsewhere in the house, it is essential to turn off the electric supply to the immersion heater. This is because if it turns on and there is no water in the cylinder, this will create a vacuum and the cylinder will implode, it will look as if it has been crushed, also the implosion may create a split within the seams created during manufacture. It is an expensive mistake.
Cost to install: Low. Cost to operate: High.
Electric System
Then there is an electric system whereby the water is run through and heated at the same time. Think of an electric shower, where you turn on the power switch, turn on the shower water and within a few seconds, piping hot water comes through. But this usually does not provide a fast flow of water, or a strong power shower level of water. This is because the appliance can only heat a certain amount of water at any one time. It may also be that the water pressure will govern the amount of water that is expelled by the shower. This also applies to any electrical water system and is not recommended for bathrooms. Incidentally, electrical installations in bathrooms need to be tested by qualified electricians as they can be extremely dangerous.
Cost to install: Low. Cost to operate: Average
Electric System with Radiators
This is an interesting new concept because it will provide relatively quick continual hot water and up to five radiators can be added. This may be suitable to install to a small one-person flat.
Cost to install: Average Cost to operate: Average
Gas Powered Boilers
A popular option is a gas powered boiler. These are very common sources of bathroom and kitchen water heating. There are many different types of boilers. But extremely important – there are two types of flue. Open flue and Room Sealed. Open flue boilers are dangerous.
Open Flue Boilers
These are the boilers where it’s usually reported that someone has died in a property, usually in a bathroom and the boiler in the bathroom has caused the death. A person can usually establish if an appliance has an open flue boiler if they can actually touch the pilot light. If in any doubt contact a gas professional without delay. A gas cooker is a type of open flue gas appliance. This means that the gas burns and the flue is open. The fumes go into the room air. This includes carbon monoxide fumes. A kitchen has to be a certain large size to accommodate a gas cooker. If the kitchen is small then fixed ventilation needs to be installed before the cooker is installed. Always check with a gas professional. Another type of flue is where a gas fire has a back boiler that heats water, this flue travels up the chimney and they notoriously get blocked. Also the gas burned by the front of the gas fire is open flue. So any room that has this type of appliance has to have fixed ventilation installed as does any room that has an open flue appliance situated within it. It is illegal to sleep in a room that has an open flue appliance.
The important message is: if you have an open flue appliance at your property, get it replaced immediately. If you cannot get it changed immediately, call a Registered Gas Contractor urgently and ask them to check it and certificate it for you. Install fixed ventilation and ensure that nobody blocks it with paper or other items, which is a standard thing that tenants do when it is cold, and they do not realise the danger that this can cause. And look for tell-tale signs of problems, any dirt or soot around the boiler is an indication that something is wrong. Buy a good quality carbon monoxide detector immediately and ensure the battery is always working and situate the detector near the appliance. Test the detector once a week. Do not ignore any signals from the detector.
Cost to install: Do not install – dangerous
Room Sealed Boilers – Direct System
There are various types but they generally are either direct feed or indirect feed.
A combination boiler is a direct feed boiler that is room sealed and probably the most popular item but it is not necessary suitable for a family house.
What occurs when a person is in the bathroom upstairs running a bath and downstairs someone turns on the tap in the kitchen to fill the kettle? The amount of water pressure that is available to both users is halved. This might mean that half the amount of water is travelling through the combination boiler if the bath is using hot and the kettle is using cold. The boiler needs to act quickly to do some adjustments otherwise the water coming out of the bath tap will double in heat. So the thermostat trips in to cut the heat of the water down, the flow drops and the bath takes twice as long to fill. Then the person downstairs completes filling the kettle, and the bath flow returns to normal. When using an electric shower and the same instance occurs the shower can actually run scalding hot or freezing cold. This is because when people use hot water in the kitchen, the hot water is actually originating from the mains cold water. The mains cold water goes to the gas combination boiler where it is heated and then sent to the kitchen hot tap. This means two things. It takes the hot water supply from the combination boiler, but by default, the combination boiler is taking the mains cold water supply. All electric showers are fitted to mains cold water supply, so when the mains cold water supply pressure is reduced by feeding it through the combination boiler, this leaves the electric shower in a precarious position where the water may become really hot then the thermostat kicks in and it becomes freezing cold. Once the use of the hot water downstairs ceases, the water pressure will rise, the shower water will return to normal flow… until someone else uses a tap, or the washing machine or dishwasher starts to run. This type of system is called a direct system.
Cost to install: Average. Operating costs: Average
Room Sealed Boilers – Indirect system
Another type of gas boiler system is called an indirect system. This is where the boiler heats water, but not on demand. The simplified version is that it heats the water and sends it to a tank where it is stored. In actual fact it is a little more complicated than that, it actually sends heated water through pipe work to a coiled pipe in the tank, and that heats the water in the tank. It is an efficient, cost-effective way of heating water. When people draw water from the tank, because it does not rely on the outside pressure, the pressure of the water is not affected so much, there will be a small noticeable drop in the running of the bathwater whilst the kettle is being filled, but the water is already pre-heated to a certain temperature and it is likely that the kettle is drawing water from the mains. If two basins, the bath and the kitchen hot tap are all running together, then it is likely that the item nearest the tank will have the most pressure from the hot water feed, depending on the height of the tank. These tanks can also be heated by element. These systems are quite reliable and useful in a small family house.
Cost to install: High. Operating Costs: Average
Room Sealed Boilers – Indirect system – Pressurised
The third and final type, and in my opinion the very best system is a pressurised hot water system. This provides the most glorious hot water, powered, but without a pump. The pressurised system creates the power pressure. In short terms, the water is heated in the same way as the Room Sealed Boilers – indirect system, but the water is stored in a highly pressurised tank. This means that water can be run from all taps at the same time and the system will cope with it. Turn on all hot taps in the house and only a slight drop in pressure will be noticed. A tank like this can cope with a three-storey house with three bathrooms, utility rooms and kitchen with many appliances. They are not as expensive as you would expect, but will add about 15% to the cost of a gas central heating installation. They do take up some room and are available in a variety of sizes to suit the space and the number of people living at the property. The most ideal place to install the pressurised tank is very near to the boiler, but if the space is not available then the loft provides an excellent alternative.
Cost to install: High. Operating costs: Low
Jane is currently working with Splash Direct bathroom accessories