Central Heating

[tooj]

Our dining room radiator never got . more than lukewarm although we had the heating control set at 20 as advised in various newapapers to save on heating bills. The heating engineer called to service the boiler last week and said he had tweeked the radiators and now theyb are lovely and warm. Since then I saw that he had altered the heating contrloi to 27 degrees and the bojler tremperature from three quarters of the way round to max. Do you think that this means my bills will go tjhrougj the roof if I leave them like this?

[Ryzen]

Yes..higher temp = higher cost

[TonyV]

27 degrees is a ridiculous setting IMO. I think your heating engineer has fudged an underlying root cause by adjusting the temperature settings. I would ask him for his reasoning in adjusting temp or get another engineer, preferably from a recommendation.

[-SharonA-]

20 is low. Looking at mine, they're on 25!

[Prudie]

tooj I really feel the cold and others often moan because our house is too hot but never in a million years have I had the control up to 27, that is ridiculous and no-one else would have that temperature. Take advice from above.

[Old_Geezer]

I think if the temperature of each room is as you wish, then best not take too much notice of what the knob may or may not point to, or whether it's accurate or not.

You are referring to the single house thermostat/control ? Mine's set to max (30 I think), and proper control is set at each radiator individually.

Of course if you want to freeze and save money, turn the c/h off.

[Buenchico]

Buy a thermometer! You need to get the actual temperature in your home to a sensible level, rather than looking at numbers on a dial.

18C is an adequate temperature for a working environment such as an office or a classroom but many people prefer a temperature of 20C (or possibly 21C) to create a 'cosy' feel in their homes. Anything much above that not only wastes a lot of money but also tends to slow brain activity. (Kids doing their homework, someone doing their VAT returns or a budding author working on their novel should never be in an indoor environment where the temperature is above 21C; their brain simply won't function efficiently enough).

The thermometer next to my desk is currently showing 19C, which is just a bit warmer than the 18C that I normally try to keep my living room at during the winter.

[TonyV]

The room we use the most and controller is in is set to 20, all the other radiators are controlled by thermostatic valves.

[The Builder]

We've had this before. (See OG's post.)
It makes no difference what your roomstat is set at, as long as each individual radiator valve is on the desired setting for that particular rad.

Although......... if the roomstat is set low, (20 degrees), then your individual rad setting is less effective.

As far as boiler (heating) setting is concerned, it depends on the size of the boiler.
For a normal (and oversized boiler), then a setting of around three-quarters is the norm.
Perhaps your boiler is a tad under-sized, in which case, setting it on full may make sense.

The simplest thing to do is to set your rads, and put the boiler on three-quarters, and see what happens.

I guess your plumber simply re-balanced the rads when he tweaked the system. If the boiler setting is too low, then the rads may once more struggle to keep up.
I doubt it though.

[teacake44]

It always seems to me that heating /service engineers want to be in and out of your house like a dose of salt, and check very little other than the burner, fan pressure and spark electrode. Mention to them that you have one or two radiators that seem to have a problem, and they look at you as if your stark raving mad, because they want to be out of the house in 20/30 mins max. But of course if your radiators need to be balanced, or have an air lock, that means work. :0)

[davebro]

Not everyone has TRVs.