Three Common Types Of Boilers

Many take having a boiler system in their homes for granted not paying proper attention to its maintenance and upkeep. It’s just one of those things in the house that you don’t even give a second thought to...until it breaks down. Then everyone is on Google researching about Boiler Repair and how to keep themselves warm.

Nothing is worse than having a broken boiler in the middle of the harshest of winters having you scrambling for your phone search for ‘boiler repair near me’ at 1 AM in the morning. You do not want to spend a cold night, shivering under the blanket, teeth-rattling, unable to sleep and at risk of catching hypothermia so it’s best you take care of your boilers instead of ending up with a boiler emergency.

There are a dozen ways to guarantee that your house is warm during the winter. You can opt to have installed a gas furnace, an electric furnace, a fireplace and chimney, or a heat pump or you could even get a boiler on finance here. However, and many would swear by this, a boiler is still the best way to go.

Since boilers give off radiant heat, objects in a room warm-up faster as compared to say an electric furnace which warms the air in a room first meaning objects heat up more slowly. Many prefer boilers than other centralized heating systems because they provide a more balanced heat throughout the room. These boilers need regular boiler service or tune-ups from a boiler repair technician to maintain its efficiency and extend its operational lifespan.  If you are interested you may check this website to see if you qualify for this free boiler grant scheme.

Unknown to most homeowners, there are multiple types of boilers and you shouldn’t just choose a random one for your house. Each type is best fitted for a certain manner of use and house. There are numerous factors that you have to consider as to which type of boiler you should get. The number of residents, number of rooms, type of house, and even the electricity and gas costs in your area will affect your decision.

It is definitely for the best if you do some research and take everything into consideration before deciding on getting a specific boiler. After all, you do not want to end up with an unnecessarily huge and expensive boiler, do you? Or worse, a cheap boiler that will not provide adequate heating for you and your family. Take also into account that certain items in your house like wooden furniture will not fare well with the constant cold meaning your centralised heating system must be up to the task of staving off winter.

Here are the three most common types of boilers and some of their pros and cons.

Condensing Boilers
Condensing boilers are best known for being cost-effective and energy-efficient, able to extract over 90% of the heat from the fuel that they burn. The residual heat from flue gases is not wasted as they are also used by condensing boilers. They may be slightly more expensive than other types of boilers but the savings, in the long run, will pay it off.

The problem with condensing boilers though is that it will require a regular checkup of whether you have frozen pipes or not. You need to make sure that these pipes are quickly melted and do not cause a major problem as repairs for condensing boilers can be quite high.

Pros:
-Energy Efficient
-Cost-Effective
-Compact Design
-Cons:
-Frozen Pipes
-Expensive Repairs
-Combi Boilers

Combination boilers are a type of condensing boiler but are smaller, making it ideal for smaller properties. Combination boilers also act not only as a centralised heating system but also as a water heater. There are numerous factors that became the reason why combi boilers have become the most popular type of boiler used, accounting for almost half of the UK like the need to downsize, easier and cheap to install, and the small amount of space needed.

Combi boilers also save a lot of resources as it only heats up water once you need it avoiding the circumstance of wasting energy on heating up water just for storage only for it not to get used. With combi boilers, you will also have hot water on demand eradicating those awful cold showers.

Pros:
-Small and could fit anywhere
-Hot water on demand
-Energy-effective
-Cost-Efficient
-Great water pressure
-Easy and Cheap to Install

Cons:
-requires good water pressure
-incompatible with some showers
-can’t accommodate more than one shower every time
-no storage for water
-System Boilers

A system boiler is a heat-only boiler that has additional features inside the boiler itself like an expansion vessel and a pressure release valve. This will also need a hot water storage tank which will take up space. However, it doesn’t need a cold water storage tank so it’s still more compact than regular boilers. Because of the small hot water storage tank, once all the hot water has been used up, you need to wait for the boiler to heat the water again which takes a considerable amount of time.

Pros:
-easy to install
-can accommodate multiple taps being used
-requires less space than regular boilers
-compatible with solar thermal systems

Cons:
it still needs a hot water storage tank which requires a lot of space
When turned on, it heats water and stores it in the tank. Over time the heat is lost resulting in a waste of energy
Limited hot water storage

Given this knowledge, you can now determine which type of boiler you will need for your home. For example, a household with only one to three residents would really only need a combi boiler.