Our beginner boiler guide will have you thinking like an expert in no time. Want to learn more about your boiler carry on reading for our boiler basics.
Boilers can often strike us as mysterious things. Because of the obvious concerns over gas safety, homeowners are well-advised to take a hands-off approach to them, particularly if something goes wrong.
Put it this way - they’re not the sort of appliance you want to go poking around in, fiddling with valves and bolts if you don’t know what you are doing.
But on the other hand, simple curiosity makes it inevitable that many of us will wonder exactly how our boiler works. And having a broad idea can even be useful. If confronted with a central heating system that won’t warm up enough in the dead of winter, it helps to have a vague idea if there’s a serious problem which we need to call out an engineer to look at or if we just need to reprogramme the ignition system.
Boiler basics
For the purposes of this article, we’ll stick to a combination (or combi) boilers, the type which provides both your hot water and your central heating and which are these days the most common type of boiler found in homes.
Your boiler’s job is to heat water by burning gas. In order to do this, your boiler has the following main parts:
- A gas inlet pipe connected to the mains gas supply
- An ignition chamber where the gas is burnt
- An electronic ignition system
- A heat exchange, which is part of your home’s water pipe circuit
- An electric pump, which moves heated water around your pipework.
When you switch your central heating on, a number of things happen. Gas is allowed in from the inlet pipe into the ignition chamber, in the form of several jets. At the same time, the electronic ignition system kicks in so these jets of gas start to burn.
Above the flames, the heat starts to be absorbed by the heat exchange, which looks like a series of tightly packed vertical metal fins (this is to increase the surface area so heat is transferred more efficiently). The exchange surrounds a section of water pipe, so any water passing through it is warmed up by the heat from the burning gas. As all of this is happening, the water pump also kicks into gear, so hot water is moved on through the system to be replaced by cold, which is in turn heated and so on.
A similar thing happens when you turn on your hot tap, although a combi boiler is set up to ignite automatically in that case rather than you having to press a button. A valve system determines whether hot water is pumped around your heating system to your radiators or around your water system to your taps.
All of the above depends on a number of other components for operation and regulation. You may have a wireless electronic control panel, for example, which you can use to programme when your central heating comes on. This connects directly to the ignition system, and if you can’t get your central heating to work, the first thing to troubleshoot is to check the programming. If your control panel is in an ‘off’ mode, it won’t tell the system to ignite. You have to cancel that programme first.
Similarly, thermostats are used to regulate the system according to air and water temperature. This is for both safety and comfort (stopping you from scalding your hands on water that is too hot from the tap, for example, but also keeping room temperatures at a reasonable level). If your thermostats are set too low, your boiler will not come on, because the system is being told the air or water temperature is below the ‘active’ level.
For fast reliable boiler repairs contact Go Assist
Just to emphasise again - it’s not a good idea to take any kind of risk with a faulty boiler. Even if you are happy that you understand how your boiler works a bit better now, if you have a problem that can’t be fixed with a bit of tinkering with the control panel, call out a certified gas engineer. Get an instant quote for a professional in your local area through Go Assist today.