How your localised water system can trim your gas efficiency and injure your gas boiler

There are innumerable products available in the market that you can add to your central heating system to ensure that it runs properly, and there are several other products that can do work for you even in standalone mode. Regardless, a gas central heating systems that’s given proper care will work for you smoothly. It is now well known, thanks to advice given by governments and environmental organisations, that we should save energy wherever possible by turning off lights, washing clothes at lower temperatures, switching televisions off and turning down thermostats. All these habits will result in lower household bills in addition to protecting the environment through energy saving. But, how will you make sure that your central heating system works efficiently? As the layers of sludge and limescale starts piling up, the efficiency of the system starts dwindling increasing your energy costs.

Whether your water is hard or soft can play a crucial role in the life of your central heating system and water treatment can help here – to extend the healthy working of your system with products such as Fernox.

Water treatment looks after your system in more than one way. Many types of water treatment products such as scale reducers and inhibitors, magnetic and electronic anti-lime mechanisms, sludge destroyers, noise reducers and anti-freeze can be used for water treatment.

Your location in the UK caninfluence the extent of your water’s hardness or softness. If you are living in hard water region, then you will be more susceptible to limescale attacks; you can notice deposits in your kettle, tap and shower head. Heating bills grow as a result of efficiency reduction caused by limescale. Your fuel bills can increase by forty percent even with small deposits of limescale in your cylinder. Limescale deposits are simply composed of calcium. Although those living in soft water areas will not have to take as many provisions, if you are unsure you should still get professional advice.

A majority of water treatment methods alter the molecular structure of water and the associated particles, and thereby changes the way water behaves. One way of modification is to convert a structure completely to another, another is to take out the mischievous component, and yet another way is to prevent the structure from becoming solid, thus leaving its normal process unrealized.

There are different types of chemical test kits available that can help you to ascertain the corrosion potential of water by measuring the pH, chloride, iron and copper levels.

Your system must be installed by a professional, never connect brass or copper to aluminum as this can lead to corrosion through the interaction of these metals. The gas connections should be made only by a trades person, who is Gas Safe registered (with CORGI).

Always plan before getting the new system installed; for instance, you should know what water treatment method should be used. Before using a water treatment remedy on your present system, ensure that the entire heating system is completely flushed out.

Products added to the mains supply can soften hard water and improve the quality of water for domestic use, but they do not prevent or remedy deterioration of the central heating system. These solutions can make detergent and soaps to lather effortlessly, but they will not be able to help the heating system to work efficiently.

Corrosion, limescale and biological growth are the three prominent things you need to stop.

Corrosion will begin as soon as the tank is filled with water. One of the symptoms of corrosion is cold spots in your radiators because sludge in the system prevents the water circulating properly. Pinholes can develop in the radiators which can make the boiler noisy when heating up.

Limescale results from the presence of calcium and magnesium in water, hard water regions have these elements more than the rest of the country. Once the water is heated it leaves deposits of these minerals which form a hard crust, building up over time and blocking pipes etc. Again, the symptom of this can be a heating system that makes noise.

The next problem to deal with is the biological growth. The growth enters the system through open tanks in certain types of heating system. The biological growth advances rapidly in the form of a slimy lining. This gunk stagnates in the plumbing and slows down the flow of hot water.

A lot of free advice is available on the internet on how to get rid of biological growth. It would be wise to take time to go through some of this information. Manufacturers of water treatment products provide detailed data and user references on their websites. Some well known manufacturers and their popular products are listed in this site, such as Sentinel or Fernox. Blogs are another great source of free advice and information or contact a supplier with any queries that you may have.

All the best with your treatment and let’s hope you can get your heating systems working as efficiently as possible to save you some hard cash.

Posted in Safety