How your local water can trim your energy cost-efficiency and hurt your heating boiler
How your local water can trim your energy cost-efficiency and hurt your heating boiler
Nowadays a typical household is fitted with dozens of automatic appliances and systems to provide householders with a convenient life. In either case, your system will be well-prepared to work efficiently if you take the time to maintain it. Environmental agencies and local authorities constantly advise us to economise our carbon footprint by switching off unneeded lights and electric devices and by setting our thermostats at lower temperatures. These environmentally conscious steps not only save the greenery on our planet, but also save the pound notes in our wallet. What is the best way to get your central heating system to work more economically? With the accumulation of the likes of limescale and gunk in your system will make it less efficient.
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.
The term ‘water treatment’ is one that is used to describe various methods of taking care of your system. Various products of water treatment are available like electronic line and magnetic filters, noise reducers, gunk removers, anti-freeze and scale reducers and inhibitors.
If you are living in UK, you should first ascertain the hardness of the water you are getting. 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. Limescale deposits inside boiler parts, pipework and radiators increases energy consumption and can lead to banging and bumping in the pipework. A tiny layer of scale inside the cylinder of your hot water can augment your fuel cost by up to 40%. Basically, limescale is just the build up of calcium deposits. If you live in a soft water region, then you need not worry about limescale that much; however, if you are unsure about the water quality, then without any wavering seek advice.
Water treatment products act by modifying the water borne salts and preventing harmful reactions. These products can neutralize limescale, loosen and remove hard deposits or even maintain the residual salts in suspension form to be flushed out periodically.
You can find out the ph and chloride, iron and copper levels with chemical test kits, which will allow you to measure the likely corrosion rate in your system.
The first thing that you need to do is to determine whether your system has been installed by a competent person or not; if different metals like aluminum and copper or brass are connected together, corrosion will set in immediately. Every gas connection should be carried out by a CORGI, Gas Safe, registered professional.
Always plan before getting the new system installed; for instance, you should know what water treatment method should be used. It would be a good idea to completely flush your whole system before adding any water treatments.
Heating systems get their supply of water from the main water source of your household and many mechanisms can be connected to the main source to solve water issues, yet, you should keep in mind that water softening systems installed for your home are only meant to serve your household needs and will not help with the hard water problem affecting your central heating system. You will be able to make lather with detergents and soaps more easily but your heating system will still have problems with efficiency.
Corrosion, limescale and biological growth are the three prominent things you need to stop.
From the very instant your heating system is in place corrosion can begin. Corrosion produces gunk and this prevents free circulation, this can eventually lead to formation of cold spots on radiators. Gradual pitting can perforate the metal piping, causing the boiler or radiators to rattle.
The calcium and magnesium present in hard water is responsible for limescale deposits. The deposits thicken when the water is heated, this leads to formation of a hard crust over a period of time which eventually blocks pipes etc. Again, the symptom of this can be a heating system that makes noise.
Fungal and bacterial growth is another menace to vented heating systems. This problem occurs when tanks are open as they are in certain types of central heating system. After the biological matter gets into the tank it begins to breed and produces sludge and slime. This can also grow and cause blockages in the pipework thereby reducing the efficiency of the whole system.
A lot of free advice is available on the internet on how to get rid of biological growth. These resources cover product details as well as user feedback. Kick-start with the manufacturers and their web sites. You can find a list manufacturers and the popular items they carry in this site. You can also find a lot of really useful information and tips through forums as well as speaking to suppliers directly with any specific questions that you may have.
All the best with your treatment and let’s hope you can get your central heating systems working as expeditiously as possible to save you some hard cash.