Advice Requested On Fitting A Salus Rt500 Programmable Room Thermost

[G W]

I have just acquired a house with a  Warmflow Bluebird Oil boiler - probably installed in 2004.

There is no programmer attached to the system at all.  It seems almost too simple. The only " controls" are :

1. An ordinary electrical on/off switch ( Marked " Boiler" in felt tip ) wired to the thermostat hanging on the front of the boiler.
2. An ordinary electrical on/of switch wired to what is the
   circulating pump(  so far as I can see there is only one pump but the
   house is a bit of a rabbit warren so there may be another one somewhere).

I am considering installing a Salus RT500F ( Combined Central Heating
Programmer and Room Thermostat )  and would be grateful for any advice
re the following questions :

• Is the Salus T 500F the right sort of kit to do what I want, which
  is basically to programme on/off phases and set a max temperature/
•  If so, am I right in thinking that the Salus should be connected to the wiring that currently goes to the "Boiler" switch?
• Should the pump be connected in some way to the Salus?
• If not,  do I need to install some separate controller for the
  pump, or should I just leave that with the switch permananetly in the
  off position/?

Many thanks for any help you can give.
 

Graham

 

[steptoe]

is it a combi boiler or a system?  ie, do you have a hot water cylinder fed from the boiler?

if it is a system boiler, what system is it.

it sounds like an old style system with gravity hot water and heating operated manually via the pump switch,

used to be very commonplace, about 20years ago.!

 

[NozSpark]

I'd have thought that the stat should control the pump with the boiler being left on, ,, but then how do you control your hot water?

I have a rt500, you don't set on off periods on them, you just set a temperature for a given time (5 per day), say 18 deg being on and 12 deg being effectively off....however I am currently playing with the off temp so that the hours doesn't go too cold when it's "off" as it takes a while to heat our house.. 8mm micribore doesn't help

 

[G W]

It's not a combi boiler, for sure. There is a hot water cylinder which I assume is fed from the boiler

The bolier itself is a Warmflow Bluebird.

Many thanks for the help.

 

[steptoe]

yep,

in that case there should be a clock somewhere to actually turn the boiler on and off,

sounds like you do this manually, this will turn your hot water on and off,

in turn, the pump switch will be for the central heating,

to do this properly you will require a 2channel programmer,

am I right in thinking the one you have is single channel?

you should also fit a tank thermostat, for better efficiency. [ you may, just may, be able to get away with a pipe stat, not brilliant, but better than nothing]

 

[G W]

NoZSpark

Only just getting to grips with the "system" so not sure how to control the hot water independently of the heating as will want to do in the warmer weather.

Thanks for the tip on how the rt500 works.

 

[steptoe]

oh, this will need a 2 [or 3] port valve most likely to be fitted.

depending on your actual plumbing layout

 

[G W]

Steptoe

Sorry, don't know if the Salus 500 is 1 or 2 channel. Have tried pasting a link to the manual but cannot do that yes cos I am a newbie to the forum

 

[a3]

Ill promote you so you can post links and photos

 

[Steve3948]

The boiler may be 8 years old, but the plumbing side could be older and does sound like its Gravity Hot Water and Pumped Central Heating.

Does the Hot Water Cylinder have a Thermostat held in place with wire or strap, and is the boiler balanced flue through wall or vertical, oil boilers will often have a purge overrun to get rid of gases on a balanced flue.

 

[steptoe]

just had a google,

its a single channel programmable stat,

Im thinking that to use this effectively you are also going to need a 2channel programmer fitted to your boiler, along with either

A :  a tank stat

B : a pipe stat

the former being more dependable and accurate,

you will also require either a 2 [or3] port valve( to turn off hot water , if required to), depending on your specific plumbing arrangements, I would think a 2 port should be suitable, but without seeing it I cant be more definate.

 

[NozSpark]

The salus rt500 is a single channel programmable roomstat.

I'd look at getting your whole system changed to a s planIf I were you... just IMHO

 

[steptoe]

G W

how difficult would it be to get a cable from your hot water cylinder to your boiler/pump position?

this is going to be something that needs done in order to even think about having your system efficient.

 

[ProDave]

If I'm reading this right, you won't be able to do anything fancy with what you have got.

It sounds like gravity hot water (with no thermostat, so water just heats up to boiler temperature) and pumped heating.

so you can't have heating without hot water.

Yes you can have a time switch and a room stat, but that's about all.

If you want proper controls, like the ability to have heating without hot water, and a cylinder thermostat, then it sounds like some re plumbing will be needed to introduce some motorised valves.

 

[G W]

Many thanks for all the responses, which have been very helpful. To respond to the questions :

1. Wiring from the cylinder to the boiler would be a bit of a struggle, but should be doable
2. The flue is vertical
3. I'm not sure if the tank has a stat attached to it - will check on Monday when I am there next

If I am reading things correctly, it sounds like the system needs a pretty comprehensive overhaul to bring it up to spec? If so I think I will get that done later in the year when funds allow.

In the meantime I seem to have a system that only allows me to turn it off and on manually, and that the only temperature control I have is the stat on the front of the boiler.

Pending a major major of the system later in the year, is it possible to  / worth fitting the Salus 500 so that when it wants the system to some on it feeds power ( presumably through isolation switches) to the boiler and the one pump that I have.

By my way of thinking I could then at least regulate off/ on and achieve some measure of control over the temperature, even if I cannot be clever about controlling heat and water separately?

Again, many thanks.

 

[steptoe]

I would guess at present the stat merely only controls the boiler temp,

Currently your new stat will only control heating, but, you will still need to manually turn the boiler on, thereby it's constantly heating the cylinder .

 

[ProDave]

Fit a programmer to at least turn the heating on / off when you want.

Get a 2 channel programmer, set it to "gravity"

the "Hot water" on output will turn the boiler on.

The "heating" on output will turn on the pump.

You could also fit a room stat in series with the heating output to stop the pump when the rooms get up to temperature

That's about all you can do without major plumbing upgrades. The hot water will heat up to boiler temperature, so the boiler thermostat is about the only control you will have over the hot water temperature

 

[G W]

Thanks for the further advice.

Pro dave - sorry to keep asking what are probably dumb questions, but what is the difference between a 2 channel programmer and the Salus r500 programmer which NoZSpark says is a single.

Link below to a page with the Salus rt500 manual on it

http://www.salus-tech.com/products/thermostat/rf-thermostat/_c1_34_wireless-programmable-room-thermostat-868mhz/

 

[ProDave]

That room stat is a single channel device, so it would turn the heating (pump) on or off, but would have no way to turn the boiler on or off (hot water)

You want something like this http://www.screwfix.com/p/drayton-lp112-mk4-programmer/64558

That's a proper programmer for hot water and heating.

You could combine that with the wireless room thermostat as well if you wanted to.

 

[G W]

Pro Dave

Thanks - I think i'm finally starting to understand. 

The Drayton LP112 you linked me to says it has common timings for heating and hot water.

Is it ok to go for the "top of the range"  which allows for separate timings for heating and hot water? See here :

http://www.screwfix.com/p/drayton-lp722-mk4-programmer/26078?cm_sp=Search-_-SearchRec-_-Area1&_requestid=946340

Many thanks