combi boiler lockout button Help and information on all topics relating to your central heating, air conditioning and ventilation issues.

[petea]

Hi, I am new to the forum, so please bear with me! I am currently off-shore, and having phoned home, my wife tells me that our oil fired combi boiler keeps tripping out. She presses the lockout reset button and 'noises' come from the boiler and the heating comes on for a while, but then stops and the red 'lockout' light is on again. As I am not at home, I can't deal with the problem myself. Any ideas anyone as to what she needs to do? Call out the boiler man? Many thanks.

[collectors]

Quite likely a lack of water in the system. Best bet is call a heating engineer. But she can! Switch the boiler off, & have a look at the heating pressure gauge, & it should be reading 1 to 1-1/2 bar. If it lower than this, it might be the problem. On most of these systems there is a filling loop between 2 of the pipes near the boiler & it may need topping up with water. The loop looks like a shiny flexible hose that is connected between 2 pipes with a valve at each end of the hose. You have to make sure the flexible hose is connected & slowly open one valve making sure the pressure gauge is [b]NOT[/b] moving up. Now! Very slowly open the 2nd vulvae & watch the gauge & make sure the reading is [b]not [/b]more that 1-1/2 bar. Close off when it reaches this point. Go back & also close the other valve & hit the reset button. Switch back on.

[petea]

Thanks, collectors for that. It might be a bit complicated for my wife (no ******* intended) but I have e-mailed her your suggestion and we will see what she can come up with.
I thought the system was a sealed one, if there is a lack of water. does this mean I may have a leak?

[collectors]

It is possible there is a small leek. But quite likely down to evaporation over a period of time.

[petea]

Having arrived home and found that there is no flexible pipe or pressure gauge on my boiler, I called in the expert. He found that the new oil pump, fitted the week before as the old one was leaking, was too much of a load on the old motor, which was tripping out. A new motor fixed the problem. So, £165 for the service and new oil pump, followed by £98 for the new motor.
I might invest in a wood fired Rayburn with a back boiler and burn logs-it must be cheaper!