THE BAD. Thankfully this boiler and its shocking pipework were stripped out by us yesterday. Sadly I've actually seen worse than this but just haven't had my camera with me. The boiler itself is a bottom end, low cost type model. Such poor quality cheap boilers actually have greater lifetime costs over their short lives than the better quality boilers. They are unreliable and the spare parts for them are vastly over priced. The installers who fit such boilers are invariably from the lower end of our trade and this type of pipework is their hallmark.
THE UGLY. Note the poorly soldered joints and the green corrosive flux residues. The joker who did this work has used self cleaning flux and not bothered to wipe down his joints.
THE GOOD. I love the old quote about how you should never argue with an idiot in the street, as anyone walking past wouldn't be able to tell the difference! Likewise a good tradesman should never try to join on to such poor pipework. It is impossible to make it look neat and you are simply pulling yourself down to the original installers level. We stripped this mess all out and started again. The new boiler is the Worcester 28CDi 'Compact' complete with seven year warranty. The pipes are much neater now thanks to the spirit level on the left of the picture. We only use Fry's traditional 'Fluxite' on our soldered joints. You have to clean your pipes and fittings with wire wool but it is is much cleaner and gives better results. Luckily the customer has some spare matching tiles which we will slot in later leaving the job in much better shape than when we found it.
Here's a little shot of inside the aptly named 'Compact' boiler. I predict we'll be fitting quite a lot of these.
