DANGER OF THE WEEK AWARD
Bad ‘DIY Property Maintenance ‘

It’s getting on to the end of the year. No Really! If you don’t believe me take a walk through your town centre. Christmas sales and decorate remind us that the cold weather is coming. My interest in the seasonal change however is safety. The big burning ball of mostly hydrogen called the sun is around in shorter supply every day. Especially here in Oldham. Your heating systems and fires are starting to get turned onto supplement.  If you haven’t had your fire or boiler serviced recently here’s at least one good reason why you should.

The first picture shows the fresh air supply vent for this homes back boiler.  The screen behind the vent is not allowed for the very reason shown here. It’s clogged up with paint, dust and debris. The second photo is what the vent should and now looks like.

I’ve not met many people who take the fresh air vent seriously. I had one client boast a few years ago that she plugged the vent in her property and then hung a radiator over it. She was not amused when I gave her a choice of re-establishing the vent or having her gas turned off. Incidentally she has not used us since. Better to bitter and alive then happy and dead though. I’ve been to many more homes the fresh air vent has been plugged up and plastered over during a renovation! Now this may not seem like a big deal. The vents do cause a nasty draft at times and it’s near impossible to be comfortable in a room where the vent points straight to outside especially in the minus 20 degree weather we had last year. Problem is this. If that vent is missing then your flue may not function properly and you may indeed die from carbon monoxide poisoning and them’s the facts, Jack!

The science of flues is simple. In order for a flue to work it must be able to remove the products of combustion which are the fumes from the fire. The fumes go up and out of the terminal at the top of the chimney. Simple enough. Hot air rises so in the most simplistic way this works without a fire too. Warm air from a room heated with nothing more than the sun will drag air up the flue and deposit it outside.  Problem is this. If there a vacuum in the room and I don’t mean a Hoover! If there is no way for fresh air to replace the air that’s going out through the flue then a couple of things are going to happen. Firstly the fire is going to light with the oxygen that’s already in the room. The fire is going to burn with the oxygen already in the room. As not enough fresh air (oxygen) can get in then the flow of air and the products of combustion will stall and start to back up down the flue and spill back into the room. Depending on how cold the air is outside this can happen even on a flue in good condition as well. Most gas fires and back boilers have safety devices to stop them from working if there is a lack of oxygen however it doesn’t stop you from breathing in the carbon monoxide in the meantime and if the devices aren’t sensitive enough you could die before the fire goes out.

So back to our fresh air vent. It’s there for a reason. Fresh air means fresh oxygen. In today’s homes the vents are even more important as older houses had drafty floor boards and windows as well as air bricks peppered around the perimeter. There was no shortage of fresh air (a.k.a. adiabatic air flow). As homes improved over the years things like laminate flooring and underlay can plug up all the air flow that used to come through the drafty floor. Double glazing now stops all air flow around the windows and sealed outside doors stop the flow there. Even conservatories can dramatically change the way a house breathes. With all of that air flow dampened down you create a sealed environment. Poison gas can’t escape and no fresh air gets in. It’s only a matter of time before that room is inhabitable.

So before the heating season really kicks off get your gas fire (back boiler, coal and wood fires follow the same rules!) serviced. Make sure that service includes a flue flow test (a smoke bomb up the flue to check for leaks throughout the property) and that the ventilation is good (no shrubs, bugs, paint or other substances) with nothing is blocking the fresh air vent. A Gas Safe Registered engineer will know what to look for in every circumstance so always trust them. DO NOT TRUST ANYONE ELSE!!!!

If your current service engineer can’t show you a valid ID card then he/she/it isn’t Gas Safe Registered. You might as well hire a BABOON! You’ll have about the same chance of getting it done safely and correctly. Here’s a short video on what the ID card MUST look like.

More question?  Gas Safe Register Website – Click Here or ring them on 0800 408 5500

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