Potterton Boiler: Seemingly Can’t Take the Pressure …

Whoah, now hang on …

Woodward and Bernstein, here we come … !

Well, maybe not …

I don’t actually think they had to deal with boilers, did they … ?

Well …

Not unless they had a very funny definition of ‘boiler’, ‘Deep Throat’, ‘US President’ or ‘Richard Nixon’.

At any rate, do you remember me telling you — Friday just gone — that I was flat-sitting for one of my neighbours … ?

Lynne, bless her, had to go into hospital to have her knee operated on, and asked me to flat-sit her place, as she was expecting a chap from TSG — the company that South Anglia, our landlords, use whenever something needs fixing or servicing — so asked me to sit in, when the chap turned up.

Which he duly did, when I was in the shower.

Always the way, isn’t it … ?

At any rate, once I’d got quickly dressed, I grabbed a copy of a good read — a compilation of Michæl Moorcock’s Elric stories, so you know — and headed over to Lynne’s to let the engineer in, to do his job.

Which Lynne had already told me was a simply case of replacing the relevant circuit board: something I’m told is called a PCB.

And something that a previous visiting TSG engineer had told her that was all that was needed.

I think — from what the engineer, and subsequently, Lynne told me — we can safely say that was a mis-diagnosis …

The first thing he told me was that the circuit board in her boiler looked ok. And that the company had given him the wrong replacement part!

And that he very much doubted that was all of the problem!

He literally went all out, in dismantling the thing to see if he could see what was going on.

Oh boy!

From what he told me … ?

It seems that there was a problem …

Not necessarily with the circuit board …

But with an air-pressure valve that connects to the flue at the top of the boiler.

And that, while the valve in question is fairly easy to replace, it wasn’t a part he’d been supplied with.

What he asked me to do was to let Lynne know about this, he’d try an get some hot water out of the boiler — whilst stressing this wouldn’t last, and wasn’t guaranteed — and let the office know what was happening, and that they’d have to get the parts in, whilst Lynne herself would need to contact them, as well …

Lynne was, understandably, not a happy bunny.

I don’t think I’d be, either.

After all, from what she’s said, she’s been without hot water for a couple of weeks now.

And, as I know from personal experience, filling up a bath with a kettle, in order to get hot water, isn’t exactly easy.

You need about nine standard sized kettles to do it properly. And, even then, it’s not certain to be as warm as you want.

Actually, it’s not just Lynne who’s had problem’s with the boilers, either: I’ve been asking around.

I had a word with Hailey*, who — along with her partner, James — own one of the part-buy properties on our estate.

Now, because they part-own their flat, they’re in the position of having to look after their own property, and its maintenance.

But as a logical result of this … ?

They also have a freer hand in maintaining their own property.

To the extent that they pay £13•99 to British Gas, to maintain their boiler: the pictured Potterton 24i HE.

A model that’s in the majority of flats, here in Rollason Way.

From what Hailey and her partner were told by the British Gas engineer that serviced their boiler, the model concerned is fairly reliable.

But if it goes, completely … ? Is pricey to replace, to say the least.

That’s one thing.

The other thing she told me … ?

Was that the British Gas engineer also had to re-inflate — rather than replace — the same air-pressure valve that had seems to have been at the root of the problem Lynne was having with her Potterton 24i HE.

Lynne and Hailey aren’t the only ones … !!

As you’ve probably realised, I ran the pub quiz at the Sir Charles Napier for many years: the irony is that Nan, the landlady of the Napier, now lives at the other end of Rollason Way. And, in chatting to people about this, I got talking to both her, and her daughter, Caitlin.

Guess what they’d recently had fixed … ?

Yep.

The air pressure valve in their Potterton 24i HE …

I’ve also had a word with another neighbour, Dave, who’s told me that he, and others in his block have had the same sort of problems with their boilers.

And — if I’ve understood him correctly — that the various repair contractors have had to make sure that the various bits of piping that connect the flue to the exterior of the building are correctly hooked up.

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Now, I’ve got to admit, that doesn’t sound good, does it … ?

Or is that just me … ?

The one thing I do know is that South Anglia are usually — usually — fairly good about dealing with this sort of problem, especially Sara Bartleman, South Anglia’s hard working Housing officer for our area.

But they have been left with a large problem by Crest Nicholson, the company that developed the flats in Rollason Way.

These boilers are reliable, but seen to have a flaw that South Anglia — and their maintenance contractors — have been caught on the hop by.

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* I should add, at this stage, that I told the engineer who was in to fix Lynne’s boiler, that we all had the same type of boiler in our block. His response … ? Was pretty vernacular …