Monday 12 November 2012

Glowworm Flexicom CX Heating Not Working Properly

A friend of mine who is also a heating engineer asked me to look at a Glowworm Flexicom CX which a customer of his was having trouble with. He had serviced the boiler 6-7 months ago and the lady had called him back because it was not working correctly and hadn't been since he had serviced it apparently. During the summer one of the radiators had been getting hot when the hot water was run for extended periods and warm even when the hot water was run for shorter periods.

With the winter weather turning colder the lady began to use her heating and not all of the radiators were getting hot. Two of the three upstairs radiators were getting red hot, the other lukewarm. One of the radiators downstairs was getting lukewarm but the others were hardly getting warm. The boiler was getting up to temperature really quickly and then cutting off taking a while to cool down before relighting. When the status display was on it would run through the central heating status mode as normal eventually ending up on S7 the central heating pump over-run status. Then it would go to S97 where the boiler checks the water pressure sensor, and suggests you check the connection to the water pressure sensor and that the pump has not seized. Both of which appeared to be fine. The boiler flow was very hot when the boiler was running and the return was barely warm.

Another engineer had previously removed and cleaned out the water pressure sensor just after the boiler had been serviced and said there was a fair amount of debris fouling it. My friend also said that there was some debris when he drained one of the radiators. From this I assumed that the diverter valve may have been fouled with debris and not moving correctly between the heating and hot water positions. I drained the boiler and removed the diverter valve. To remove the diverter valve all three of the screws had to be removed fully before the diverter valve would come out, the bottom one was particularly tricky to access but managed to get it out with some needle nosed pliers.

After removing the diverter valve the remaining water in the boiler which leaked inside the boiler was really clean and there was no sign of any debris in the diverter valve. However it didn't look as if the motor was attached to the spindle of the diverter valve. I removed the motor from the diverter valve assembly and the spindle was free to move. I reconnected the spindle and fitted the motor back to the diverter valve assembly.
I then re-filled and tested the boiler. I ran the hot water and it was heating and modulating as it should to heat the water to an even temperature. I then switched the heating on and the motor moved the diverter valve in towards the back of the boiler and the connection to the spindle was visible through the hole in the diverter assembley close to the white plastic section. Opening the tap the motor pulled the spindle back outwards, and stayed there for a while after the tap has closed before the motor pushed the spindle back in.

I checked around all the radiators and they were all getting hot as they should be.

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