How does the hot water work on solar, might be worth exploring ourselves

We’ve got panels from about 25 years ago, basically they pre-heat the water before it goes into the AGA, which then fills up our tank. Red hot in summer, barely above freezing in winter.

They’ve probably paid for themselves by now, but no way of actually knowing.

Has anyone ordered and paid for oil in the last day or two? I’m awaiting the call of doom and have no idea what to expect.

I think it depends where you are.
Boilerjuice is giving 94p here near Chester – that’s just the 10p/L less than I paid last week!
😖
….. although that’s for delivery in 2 weeks.

Ah! They’ve just called and quoted £500 for 500 litres all in. Not as bad as I was expecting.

£1.05 a litre for a delivery last Friday and there’s a discount if payment is received within a week? Northen Energy: always seems less than Boilerjuice are quoting.

Northen Energy: always seems less than Boilerjuice are quoting.

Ime almost anywhere quotes less than boiler juice. They sub it out to your local supplier at X+% anyway

I use it for a ball park then call my local supplier who’s always A cheaper and b. Delivers quicker as a direct order

I suspect Boiler juice sit on your order to make you use a higher priority/cost option next time.

I use it for a ball park then call my local supplier who’s always A cheaper and b. Delivers quicker as a direct order

This – it’s the worst case scenario!

That was our experience when we moved here eight years ago. Find the cheapest quote, then go to a local supplier, Goffs in our case, and they’ll always undercut it.

We had a new tank installed the other week which unfortunately meant running the old tank very low. So low that the oil salvaged from the original tank didn’t reach the outlet of the new tank.
Collected 120l @126 to get us going and had a further 500l (capped) at £1 p/l delivered a few days later.

Tough times

Bell Fuels currently quoting 83.5 pence per litre if you’re in Essex or Suffolk. They usually delivery quickly too.

Quick edit someone also recommended the prices BFS Fuel Services for Essex if you’re in the area but I haven’t tried them myself as yet.

Bell Fuels currently quoting 83.5 pence per litre if you’re in Essex or Suffolk.

Including VAT?

Just paid 85p inc VAT today, delivered tomorrow

South of England the Oil Club weren’t offering prices because the suppliers weren’t doing a deal. Just had an email of 93ppl. Sounds like things are settling, a bit.

99ppl here in Wiltshire.

Just had to pay 97p for another 500 ltrs 🙁 – Shropshire

Looking at that 400 ltrs has only lasted 2 months and thats mainly been hot water heating only with maybe the occasional evening to warm the house through

We had 767l at 104.4 delivered last week (Homefuels Direct, Cheshire, came from the Certas place in Bramhall). Was cheaper than the Boilerjuice quote

Markets down a bit but not a lot….

Need the pound to pick up

Must be dearer here in central Scotland. Paid £1.09 a litre this week for 1000 litres. 2700 litre tank, but I couldn’t bring myself to fill it at that price. Might regret that decision.

I turn our oil based system off over the summer and use the immersion heater for hot water.  Running on a timer it only needs to be on for about 30 minutes a day. I need to do the sums but I think it’s cheaper than running the boiler.

think it’s cheaper than running the boiler.

We’re on Gas, but our gas bill for last month was £36 and that’s just heating the HW tank as I switched CH off a couple of months back.

£1 / day does seem a bit steep, but I guess it was under 50p a day before the madness started.

We’re on Gas, but our gas bill for last month was £36 and that’s just heating the HW tank as I switched CH off a couple of months back.

£1 / day does seem a bit steep, but I guess it was under 50p a day before the madness started.

if it’s anything like our tarrif, the standing charge is now ~50p/day.

We’ve got 3 bars (out of 5) left on our 1300l tank. Was filled end of December. Only had it one for water 2x1hr a day for a bit now, been on 3 bars for a while.

I need to sort out my hotwater system.

Our oil combi used to be right outside the kitchen window…. Now it’s 30 ft away ….. And the subsequent pipe ….even lagged up needs displaced every time. Might be imagining it but we are going through considerably more oil than we used to….. Even though the heating is off.

Sorry I meant 3 bars out of 10 above 🙄

Being new to oil I’m not sure how much 3 bars actually equates to or how long it will last? We were told when we moved in that it needed refilling at 2 bars??

Being new to oil I’m not sure how much 3 bars actually equates to or how long it will last? We were told when we moved in that it needed refilling at 2 bars??

3 bars on a 1300l tank is probably about 400l (3 x 130l). That’s pretty rough though and assumes your tank is a uniform shape all the way down. As for how long it’ll last, what you need is a spreadsheet 🙂 We have one, and make a note when the level drops a bar, that way you can start to gauge how quickly you go through the oil. In winter we generally do one bar every couple of weeks, that’s on a 1000l tank. Worst was 9 days. Soon starts going for longer once the weather warms a bit.

I assume you’ve got a modern plastic tank. In which case it’s not easy to work out use rate in litres/day. The old metal tanks were much easier, just measure it and you get litres/mm, which is the same over the full tank. Moulded tanks have a different cross sectional area as the height changes.

If you know what the flow rate is of the burner, the jet diameter (it should be in the boiler spec) and you measure how long the burner is on for (I did this with an Arduino which detected the sound of the burner starting) you can get an estimate of the volume per mm drop of the sight glass. For my 1000l tank, it’s about 1l/mm in the middle (200 to 800 litres.

Also make a note of the reading just before it gets filled and just after, the difference is the amount added.

But it’s not easy getting a reading in litres!

Yeh it’s a green plastic one, cylinder on its side, so 2/10th of a tank height from the bottom (if that’s what the bars represent) will not be 2/10ths (260l) of the 1300l volume.

I don’t know I guess we’ll have to see and not leave it too late before filling! And I better start recording when we have it filled, I do that with our prepaid electric and currently on about £14 a week

Does it have an external sight glass?

I think the electronic ones just bounce a light onto the oil surface. It still just gives a linear value but you can stick a tape measure to a sight glass and read it off in mm’s, so much higher resolution than 10 bars.

But yes, you need to start recording before and after filling it, that will give you some info.

I’ve planned ahead…

I’ve stacked a pile of rocks on top of a dead horse in the back garden. I’m hoping it will be ready for winter.

Just filled up, again.

Called our local two providers as per usual – first wanted 112.84ppl and the second 94.29ppl (both inc VAT).

£170 difference when I’m buying 1000 litres.

Good to know as we’ll be topping up next month, 1000l too.

Fingers crossed for us though as we have £100 in credit with our last supplier. My wife had decided to sign up with them to bank £100 a month with them. I didn’t find out until she’d already paid a month and I said what if they go broke or have a crap price next time 🙄. Atleast we have since been sticking £100/month in another bank account and have around £800 in hand.

Not sure if we could just ask for it back if theirs isn’t a good price. Grrrr …

Yeh it’s a green plastic one, cylinder on its side, so 2/10th of a tank height from the bottom (if that’s what the bars represent) will not be 2/10ths (260l) of the 1300l volume.

Get a long piece of wood like a broomstick and dip the tank, measure how deep the oil is and the size of the tank then put the tank dimensions and the oil depth into this calculator and it will tell you what you got in litres

https://www.omnicalculator.com/construction/tank-volume

We have no mains gas in our bit of Germany, its oil, solar or wood from the forest for heating/hot water.

For some reason we have an in-ground 18,000 oil tank. It used to supply two houses but now it’s just for us. The Telmar gauge to show contents is broken and imagine our surprise when the last delivery brimmed it during low price covid times….

Its also possible to find recovered oil for sale. This is from houses that had oil but changed to another fuel. Its filtered and clean as well as cheaper than “new’ oil and often appears on Facebook marketplace posted by reputable companies that offer a tank cleaning service.

Thanks to this thread resurrection I’ve just ordered 500l at 85ppl. (The Heating Oil Club/mid Suffolk). Not great, but a lot better than the last 500l.

Aye I just ordered 500l at 83p via Boiler Juice, delivered yesterday.

Same here just got 85ppl via Oil Club. About half full so I’m gonna throw another 500l in get the tank as full as possible. Better than 98ppl last time. Can’t see oil going down as we head towards winter.

Just ordered 800L to fill our tank in Fife at 89p/L. Can’t see it getting much lower for now.

Oil refill booked; £871.50 for 1000l, Angus in Scotland.

@blitz who did you use in Fife?

@SSS Johnsons