Birmingham primary school prepares for winter months with help from Baxi
New Baxi Quinta Ace boilers and Megaflo hot water cylinders have been installed at Billesley Primary School in Birmingham, improving the efficiency and reliability of the heating system and supporting a comfortable learning environment for the school children and their teachers.
The requirement
Billesley Primary is part of The Elliot Foundation Academies Trust (TEFAT), a successful, charitable multi-academy trust specialising in primary academies. When the non-condensing cast iron boilers serving the school reached end of life, TEFAT was keen to explore the most efficient options for delivering reliable heating and hot water in the school buildings.
Two plant rooms required upgrading. The first plant room, which serves the Main School Building, is located in a basement plant room with restricted access via narrow stairs and a single door. The second plant room serves the smaller Early Years Building.
Lowering operational costs where possible and maximising the efficiency and reliability of the service were key requirements from the Trust. As part of the project needed to be carried out in term time, minimising disruption to the live environment and adhering to tight project deadlines were further major considerations.
The solution
M&E Consultants Rider Levett Bucknall (RLB) were appointed to carry out a RIBA stage 4 design. After assessing the feasibility of installing heat pumps, the capital expenditure and operational costs associated with this approach led to TEFAT ruling it out as a viable option. TEFAT concluded that a full plant room replacement involving an upgrade to condensing boilers, around 20% more efficient than the existing cast iron units, was the most suitable solution at that point in time.
RLB undertook the detailed design for a full plant room replacement of the Main Building plant room and the Early Years plant room. Baxi’s technical design team paid several visits to site to triage the heating systems and work with RLB to propose a design that would maximise energy efficiency and reliability within the project constraints.
The approved design for the Main Building plant room, the larger of the two projects, included a cascade modular Quinta Ace boiler installation. A Megaflo cylinder, also from the Baxi range, was selected to serve the kitchen. RLB specified incorporating a plate heat exchanger to hydraulically separate the new and existing systems and protect the new equipment.
Main Building Plant Room
Six Baxi Quinta Ace 50kW boilers were assembled in a back-to-back cascade arrangement within the Main Building basement plant room to meet the heat load and maximise efficient use of floor space. The decision was taken to split the load between six boilers to help overcome the access restriction into the basement plant room, improve redundancy and optimise the energy efficiency of the boilers during part load.
A Megaflo 300l indirect hot water cylinder was specified to serve the kitchen.
Early Years Plant Room
In the Early Years Building, a wall mounted Baxi Quinta Ace 115 was specified to meet the heat demand. A Megaflo 150l direct electric hot water cylinder was also installed to replace the existing cylinder.
The outcome
Ignis Group were appointed to undertake the full plant room replacement works. Temporary boilers were installed to maintain the heating and hot water service at the School, with the Ignis team ensuring completion and commissioning of the new Quinta Ace boilers before the winter months.
Terry O’Neill, Director at Ignis Group, said:
“We know Quinta Ace boilers well and our engineers find them straightforward to install and highly reliable in operation. This, together with their space-saving dimensions, proved helpful in overcoming space constraints and meeting the tight project deadlines."
Andrew Hanson, Senior M&E Consultant at RBL, said:
“We chose to work with Baxi as we have a good relationship with them and value their support in providing product information efficiently. The Quinta Ace is renowned for its excellent quality and has the back-up we look for from a well-known, well-respected brand.
“Both plant rooms have been refurbished to the highest of standards. The Main Building Plant Room, which is the showstopper, is one of the neatest boiler installations I have come across in my 20+ year career. Ignis’s attention to detail, and communication throughout the project has been outstanding. This is an extremely successful project that will make a huge difference to the School. The School and Trust are extremely happy with the outcome which meets the high efficiency and reliability requirements and is easy to control through the BMS by the caretakers for straightforward operation and future maintenance.”
The new Quinta Ace series of versatile wall-hung boilers is available in eight outputs from 30kW to 160kW and up to 1,200kW in cascade. With a lightweight aluminium heat exchanger for improved thermal conductivity and an operating 6 bar working pressure at 40ºC ΔT, the Quinta Ace is a powerful, low NOx high efficiency boiler generating up to 97.6% GCV for higher-than-average savings. Suitable for a wide range of commercial heating and hot water applications, the Quinta Ace has a small footprint making it easy to install in compact spaces.
For more information on Baxi’s portfolio of energy-efficient and low-carbon heating and hot water solutions, visit Our Solutions.
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