From sizing to setup: what you need to know about your hot water cylinder

We’ve seen a massive shift in the industry with more installers working with and specifying hot water cylinders to customers as part of low carbon heating solutions. But are you ready for this resurgence in the product’s popularity?

Whether you’re working with unvented, ASHP, direct or indirect hot water cylinders, it is always beneficial to refresh your knowledge on the products and how to make the most out of them. Read on to find out how Baxi can help.

Hot water cylinder size matters

One of the most important considerations is the size of a hot water cylinder. This is critical in ensuring maximum heating efficiency. These are the questions you can ask yourself and your customer before you start sizing to make sure you know exactly what the cylinder is going to be required to do as part of the heating system.

1. How many people live at the property?
2. How many showers and baths are there?
3. How many could be running at once?

Then, depending on the answers to these questions, you can consider how big the cylinder needs to be. Take our Megaflo hot water cylinder range for example. These cylinders are designed to be powerful yet efficient with floor-mounted units which are easy to install, even in small spaces. The range has fast heat recovery and exceptional flow rates, with capacities from 70 to 300 litres.

Baxi's hot water cylinders also provide exceptional recovery times thanks to a coil-in-coil heat exchanger. The products are designed to deliver reliable hot water across multiple outlets, without the need for shower pumps or tanks. The indirect and direct models can hold 125 – 300 litres while the air source heat pump (ASHP) cylinder range can deal with  170 -300 litres.

This is why size really does matter. We offer a vast range of exceptional cylinders which are designed to suit different household needs. To provide the most efficient heating and hot water system, it is critical that these sizing calculations are carried out correctly. The right-sized cylinder will avoid heating too much water, thereby reducing energy usage and overall costs.

If renewable energy is a priority for your customers, you could also recommend the Megaflo Eco Solar Cylinder range to encourage and enable the uptake of solar energy production in homes across the country.

Fit and don’t forget

Once you’ve determined the correct size cylinder for your customer using a hot water cylinder size calculator, it’s time to install. As a Baxi Works installer, you get access to our free product training courses which are designed to give you no-nonsense, hands-on training that moves away from the textbooks and equips you for a hot water cylinder installation.

We’re always looking to make the installation process easier for you, which is exactly what our new Baxi ASHP Pre-Plumbed Cylinder is designed to do. It is available in a range of capacities and comes with much of the pipework and fittings already in place. As well as speeding up the time you spend on a job, the new cylinder comes with a host of other add-ons such as Bluetooth and intuitive controls to level up your installation services.

Once you’ve fitted a hot water cylinder, you should be confident in knowing that your customer’s heating and hot water system will perform efficiently and be able to cope with changing seasonal demands. However, key to ensuring this reliability and safety, is servicing.

The three tiers of safety include: control stat (how hot the water comes out), temperature and pressure relief valve (T&P) and energy cut out (overheat stat).

A basic servicing checklist for cylinders will generally include the following:

1. Inspection
2. Strainer cleaning
3. Descaling immersion heater(s)
4. Expansion Volume recharge
5. Re-commissioning

The cylinder’s installation document will always contain the full servicing instructions but it is still a good idea to discuss the reasons for servicing with the homeowner to encourage that commitment to doing so on an annual basis.