Does my new boiler need to be notified to Building Control?

Yes — boiler installation and replacement is notifiable work under Building Regulations. As Gas Safe/OFTEC registered installers we self-certify the work through our Competent Person Scheme, which means we notify it directly and you get a certificate without needing to involve the council separately.

Stone cottages seem to lose heat fast — does that change what boiler we need?

Solid stone walls and older windows do increase heat loss compared to cavity-wall construction, so we size the boiler and radiators around a proper heat loss calculation for the property rather than just matching what's there already. Getting this right matters more in a cottage than a modern house, where an undersized system will never quite keep up.

What support do I get after the install is finished?

Once commissioning's complete we talk you through the controls, leave the paperwork, and register the manufacturer warranty on your behalf. If anything doesn't feel right in the first few weeks — a fault code, an odd noise, a control setting you're unsure of — call us during office hours and we'll talk it through or come back out.

Is a boiler install a noisy, disruptive job?

There's unavoidable noise — drilling for the flue, pipework, sometimes moving a cylinder — but a straightforward swap is usually done within a working day with the mess kept to the immediate work area. We dust-sheet the route in and out and clear away pipe offcuts and old parts before we leave.

Is a magnetic filter really necessary, or is it an upsell?

It's a genuine manufacturer requirement, not an add-on we invent — most boiler warranties are conditional on a system filter being fitted, particularly on hard water. The filter catches magnetite sludge and debris circulating in the system before it reaches the boiler's heat exchanger, which is what actually causes blockages and noise over time.

What's the warranty on a new boiler installed in Faulkland?

Up to 10 years on qualifying Worcester Bosch installs registered through us as Accredited Installers. Other manufacturers typically offer 5–7 years.

Faulkland's Local Boiler Servicing Specialist

Boiler Servicing sits alongside the wider servicing cycle a heating system goes through over its life: commissioning, annual checks, and eventually replacement once repairs stop making sense. Thinking about where you are in that cycle helps decide whether now is the right time to act. We're Gas Safe registered and OFTEC registered, based at 24 Bristol Road, Radstock BA3 3EE, and happy to talk through where your system currently sits before recommending anything. Nearest neighbours on our round are Hemington, Norton St Philip, Shoscombe. Most of what we open up here is stone cottages and farms, which dictates flue routes and pipe sizing. In Faulkland itself (BA3, Somerset) that usually means stone cottages and farms, roughly 3 miles from the workshop.

07516 118198 Call about a breakdown

BA3 · Somerset · 3 mi from Radstock · A366

Boiler Servicing on a village property 3 miles from Radstock, boiler servicing in Faulkland (BA3) — level setting

Site realities in and around Faulkland

This area has a genuine mix of mains gas and oil-fired properties, sometimes on the same street, depending on when the gas network reached that particular row of houses. It's worth confirming which fuel your property is actually on and whether a fuel switch is realistic before assuming either option is off the table. Being registered for both Gas Safe and OFTEC work means we can look at the honest options for your specific property rather than steering you toward whichever fuel we happen to be set up for. Nearest neighbours on our round are Hemington, Norton St Philip, Shoscombe. Our van runs the A366 to reach you, 3 miles out from the Radstock workshop. Faulkland is roughly 3 miles from our Radstock base via the A366. Typical property stock here: stone cottages and farms. Faulkland sits in the Somerset BA3 postcode and is part of our weekly run, so local response is quick. Annual services in Faulkland include a full safety check, efficiency report and warranty stamp where applicable.

Also covering the lanes around Faulkland

Beyond Faulkland we're frequently on jobs in Hemington (BA3), Norton St Philip (BA2), Shoscombe (BA2) and Kilmersdon (BA3) — so spares, follow-ups and annual services are straightforward.

Registrations and how work is signed off

Local, family-run

Based at 24 Bristol Rd, Radstock — every job is run by the team that quoted it.

OFTEC trained

Oil boilers, oil tanks and pipework — fully certified for off-grid installs and replacements.

Checkatrade 9.9/10

362+ verified reviews from real customers across BA and BS postcodes.

Fixed written prices

No verbal-only quotes. You'll get the boiler model, controls and warranty in writing before we book.

How we run boiler servicing on site

Full annual safety check
Landlord gas safety certificates
Efficiency report
Friendly, tidy engineers
Free written quote, no obligation
Local aftercare from a 3-mile base

Questions before you book

Does my new boiler need to be notified to Building Control?: Yes — boiler installation and replacement is notifiable work under Building Regulations. As Gas Safe/OFTEC registered installers we self-certify the work through our Competent Person Scheme, which means we notify it directly and you get a certificate without needing to involve the council separately.
Stone cottages seem to lose heat fast — does that change what boiler we need?: Solid stone walls and older windows do increase heat loss compared to cavity-wall construction, so we size the boiler and radiators around a proper heat loss calculation for the property rather than just matching what's there already. Getting this right matters more in a cottage than a modern house, where an undersized system will never quite keep up.
What support do I get after the install is finished?: Once commissioning's complete we talk you through the controls, leave the paperwork, and register the manufacturer warranty on your behalf. If anything doesn't feel right in the first few weeks — a fault code, an odd noise, a control setting you're unsure of — call us during office hours and we'll talk it through or come back out.
Is a boiler install a noisy, disruptive job?: There's unavoidable noise — drilling for the flue, pipework, sometimes moving a cylinder — but a straightforward swap is usually done within a working day with the mess kept to the immediate work area. We dust-sheet the route in and out and clear away pipe offcuts and old parts before we leave.
Is a magnetic filter really necessary, or is it an upsell?: It's a genuine manufacturer requirement, not an add-on we invent — most boiler warranties are conditional on a system filter being fitted, particularly on hard water. The filter catches magnetite sludge and debris circulating in the system before it reaches the boiler's heat exchanger, which is what actually causes blockages and noise over time.
What's the warranty on a new boiler installed in Faulkland?: Up to 10 years on qualifying Worcester Bosch installs registered through us as Accredited Installers. Other manufacturers typically offer 5–7 years.

Where to go from here

For landlords, boiler servicing usually needs to fit around a tenancy, so let us know at the outset if the property is occupied and what access arrangements work for the tenant. We'll build that into the quote and the schedule rather than assuming an empty property. Send the appliance make, model and any fault code and you get a straight answer, not a sales script. Typical era of build is mixed-cottage, which affects existing pipework and system cleanliness. Our van runs the A366 to reach you, 3 miles out from the Radstock workshop.

07516 118198 All services in Faulkland

The factual picture in Faulkland

County: Somerset
Postcode district: BA3
Settlement type: village
Nearest classified road: A366
Distance from our base: 3 miles (Radstock, BA3)
Typical building stock: stone cottages and farms
Water hardness: very hard limestone water
Fuel availability: mains gas with off-grid pockets
Customer mix: homes alongside small commercial and agricultural premises
Nearby areas covered: Hemington, Norton St Philip, Shoscombe, Kilmersdon

Practical considerations across BA3

Oil tank de-sludging: why it's not optional

Oil sitting in a tank for years accumulates water from condensation and fine sediment that settles at the bottom, and over time this forms a sludge layer that can be drawn into the fuel line, particularly when the tank is nearly empty and the outlet pulls from lower in the tank than usual. Sludge blocks fine oil filters and burner nozzles, which shows up as burner lockouts or a boiler that won't fire cleanly rather than as an obvious tank problem. De-sludging drains and cleans the tank base without necessarily removing the whole tank, and it's worth doing when a tank is inherited with a property, before switching to a new boiler, or if lockouts recur despite the filter and nozzle being replaced. It's a preventative job that's cheaper done on schedule than after a burner failure it caused.

Pumped-oil versus gravity feed: does it matter?

Older oil systems sometimes still rely on gravity feed, where the tank sits higher than the burner and oil flows down to it under its own weight; a pumped system uses the burner's internal pump to draw oil up from a tank at any level, including below the boiler. Gravity feed limits where a tank can be sited and is more prone to airlocks if the line runs dry, while a pumped system is more flexible on tank position but needs the pipe run and lift height kept within the burner pump's rated capacity — usually no more than a few metres of lift and a set maximum run length. When we replace an oil boiler we check which type the existing tank and pipework support before assuming a straight swap, because a tank sited for gravity feed may need repositioning or a different pump to suit a modern burner.

Chasing pipework into lime plaster and stone walls

Solid stone or cob walls finished in lime plaster, common in the older parts of Faulkland, behave very differently to modern plasterboard when a pipe run needs chasing in. Lime plaster is softer and more porous than gypsum, so cutting a neat, consistent chase without blowing the surface needs a slower hand and finer disc than a stud-wall job, and any repair has to be made good in a lime-based skim rather than modern filler, which can trap moisture behind it and cause the patch to fail. On solid stone we sometimes surface-mount pipework in painted conduit instead of chasing, particularly where the wall is a significant structural thickness and chasing would weaken it. Knowing which approach a wall needs before starting avoids expensive plaster damage.

Wood-burning stoves with a back boiler alongside a main boiler

Some older rural properties around Faulkland run a wood-burning stove with a back boiler feeding heat into the same central heating circuit as an oil or gas boiler, usually through a thermal store or a cylinder with two coils. Getting this combination to work safely means the stove's back boiler circuit has its own means of dissipating heat if the pump fails or a valve closes while the stove is still burning — a stove can't simply be switched off the way a boiler can if its heat has nowhere to go, so a gravity-fed safety circuit or heat leak radiator is normally required. It's a more involved design than a single-boiler system and needs planning at the point either appliance is replaced, not treated as an afterthought once the new boiler is already fitted.

Why very hard limestone water shortens boiler life around Faulkland

The limestone geology under Somerset gives Faulkland very hard limestone water, which drops calcium carbonate out of solution as soon as it's heated. Inside a combi's plate heat exchanger the gaps between plates are only a millimetre or two wide, so scale narrows the waterways long before it's visible anywhere else in the system. The first symptom is usually a hot tap that runs warm rather than hot, or a boiler that fires more often for the same demand. Left unchecked, scale insulates the exchanger from the burner, forces flue gases hotter, and can crack the exchanger from thermal stress. A scale reducer fitted on the mains feed, sized to the property's flow rate, is cheaper to install once than to replace a heat exchanger twice.

Working across Somerset: what being local changes

Being based at 24 Bristol Road, Radstock, 3 miles from Faulkland via the A366, means a callout doesn't involve a long cross-county drive, and it also means familiarity with the recurring patterns in the local building stock — stone cottages and farms — rather than encountering that construction type for the first time on-site. Local knowledge doesn't replace a proper site survey, but it does mean fewer surprises: knowing in advance that a particular postcode area typically has hard water, older single-pipe circuits, or restricted parking means the quote reflects the likely reality of the job before the first visit. We're Gas Safe and OFTEC registered and work across Somerset on that basis, not by claiming coverage we don't actually deliver on.

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