As a few of you know, I do love tech to help me remotely manage my properties. Most of the stuff I test is garbage and is as useful as chocolate tea pot...but this was a nifty bit of kit. So, I thought I'd share it.
The Problem:
- Boiler break downs and tenants without heating or hot water is such a pain and needs to be handled quick.
- If there is a fault with a boiler – tenants can be unaware of the outage for sometime or slow to report the issue.
- When issue is reported - it can be at an inconvenient time.
- I will not know the fault code and will have to ask the tenant to take pictures of the boiler or drive there.
- In my experience, most faults are caused by low boiler pressure, which can be easily sorted out by topping up…well that’s all good but someone has too physically do it.
In my quest for tools to help solve this issue, I came across www.vericonsystems.com – they provide tech to help monitor boilers remotely. Their devices are mainly installed across large housing associations. I gave them and call and bought their kit.
I have been trialling two of their products: BCM and AutoFill.
The BCM device monitors for issues, whilst the AutoFill is plumbed into the pipework and tops up the boiler as necessary.
My trial with these products has been impressive. Here are some cool features that really stood out:
- The BCM alerts you as soon as a fault has been detected, so I am aware of a fault before my tenants are.
- I can adjust the maximum flow temperature remotely, which can increase efficiency and decrease running costs.
- The AutoFill has a built-in leak and burst pipe detection features, whereas it will only top up if no leaks have been detected. It will also notify you if it is topping up too much.
- I can remotely monitor the boiler’s vital stats from my laptop from a beach in Costa Rica or my flat (probably my flat).
- The devices don’t require a WiFi connection, instead they utilise a 2G cellular connection, so I never loose connection.
As the device wires into the boiler BUS connectors, it does not void any warranties.
One point to note is that, as the front cover of the boiler must be removed, a gas safe engineer is required install the BCM device.
If you remotely manage your properties, these devices can be a life saver.
I have been told that advanced management features of these devices are expanding in the future, with machine learning algorithms being developed to predict when a boiler will likely break or encounter issues. This feature would really help with planning predictive maintenance schedules.
I paid for the kits at full price and do not have any financial relationship with www.vericonsystems.com I just thought it was pretty cool, so I thought I’d share my experience.
There are quite a few boiler experts in this group...would be keen to hear their opinion.
Cheers,
Neil
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