Close enough to matter
Being in town makes the biggest difference when something breaks. A boiler that has locked out in Murston or Milton Regis is a short drive for us, not a slot next week. Most repairs are seen the same day or the next. Ring us first, because some lockouts can be reset safely over the phone.
Semis, terraces and stock brick
Two in three homes in Sittingbourne are semi-detached or terraced, according to the 2021 Census. Plenty of the older terraces are built from the yellow Kent stock brick the town made for Victorian London, in brickfields along Milton Creek. Those houses tend to have one bathroom and a boiler in the kitchen or back bedroom, which is the home ground of the combi.
Older semis often still have a tank in the loft and a cylinder in the airing cupboard. We can keep that system and fit a new regular boiler, or take the tanks out and fit a combi. It depends on how many of you are queuing for the shower. Our boiler size estimator gives you a first answer before we visit.
Very hard water from the chalk
Southern Water pumps the town's water from the chalk at Highstead, Trundle Wood and Eastling. Its checker gives 122 mg/l of calcium for ME10 1XW, which is about 305 mg/l as calcium carbonate: very hard by its own scale. Scale is the main reason combis here lose hot-water flow as they age. A new combi should have a scale reducer on the cold feed, and a service is the time to catch it early.
Mostly gas, some oil
About 82% of homes in the town heat with mains gas alone. The rest is a mix of electric, LPG and oil, and that mix grows quickly once you leave the town for the villages south of the A2. We are Gas Safe registered for natural gas and LPG and OFTEC registered for oil, so whichever you have, it's one call.
Conservation areas
The town centre and Milton Regis High Street are both conservation areas, and Swale lists both as at risk. Tonge and the four Borden areas are conservation areas too. Inside them, a flue on a wall or roof facing the road needs planning permission, so we look for a side or back route first.