This week sees the arrival of the BoilerJuice Apollo Smart, advanced heating oil monitor in the BoilerJuice shop.

The new BoilerJuice Smart heating oil monitor as a revolutionary breakthrough for oil heating users. As the cost of living and the price of heating oil is increasing, a monitor such as the BoilerJuice Smart is invaluable.

• It can educate a homeowner to their usage patterns and associated costs, allowing them to take actions to make savings and use their heating oil more efficiently.

• Using state of the art ultrasonic technology, the BoilerJuice Smart allows homeowners to view the volume of oil remaining in their tank in litres and as a percentage.
• The unit also allows homeowners to monitor their heating oil consumption in litres by day, by week, by month and for the last year.
• The unique days to empty feature will give homeowners peace of mind that they are not going to run out of fuel and will avoid the inevitable panic buying during peak periods.

The cost of fuel in either Sterling or Euros and carbon emissions in kgCO2 for the same periods is also available.

BoilerJuice SMART will help heating oil users to monitor oil consuption by allowing heating oil users to more effectively monitor their heating oil usage by utilising the accuracy and visibility of this second generation device.

The BoilerJuice SMART can now be ordered in our online shop.
So don’t delay -  start being SMART with your heating oil today!

 Please note: the BoilerJuice SMART is a heating oil tank level and oil usage monitor and not an electricity monitor

Below are some extracts from our customer comments when we last ran our “top tips on savings home heating oil”, add your comments and views to keep this topic hot.

Insulation, insulation, insulation.

• Ensure you loft insulation is 2.5 inches or more
• Cavity wall insulation (If your property is suitable – there are instances where properties would suffer damp issues if cavity wall insulation is installed, so use a trusted surveyor before installation.)
• Check the seals around doors and windows for draughts. TIP: Most modern UPVC windows can be adjusted with an ‘Allen key’ via the hinge to ensure a snug fit).
• Install a letter box draught excluder.
• Check the insulation around your hot water tank.

Heating Oil Money Saving Tips

• Ensure you boiler is serviced at least once every 12 months (ensure you have your nozzle changed)
• Consider using premium heating oil / additives e.g. BoilerMax or CookerMax to extend the efficiency between services.
• Secure your heating oil tank – some thiefs will try to empty your tank in one go, but other will steal little and often, so while you think you may be burning more oil than normal – it may be that someone is visiting in the midst of night taking small, but significant amounts.
• Consider putting a fence around your tank.
• Add a lock – secure fill points and your vent
• Consider an alarmed tank monitor like the Watchman Alarmed monitor

Short / Medium term investments:

• Install TRV’s on your radiators and adjust as required. (Thermostatic Radiator Valves cost from around £5 each on ScrewFix.com).
• Fit an electronic descaler, these cost very little but removal of scale – especially in the boiler and water tank will make the system more efficient.
• Have your heating system treated with sentinel or a similar product. (Screwfix.com)
• Install double or secondary glazing

Longer term investments:

• Consider installing a wood burning stove with back boiler to feed radiators and hot water.
• Upgrade your boiler if it is an old non-condensing type  -modern condensing boilers are around 90-92% efficient. If you live in a small/medium sized property and have relatively low hot water usage consider upgrading to a combi-boiler – which only heats the water you use.

Other suggestions:

• Visit a different friend each day and enjoy their heat. Invite your friends round to visit you in a set day – by doing this you have company, food and heat.
• Take care when strimming and mowing around your oil tank, what ever you do, don’t cut your oil tank feed pipe.

Add your tips below and you could see your tips above…

 Under a programme being run by the Scottish government, a further 6,000 households in the country will qualify to receive up to £400 cashback when they upgrade to a new, energy-saving system.

Cabinet secretary for infrastructure and capital investment Alex Neil said: “This scheme will help households right across Scotland cut the cost of home heating by replacing run down boilers with more efficient models.”

It is the third time in the last year such an initiative has taken place, with total funding of £6 million expected to help 14,000 properties become more energy efficient.

The scheme opened this week and will run on a first come, first served basis until all available money has been allocated, so act now!

• Have you already registered?
• How much funding did you receive and how much did the new heating oil boiler cost to be installed.
• Did you see your home heating oil consumption reduce once the new boiler was installed?

Improving your Boiler Efficiency with BoilerMax Premium Kerosene 28 Additives…

Under normal operation a boiler fires up and cuts out to maintain a constant room temperature (usually controlled by a room thermostat). Deposits build up between services on nozzle and heat exchanger surfaces when using untreated heating oil – without us normally knowing about it because the boiler is still working.

The nozzle deposits produce a less efficient fuel/air burn and the deposits on the heat exchanger make it harder for the energy to transfer through to heat the water. In order to achieve the same room temperature the boiler needs to fire up and cut out a little more frequently – and over time this increase use of the boiler burns more fuel.

BoilerMax premium additives can also help lower costs by reducing the risk of boiler breakdowns, blocked filters, tank/metal parts rust and other common operating problems. It has a mixture of anti-oxidants, dispersants, detergents, corrosion inhibitor, metal deactivator and other fuel stabilisers that help keep the fuel fresh, the boiler clean and avoid other operating problems that routinely occur.

Each bottle will treat around 1000 litres of fuel but can treat between 500 and 1400 litres of home heating oil.

Have you used BoilerMax Premium Kerosene 28 Home Heating Oil Additives? Did your service engineer notice a difference after you used BoilerMax additives? If you own an AGA, you may be interested in our CookerMax Premium Kerosene additives.!

The government’s Warm Front scheme has opened its doors once again to heating oil users who are finding it difficult to make ends meet. Representatives of the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) have suggested the initiative is accessible to more than 90,000 households that are deemed to be blighted by fuel poverty.

“Next year we will be launching the Green Deal, the government’s national overhaul of home energy efficiency, which will provide extra help to vulnerable households,” he remarked.

What is the Warm Front scheme?

The Warm Front scheme makes your home warmer, healthier and more energy efficient

The Warm Front scheme provides heating and insulation improvements to households on certain income-related benefits living in properties that are poorly insulated and/or do not have a working central heating system.

Qualifying households can get improvements worth up to £3,500 (£6,000 where oil central heating and other alternative technologies are recommended).

Grants are available for improvements such as:

glass-fronted fire – the Warm Front scheme can convert your solid-fuel open fire to a glass-fronted fire

You won’t have to pay anything as long as the work doesn’t cost more than the grant available. If the cost of the work is more than the grant available you’ll have to make a contribution to enable work to go ahead. Work will not start without making sure you are willing and able to pay the difference.

The Warm Front scheme installs insulation and heating improvements to make homes more energy efficient. The scheme now has a new set of eligibility criteria and will be accepting new applications from 14 April 2011 so don’t delay, apply today to cut your fuel bills in 2011.

With spring on its way, it is a good time to have your oil boiler serviced. Many people think that it doesn’t make much difference but OFTEC, (Oil-Fired TEChnical association) has collected data that demonstrates the importance of having your oil fired boiler serviced regularly. It can save you money in the long run.
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It’s a bit like calling in the chimney sweep or getting that leaking gutter fixed – you know it needs doing at some point before the winter; it’s just a case of getting round to it.

But getting your central heating boiler serviced isn’t just about ticking yet another irritating job off your “to do” list. It can actually save you money. And let’s face it anything that saves you money has to be Good News in this day and age.

And we’re not just saying this because we’d like you to book a boiler service from one of our engineers, although we’d be delighted if you did!

Regularly serviced boilers operate more efficiently and therefore use less oil. In fact an inefficient boiler could be costing you ££££s more to run. And all boilers should be serviced at least annually.

Also, it’s far easier to arrange a boiler service now, during the summer months, than in the Autumn when everyone suddenly remembers they need their boiler servicing too.

So why not ask for a no-obligation quote from one of our Oftec registered engineers. You can do this easily via our website. And from only £65, it could be worth every penny!

Share your energy saving ideas, hints and tips with other heating oil users or pick up a few ideas for yourself.

Tip: You might also want to read our Premium Heating Oil blog post.