Baxi 600 Combi Reviews

Video transcript

Hi, I'm Darren from Sunrise Plumbing and Heating. Today we've installed a Baxi 600, which is a 24 kilowatt. And they use sense controls.

This is our first install on the 600, and it will be the first of many. Nice boiler to install, cupboard fit. Nice off the wall, so we can get the pipework behind the actual boiler. So the boiler itself ... very, very easy to install.

Yeah, definitely recommend the 600 to anyone that's looking for a cupboard fit boiler. Easy to install, quick release filling loop. Brilliant.

Video transcript

Hi, this is Dave from DCB Plumbing and Heating doing a Tool Talk review for Expert Trades.
Today, I'm gonna be reviewing this brand new Baxi 600. This is actually the second 600 that I've fitted. I didn't want to do a review on the first one. You're just getting to know things, you don't really know how things work. It's nice to get into it and see what's going on the first time, and then, on the second one, you've got a rough idea what's going on, so you actually take a bit more notice of the goods, the bads, the what could maybe change, what couldn't get any better, shall we say?
We'll dive straight in. We've got to take the case off, we've got a couple of screws just under here. Simple, very easy. No problems. I already pre-loosened 'em. Then we get into the meat of the boiler itself. This one isn't commissioned, this one isn't working. When it is working, I would like to say that it is very quiet. We've got some really good insulation and things on the inner case and good sealing. The actual baffle inside, that draws the air in, has a silencer built in, which, again, makes a fan noise really quite quiet. Stainless steel heat exchanges do normally have a little bit more noise to them than some of the aluminium ones, but this one, you can't tell. You can't tell.
First thing, unfortunately, we're gonna have to say is a small, little problem with it, at the moment. I believe that something might be done about this, but when you wire up the boiler itself, we have some very, very small magnets, which go onto these two. If you just have a few wires just in the wrong place, you can't always push it back. There is a couple of tips for that one. One of the ones that I found is the pump lead, if you put it under the pressure valve, pressure gauge's wire, and behind the gas valve wire, that stops it from dropping in front of the gas valve. That's one of the wires I've found does do a lot of damage. The other one is when you pull it down, with this wire being quite short, the head of the diverter valve pulls forward. All you've got to do is push that back and push it up. It's not too much of a problem because the case holds it there anyway. It's just something that there's a few wires often in the way, which is just something to look out for when installing.
Right. Let's get to it. The main points I'd like to say about this boiler is, of course, the stainless steel heat exchanger, now with a centre flow. You can't really go wrong. This is new, cool touch technology where if you go to Mrs. Miggins' house, for say, to service the boiler. It's a couple or three years old. You're gonna be taking the burner out to check all the seals, make sure everything's intact and how it should be. She's had it on, you get there, it's warm. On old boilers, you wouldn't be able to undo your screws, get it out because everything would be too hot. Whereas, in this case, it does get lukewarm, but lukewarm is all it gets. So that's a good, little feature. Whether it's necessary or not, I don't suppose it really matters, but I think it's a good, little featu.re to have, just for us service guys.
Big, big condense trap. Making sure, freezing up on the condense side's a lot less common than if you've got a tiny, little trap, just dripping a little bit of water out. So that's a good part of the boiler.
There is, as you can see, very little in the way of plastics or anything like that inside this boiler. Everything you can see is copper. Copper pipework. You've got your brass hydro blocks. You've also got everything else in here is brass, completely. All of the hydro block is brass, and all your pipes are copper. You can't really ask for much more than that if I'm totally honest.
Very easy to set up when you actually do get it running. Very easy to work with. Just having a couple of little dials on the front means that to get into the settings and stuff, it's fairly straightforward. Once you've done one, you've done it all, if you know what I mean?
Right. We'll drop a little bit lower, now, at the moment. Something else I'd quite like to just add into there. When installing, it comes with a bracket, instead of a jig. Isn't a problem. I've moaned in the past that I like my jigs. I still do, of course. I do believe you can actually buy a jig for this boiler. So if you don't like the hanging bracket idea and you still want a pipe jig, you can buy one. I believe they're in the region of about £25, £30. So we're not talking big money. So that's fantastic to know.
We'll go down here. We have the new, keyless, non mess around filling loop, whatever you want to call it. It's very, very simple. It's just you pull the green, little lever downwards and that lets the cold water into your central heating side. One little, tiny problem with that is it goes into the centre and goes higher. When it goes higher, it is actually quite difficult to get into your cold top nut, and the return central heating top nut. I haven't really found that a problem. If you just grease up the O rings when you put it on ... You can take the clips off, get it piped up, take the clips off, remove it, do your tightening up, and pop it back on. To be honest, it's a minor inconvenience. It's something to maybe talk about, but it's not really an issue. If you're greasing them O rings, that's gonna slide off dead easy and slide back on dead easy. That's what O rings need, love and care.
Again, we've got some great features. This one is absolutely fantastic. This is a drain point. The drain point, being at the lowest point than anything else, that you're not worrying about, "Oh, can I drain it?" Getting water onto the circuit board. No. That's all gone. Bang, there it is. Turn your valves off. You want to drain it, you can drain it. You're not thinking about where the actual drain point is and where water may or may not leak to. Fantastic idea. Absolutely fantastic idea.
I'm gonna have to finish on a couple of things. One is another minor inconvenience, is the pressure release. Where the pipe comes for this pressure release pipe you have, it's quite high up and it's in the back. If you don't do that joint first ... again, it's a minor inconvenience. I know some people do it last 'cause it's not really as necessary to get the boiler up and running and I've done it myself, is you leave that one to the very, very last point. On the old boilers, you didn't get it until you put the boiler on the wall. Obviously, in this one, you're actually putting the boiler on the wall to start with, so that issue comes straight into play. But if you get that done first, you can easy get it tightened up. Again, it's not an issue, it's just a talking point.
It's great to have, obviously, your pressure test nipples on the gas side, as well. Fantastic.
The final thing I really want to say is it's very light. I think, personally, when you get your case back on, I think it's a pretty good-looking boiler. It's very light, very easy to install. You've got the same flueing system that you've got with any Baxi that you install, the multi flues. One small problem I do have with the multi flue is the actual first one of these I fitted, a couple of days ago, was with what's called a plumbing management kit. A plumbing management kit gets dirty airs, your rubbish airs, away from windows, doors, patio areas, anywhere that might be of nuisance. Let's put it that way.
With the Baxi range of multi flue, you have to buy a separate flue, which isn't a problem if you know you're gonna need the flue to start with. My only issue with that would be if you instal a boiler, it's higher than two metres, it's not in anybody's way, but next door neighbour complains or it's nearest your door and you think, "Oh, I don't really like the steam coming from the boiler's flue." You want to get away from a particular place. You would have to re-buy a new flue. I believe you can buy ends for it, but it's very difficult to do. You've got to take out bits and things like that, which on other manufacturers, you can just literally install or take a little piece off 'cause it's on O rings or just a little screw. You take it off and then you can add it actually at a later date.
Like I say, it's not a problem when you know you need it because you just buy that flue and bring that flue with you, and fit it as normal. But if you are gonna need one at a later date, obviously, you wouldn't know you need it. It's gonna be awkward. Just a minor inconvenience, again, 'cause it's not very often that I would use a plumbing management kit. It's not always necessary, so it is just something maybe just for ... again, it's a talking point, rather than an actual problem. It's just something that could maybe be altered in the future.
All in all, I think this is a fantastic new edition to the Baxi range. I'm actually quite proud to say that Baxi have possibly the best range of boilers going. The 200, the 400, the 600, the Duo Tech, the Platinum, the Eco Blue Combi Plus, and the Eco Blue Advanced. That's just the Combi range, there's seven there. All of them different, all of them fantastic boilers. Everything's been made of a high quality.
So I'm a Baxi-approved installer. If they carry on making boilers like this, I will still be a Baxi-approved installer because this is definitely the way forward. The fact it's small, the fact it's light, the fact you can actually get the pipes up the back with no extra piping jigs, or anything like that. Centre flue. This is the way forward.
I'd just like to say a massive thank you to Baxi for coming up with something like this. When you're designing your next one, get in touch. I'm sure we could maybe sort of a few things out if you need me to test anything. I'm cheap. You know, I don't cost too much. Maybe a hotel night and a couple of biscuits. I'm sure we'll sort something out.
Anyway, thanks for watching, guys. I hope that's been a good enough review. If you are a Baxi installer, I do recommend at least trying one because what's to lose? What's to lose? The fantastic part of it is it's light, it's easy to instal. There's not much else I can say to be quite fair.
Thanks for watching. Take care, guys.