Plan & install a CH System

[hoomin_erra]

Hey all.

This is gonna be long winded, so bear with me.

We recently moved into an old farmhouse in Aberdeenshire.
There is an oil Rayburn in the Kitchen which does the hot water. So well infact that we need to run off hot water a few times a day orelse the hot water tank starts boiling. And it goes through 8 litres of oil a day.
There is a wood stove in the living room which heats up that room. Our room and the kids rooms have open fireplaces. There is no other central heating in the house, and apparently winters in our area can get interesting. For example, i've been told that snowshoes (The tennis racket type) may be a good investment.

We got a quote for installing a CH system and that was 10K

Now.......

I would like to plan and install a central heating system. I don't want any electrical pumps as we have power outages, which would then mean that the CH can't be used or so i've been told.
So i'm looking at a larger water tank installed in the Loft to take care of the hot water. (I assume the cold water filler will need to be above that? Or just above the boiler on the rayburn?)
I was thinking of replacing the wood stove in the living room with one with a back boiler to run 4 rads ( i managed to get 3 old victorian cast iron rads) . It would ideally be a gravity fed system. And that is where i start running out of knowledge. The quote we got had a hot water tank for the water from the boiler. Something about a radiator to bleed off excess heat?

Anyone got any experiance in DIY CH systems who can shed light on what i need, and what i need to do?

[oldjerry]

If you could get round the electricity prob(more in a bit)a Rayburn Royal or the present equivalent,will heat a system for a 4 bed house you'd just need a decent pump and your rads etc.A small genny (and I wouldnt live without at least a couple of them on any holding remote or not) will power up afew of the most important appliances when the powers down(7 or 8 times a year here,once for 3 days).£10 grand is completly bonkers ,I cant do links but suggest you check out Harrison McCarthy cant remember but think they're in Manchester,they delivered a complete system rads,pipes,fittings,boiler the lot,for a 3 bed house,overnight to Falmouth for 700 quid.

[Big Al]

Have a look here http://www.stovesonline.co.uk

If you are planing such a big investment then be sure to buy a tank with extra coils in as these can be hooked up to a solar system for the summer etc. Also rather than a gravity fed system if you use a pressurised system then I think you can get mains pressure hot water by letting cold water run through one of the coils. I have no working knowledge of CH but hopefully this will be of help.