Carefully specified heating and hot water services were central to creating a safe, comfortable and practical home for 17-year-old Daniel and his family as part of a recently aired BBC DIY SOS project.
Daniel was diagnosed with brain cancer after developing a tumour at the age of 13. He subsequently spent three years in hospital because his family’s home in Freckleton, Preston, could not meet his needs. The extensive DIY SOS transformation was designed to give him a suitable place to live and enable the family to be together at home again.
Heating and hot water services were a critical part of the adaptation. With Daniel requiring a wet room and multiple showers throughout the day, the system needed to provide dependable comfort alongside rapid hot water recovery and sufficient stored capacity. Baxi offered its support, with Barney Wharton-Jones, National Sales Manager and Chris Perkins, Field Team Manager using their company volunteering day to assist a number of local installers with the installation.
Barney said: “We are incredibly proud to be able to support this project which was instrumental in bringing Dan home and reuniting his family. It was a humbling experience that opened our eyes to the challenges some people face.”
Baxi’s in-house design team carried out a feasibility survey to identify the right solution for the property and the family’s day-to-day needs. Heat pumps were considered as part of the assessment but had to be ruled out because the building fabric was not suitable. The resulting specification combined a Baxi 600 System 2 18kW boiler with a Megaflo Eco SystemReady 250-litre cylinder, supported by heating controls and thermostatic radiator valves donated by Danfoss.
The solution was selected to deliver reliable space heating and the volume of readily available hot water required for Daniel’s care, while supporting the wider objective of creating a comfortable, functional home for the whole family.
Alongside the specialist installations, the Baxi volunteers supported a wide range of practical tasks across the house and garden.
“Thank you again for your support on this build. The family are thriving and are so grateful,” said Noah, Assistant Producer at South Shore Productions.
The project featured in the episode “Bringing Dan Home”, which was aired on Tuesday 13 October on BBC One as part of the new series of DIY SOS. To view the programme, click here.
Baxi are an Industrial Associates of CIPHE, to see the full list of associates check out the CIPHE industrial associates directory