Gas appliances: what GSIUR Part E requires

Part E of the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations covers the appliance itself: where it may go, how it is connected and flued, and what is checked before it is left in use. No appliance may be installed unless it can be used without danger.

Before and during installation

• Used appliances. Install a second-hand appliance only after checking it is safe for further use (regulation 26(3)). Paperwork from its last home, or commissioning it afterwards, does not replace that check.
• Flued appliances connect rigidly. A flued domestic appliance is connected by a permanently fixed rigid pipe, never a bayonet and hose (26(2)), whether it is room-sealed or open-flued. Flexible connections are for appliances such as freestanding cookers, designed to be pulled out and with no flue.
• Isolation, access and instructions. Where reasonably practicable, fit a way of shutting off the gas at the appliance inlet: an isolation valve, a self-sealing plug-in connector on a cooker, or a screw-down restrictor elbow on a gas fire. Keep the appliance easy to reach for maintenance, and leave the manufacturer's instructions with the owner or occupier.
• Moving an appliance counts as installing a used one, even within the same room, so verify its condition first.
• Sharing a room. HSE advises against fitting an open-flued appliance in the same room as a solid-fuel open fire or a fan-flued appliance, a through lounge included, because they can upset its flue.
• Type approval. Never do work that takes an appliance outside the standard it is approved to, and never remove or deface its conformity marking (26(7) and 26(8)). Reconditioned parts are fine if the repair keeps it to that standard.

Flues and dampers

• The flue must be suitable and in a proper condition for the appliance. Test and examine it before and after fitting an appliance. A flue that worked for the old appliance may not suit the new one, even one of the same type.
• Where jackdaws roost or squirrels live, fit purpose-made terminal protection to stop nests blocking the flue.
• Where a flue pipe enters a brick or masonry chimney, the seal between them must be inspectable (27(2)). A joint that cannot be seen cannot be checked at commissioning or at any later service.
• Seal any enclosure a flue runs through, so that spillage cannot get into any room except the appliance's own (27(3)). Room-sealed flues can leak too, so this applies to them as well.
• Never fit a manual damper to serve a domestic appliance (32(2)). Fix an existing one permanently open before a domestic appliance is connected (32(3)). An automatic damper must be interlocked with the burner's gas supply, so the burner cannot run unless the damper is open (32(1)).

Rooms that need room-sealed appliances

• Bathrooms and shower rooms: room-sealed only (30(1)).
• Rooms used for sleeping: a gas fire, other space heater or water heater over 14 kW gross input must be room-sealed. At 14 kW or less it must be room-sealed or have a safety control that shuts it down before combustion products build up to a dangerous level.
• Instantaneous water heaters, in any room: room-sealed, or fitted with that shut-down safety control (30(3)). An open-flued one in a kitchen needs the control; the 14 kW figure belongs to the sleeping-room rule. A CO alarm warns but shuts nothing down, so it cannot take the control's place.
• Cupboards count. A cupboard or compartment within one of those rooms, or next to it with an air vent into it, is treated as part of that room (30(4)). Keeping the door shut changes nothing; the vent is the connection.

After installing, and after any work

• After installation, test the connection for tightness and examine the appliance: it meets the regulations, runs at the manufacturer's operating pressure, is installed to the instructions and has all its gas safety controls working (33(1)). If it needs an adjustment you cannot make, disconnect it or seal it off with an appropriate fitting (33(2)): turning it off and leaving a note still leaves it connected. If you cannot finish commissioning, seal the appliance off and label it as not fully commissioned, saying it must not be reconnected until the procedure is complete.
• After work on an appliance, examine how well any flue works, the supply of combustion air, the operating pressure or heat input, and that the appliance works safely (26(9)). Where you cannot reasonably examine the pressure or heat input, check its combustion performance with a suitable flue gas analyser instead. Report any defect to the responsible person. You don't need this examination after simply disconnecting an appliance, or after purging that does not affect safety, but any adjustment made afterwards means you do (26(10)).
• Spillage checks. Take the warm-up period, test conditions and any repeat from the appliance instructions: five minutes if that is what the manufacturer says, but no single time suits every appliance. Passing a spillage check does not mean every flue joint is sound.
• Suspected danger. If you know or suspect an appliance cannot be used safely, take all reasonably practicable steps to tell the responsible person, and the owner where different.