Central heating conundrum

motherbored21

Moved into house three weeks ago and gave problems with the gas central heating. The radiators run from upstairs downwards, I.e., there are pipes from the upstairs running down the walls to the lower rads. There are TRVs and a thermostat. The boiler is condensing.

With the four downstairs rads, the kitchen one runs off its own pipe work and heats great. The dining room runs off a bedroom rad and is lukewarm. The hall and lounge run off a small bedroom rad. These two used to be run from a down pipe that split into two, one going to each rad and returned the same way. The hall one was fine, but the lounge one was warm at the top and cold at the bottom.

We have re-jigged the pipe work to run to the hall and then to the lounge and then return, to create a 'loop'. We have flushed the system, bled it, opened valves that were closed and we still can't get the dining and lounge ones to heat above just warm.

Can anyone suggest anything else we can try?

Thanks!

bridgedino

Have you tried balancing the system?

Closing down the lockshields enough to encourage better flow to the furthest radiators but not enough to starve the radiator you're working at

motherbored21

Hello bridgedino, the pipe to the hall and lounge radiators is red hot, but when the water cones out of the hall rad, before entering the lounge rad, it's a lot cooler.

Could it be the valve on the hall rad causing a problem?



Lock Shields? Are they the valves at the bottom of the rad, opposite the TRV?

martinthebandit

bridgedino wrote: »

Have you tried balancing the system?

Is the right answer........


.....and fairly simple to do

Step 1. Turn off your central heating
2. Close the valves opposite your trv's on all the radiators.
3. Open the valves you have just closed but only by one half turn.
4. Turn central heating back on and run for half an hour.
5. On any radiators that have not got hot open the valves another half turn.
Repeat steps 4 and 5 until all the radiators are hot.

motherbored21

Thank you Martinthebandit! Will give this a go.

southcoastrgi

pics of the pipework you have altered & how it runs to the rads would help

Ruski

Sounds like you've used the 'return' from the hallway to 'feed' the lounge rad?


If so you you'll never have a lounge rad as hot as the hallway as you've already used the heat energy in the hallway.


Each rad should have it's own 'feed' - and then you can try balancing.


HTH


Russ