radiator warming up question

keyboard

hi all

i have just been told by the guy who installed my boiler that the last radiator will take a while ot heat up becuase of the size of my pipes, however all the other radiators heat up fine, apart from the one in the front room downstairs. he balanced all the radiators and left the valuve fully open. but still if all the other radiators are warming up quickly, shouldnt this this one too

keyboard

but it takes forever, if at all

gasmanmartin

your right, it should!

Check to see if its hot/warm at the bottom. if it is and is cold at the top then i suggest bleeding the air out of it.

Also make sure (if its a sealed system/no tanks in loft) that your pressure is topped up to 1.5bar

not suggesting your stupid but double check the valves - clockwise closes them, anti-clockwise opens

keyboard

hi gasmanmartin

its a sealed system, the system/radiator doesn't need bleeding, becuase i checked that. i will double check the lockshield valve though..... thanks for the information regarding which way to turn the valve.


will report back

cheers

EliteHeat

If he has warned you about the size of your pipes then it is possible that the original installer made a bit of a hash of things. Typically, a 15mm pipe can carry about 5kWs of heat, or in other terms, about 3 radiators.

If you have more than this on a single run of 15mm you can expect very poor performance.

Try turning off all other rads and see what happens, you might just be air-locked on that radiator and turning off the others will clear it.

If this works, turn on the others and see if the problem radiator maintains its heat. If it doesn't then try re-balancing the system, if this doesn't work you will need some pipe work done.

keyboard

hi

if i have to reblance my system, how do i know which one to do first. my understanding is that you have to do them in a particular order?

Canucklehead

Good morning: A quick gander on popular search engine flagged a number of useful sites, http://www.diydata.com/projects/centralheating/balancing/radiator_balancing.php
http://www.diyfaq.org.uk/plumbing/rad-balance.html
www.diynot.com is a fantastic resource and the forums make very interesting reading:eek:

HTH

Canucklehead

keyboard

hi all

went to doubel check the lockshiled valve was fully open and it was. I switched on the rads and noted the radiator that is furthest away from the boiler, only barely heats up the top half of the rad, the bottom half seems cold.... does that mean anything ?

Canucklehead

keyboard wrote: »

hi all

went to doubel check the lockshiled valve was fully open and it was. I switched on the rads and noted the radiator that is furthest away from the boiler, only barely heats up the top half of the rad, the bottom half seems cold.... does that mean anything ?

Good afternoon:
Did your installer flush the CH system with Fernox or Sentinel cleanser( recommended by many boiler manufacturers and good practice) then add inhibitor? If the rad is hot at top and cold at the bottom this suggests you might have sludge in the system ... as I suggested in my previous post, visit www.diynot.com : you will find several threads about this scenario. I would call back your installer and get it sorted! Also, if you live in England or Wales, make sure the installation complies with Building Regs and has been notified to building control: this applies whether you have relocated an existing boiler or installed a new one. http://www.trustcorgi.com/consumer/requestacertificate.htmx

Canucklehead

keyboard

hi Canucklehead

Yes he used Sentinel cleanser, during the installation, also when he was draining the system , the water was coming out a blue colour i think, and he said that it appears that the must be an inhibitor in the system........

Actually now that you mention it, he drained on radiator in the hallway, but he didnt drain the problem radiiator in the front room, and it does have a drain valve....... so i think u might be on to something there ?

will double check that there is a drain valve on the front rad.

Is sentinel an inhibitor ?

Canucklehead

Hi

It would seem from your post that the water is getting into the rad but is struggling to get out and back to the boiler. This suggests that your installer's warning about pipe size and Eliteheat's confirmation is correct Size does matter in this case.Get him back and ask him to sort it.

Corgi Guy.