Old house with an old boiler

[chickenslippers]

My first post.

Many thanks in advance of any advice.

I have moved into a very old house 3 yrs ago and have had to continually bleed my upstairs radiators. Only occasionaly the ones downstairs.

When the central heating is on and when the pump kicks in I can hear water/air flowing through the pipes.

I have spoken to a friendly plumber who suggests I put some central heating cleaning solution into my header tank. Apart from what solution, I have no probs with this. What I do have a prob with is draining the system after the aloted cleaning time. There doesn't appear to be any drain valves that I can connect a hose pipe to and drain the system into the garden.

Do I just have to bite the bullet and disconnect a rad and quickly change containers as they fill up with water or is there a dinky way of connecting a hose?

Whats the best recommended cleaner?

Cheers and thankyou

 

[swidders]

Any sludge remover such as sentinel X400 will do.

As for draining the system, you could get one of these

Untitled

• swidders
• 9 Mar 2009
• 1

Once you've run the sludge through the system and drained it all down, it's still advisable to remove the radiators and flush them through with a hose in the garden.

Finally, don't forget to add inhibitor when it's all cleaned out

 

[stevies62]

Fernox f3 tickles my buttons, but they're all more or less the same stuff.
If you add it the header tank it may take a while to get into the system.
This bit works only if you've got 1/2 inch plugs in the tops of a radiator.
Get yourself a cat litter tray. (I kid you not.......)
Turn a rad off both sides. Crack the valve tail and gently ease apart the valve from the rad (I mean only a crack).
Let the pressure of water drop before you move the valve away.
And drain the rad.
Reconnect rad valve.
Remove the plug.
Screw in a 1/2 inch elbow.
Open the bleed vent on the other side.
Pour in the stuff.
Refill the rad.
If you can get the stuff into a rad, it reaches it's best after about 2 weeks, otherwise I'd give it a couple of months.
Good idea about taking rads off though and giving them a good swill through with hose in the garden.
If you get a rubber mallet give the rads a thump at the same time. It's surprising what comes out.
Just one thing, don't let the sludge go on the grass if you want to keep it.
Good luck........

 

[chickenslippers]

Cool thanks very much for help.

Many thanks

 

[JohnD]

older radiator valves fit a washing-machine hose or some garden hose fittings. Once you have drained it the first time, put some rad valves with integral drain cock on the downstairs rads. makes it all so easy next time.

If you can fit a full-bore valve on while you are plumbing, it will make future draining much faster, and the speed of flow will help to wash out loose sediment.

 

[kevindgas]

Untitled

• swidders
• 9 Mar 2009
• 1

OK Tonto where's your horse parked

 

[gas4you]

I assumed this was meant as a temporary measure, just to drain down, then cut out pipe and replace with a proper drain off point