Strange smell in workroom.

[conny]

For the past few days there has been a slightly strange smell in my sons work room. (He is a computer coder and uses a spare bedroom as a work room). We have tried to trace where the smell comes from without success until this morning my wife turned the radiator off. The smell has now almost disappeared. Does this mean the radiators need flushing through with an inhibitor?
No idea when they were last done as it is a rented house and we have been here over 6 years.

 

[Old Salt]

Anything stuck behind the radiator?
Any plant material with funny shaped leaves

 

[Mottie]

Dead mouse?

 

[conny]

Anything stuck behind the radiator?
Any plant material with funny shaped leaves

No definitely not.

Dead mouse?

That was one of our thoughts but no sign of anything. Why would the smell disappear when heating turned off?

 

[petit_pablo]

Why would the smell disappear when heating turned off?

Because whatever it is, is being heated by the radiator causing the smell.

 

[CBW]

Because whatever it is, is being heated by the radiator causing the smell.

Yep, I had one recently, similar thing, but boiler was in the same room, so naturally, this was reported as the smell, only thing I could find was an extension lead cable draped over the convectors and only heat rated to a small amount, 50 degrees iirc.

 

[conny]

No mice/birds or cables around the area. All the vents between the two panels and behind the back one are regularly dusted so no fluff or anything. Rad hasn't been painted or changed in any way. No carpet as it is a wooden floor.
Just spoke to LL and he is getting an engineer out to have a look. Will let you know if he finds anything.
Thanks guys.

 

[Munroast]

For the past few days there has been a slightly strange smell in my sons work room. (He is a computer coder and uses a spare bedroom as a work room). We have tried to trace where the smell comes from without success until this morning my wife turned the radiator off. The smell has now almost disappeared. Does this mean the radiators need flushing through with an inhibitor?
No idea when they were last done as it is a rented house and we have been here over 6 years.

you can't smell the liquid inside the radiator unless it is leaking out. So as others have said the smell is something external to the heating system that is being heated, maybe a dead mouse near the pipes under the floor boards, or even dry rot. What sort of smell is it?

 

[conny]

Had a board up tonight and it's clean under there. Not so much as a dropping and only a light covering of undisturbed dust. Both pipes run along the joist into the bedroom next door but there is no smell in there. LL has asked the engineer to pop round in the next few days and has suggested to him it may need a flush through but will leave the decision to him. It's planned to replace the boiler sometime this summer as it is beginning to show signs of it's age.

 

[Munroast]

For the past few days there has been a slightly strange smell in my sons work room. (He is a computer coder and uses a spare bedroom as a work room). We have tried to trace where the smell comes from without success until this morning my wife turned the radiator off. The smell has now almost disappeared. Does this mean the radiators need flushing through with an inhibitor?
No idea when they were last done as it is a rented house and we have been here over 6 years.

dead mouse inside the computer ?

seriously though, do post back when you get to the bottom of it.

 

[Mottie]

dead mouse inside the computer ?

Years ago, we had a smell (of gas) in our office whenever the photocopier was used. We had no gas in there. My office lady suspected a mouse and when I turned the copier it upside down, a mouse ran out! It frightened the life out of us but we realised that a live mouse wouldn't smell so I stripped it down further. I found a dead fried mouse trapped on the circuit board that had been creeping about inside and shocked itself. I can only assume the other mouse was eating it or was it's grieving partner!