COLD lower room radiators

I have a Ideal W, RS 440 (ancient!!) boiler with a Myson dual-speed pump. Recently, I turned on my central heating to find that only the upstairs radiators were working, whilst the rads downstairs are totally COLD. As advised on the other messages on this forum, I\\\'ve tried bleeding all the rads, checked the water tank and even the pump (although I\\\'m not too sure whether the procedure is correct?!?) by touch to see whether the pipe temperature on both sides of the pump is the same. Which turns out to so. After all the checking I\\\'ve done best to my knowledge, the problem is still the same..COLD rads!!

Can someone please help me. Any help given will be much appreciated!!

Thanx.

Try turning off the upstairs rads. and see if the downstairs ones get hot. If not you have a blockage and this sounds to me like sludge in the rads. If they do work, you need to restrict the flow through the upstairs rads by closing the lockshield valves and then opening them perhaps only 1/2 turn and see if it helps.

Firstly, thank you oilman for helping out! Very much appreciated!!
I've done as you advised and turned off the upstairs rads, but to no avail. The rads downstairs are still totally cold. In reflect to the solution of trying to remove the sludge, do you think I should buy sludge remover and enter it into the system or should I take off the non-working rads and flush it out??

Many thanks again for the help given.

p.s. As you probably tell, I'm a dumb novice in this area ...Does the lockshield valves control the flows of cold water?? If so, would it help by closing the lockshield valve on the cold rads so that only hot water will flow in?? Does this make any sense??

It sounds like the pump to me, try removing the plug from the centre (catch any drips!) and see if the pump is turning, if it isnt try tapping the pump with a mallet or a hammer and block of wood, or turning it with a small screwdriver. the pipes both sides will feel the same temperature, convection will make the upstairs radiators hot and will flow through a duff pump.

On the subject of lockshield valves, the hot water flows in through one end, round the radiator and out the other end, it doesn't have a hot and cold feed, just a feed and return.

Hope this helps

I've just come across this situation on a fairly new system. The pump had died (why?) so I replaced the pump and bled the system. Pump now pumps water but only to 2 rads downstairs and all rads upstairs. Other rads do get some water but only very slowly. I shut off all warm rads, but downstairs rads still cold. Pump is now making a noise as there's probably air in the pump, but why didn't the downstairs rads get hot? HELP!!!!! guys, I'm stuck!!!!

Keeh, I tried the things I suggested for your system, just like yours, it didn't work. doh!!

Try turning the shaft on your pump as notpaye suggested, but my pump turned freely. It was electrically dead, caused, I think, by pumping air and so not being cooled until it burnt out.

Could it be that the pump is pumping backward ?????? or put in wrong way round or in a wrong position .There should be a arrow on the pump for the flow circ's

A electrician at work told me that a pump motor can sometime reverse itself,not heard of this thou.......

My rads are finally back to working order, or so I think....for now..

First above all, thanks for everybody who has helped!!
After reading the advise given by all you helpfully people, I've tried bleeding the valves again, switching the upstairs rads off etc.
What I found was the problem is that every time I switched on the CH the pump would get extremely hot for about 5 mins or so and then automatically cut off.
So today after all attempts, I decided to call in the pros...and guess what..its gonna cost £89 per hour for the engineer to come out AND it won't be until 'Wednesday' TOO !! After all frustration, I decided to give the pump some 'extra loving care' so I gave it a big whack with a mallet. The pump started to make a whirling noise (and to be frank, i was a bit worried that I did some serious damage) but then the cold rads started to heat up. Its working!!!

So many thanks to the people who has helped with advise!!

Keeh.

p.s. whenever I switch it on now, the pump makes a rather loud whirling noise. Is that suppose to happen , becos it didn't seem to sound like that before this problem occured. Appreciate any help and advise.

Pumps should be so quiet you have to feel them to see if they"re on It may have picked up a little air, more bleeding I suspect.