Radiator problems

[sash49]

Hi all, Can any one help?
Whole system fitted 2 years ago. Vailant eco tech plus and 9 rads.
Prob is 3 rads downstairs wont warm up properly. 2 get luke warm and one stays stone cold until heating has been on for whole day then the cold one gets warm but the other 2 stay luke warm. The boiler is upstairs and the upstairs rads get boiling even when turned down.
Tried everything I can think of but no good.
Please its freezing here.

 

[swbjackson]

Have you tried balancing the system?

 

[sash49]

Have tried ballancing several times but have noticed some of the therm. valves are on the return side, they are ecocals and say that they can be fitted either way round.When you try to balance middle bedroom it seems to make problem worse.
Pulling or hair out.

 

[swbjackson]

Try shutting all the upstairs rads bar the middle bedroom. Make sure both valves on the middle bedroom are fully open. Could be piped wrong/

Mike

 

[sash49]

Thanks Mike , will do that and get back to you .
Cheers Steve

 

[sash49]

OK Mike,
Have turned all rads upstairs off except middle bedroom .
The hall rad which was stone cold is now warm but not hot and the one in the living room that comes before the hall one is also just warm as is the one at the other end of the house. It seems that the ones playing up are furthest from the boiler.
One more thing , all the inlet pipes to the three offending rads are boiling hot. We have had the rads off and flushed them out and flushed the pipes while they were off and the water flowed really well through the valves so we thought it couldn't be faulty valves but beginning to wonder.

Cheers Steve

 

[2face]

what sort of temperature is the water coming out of the boiler. ??

sounds strange that a new system would do this .was all the pipework changed or re used.

if re used was it checked for sludge etc .. this can build up and cause problems later in life.

 

[sash49]

well at the moment we have the boiler on full and it's at 77degrees.
The radiator we have left on in the middle bedroom following Mikes suggestion is too hot to touch.
The pipework is all new as is the boiler.
We have taken off the 3 downstairs rads and there is no sludge just a bit of dirt, grit... very very tiny amount.
We have now tried to balance the middle bedroom rad but this is one of the rads where the therm.valve is on the return pipe and the lockshield is on the flow.
Don't know if this is the problem.

 

[bengasman]

do you have the tools to balance the rads?

 

[bengasman]

do you have the tools to balance the rads?

 

[sash49]

Didn't know there were any special tools to balance the rads .
What do you recommend ?
Yes but it seems that there are a lot of monkeys out there..peanuts or not!!

 

[bengasman]

dual channel thermometer is most accurate, but especially if you have a boiler with a digital temp readout, a non-contact infrared thermometer works fairly well
one way or the other, you need pretty accurate thermometers

 

[2face]

http://www.diyfaq.org.uk/plumbing/rad-balance.html

you dont need any tools, its not an exact science.

remove the trv heads when balancing the rads.

the trv`s should be ok on either flow or return if the correct type. most are now a days. they clonk if they are not when shutting down.

 

[sash49]

Thanks to the last replys.
If the trv's are on the return instead of the flow then I guess you have to balance rad with the lockshield on the flow instead of the return. Is that right ?
Cheers Steve

 

[swbjackson]

Doesn't matter which pipe the valve is on. When you balance a system you are restricting the flow of water through the radiator. It doesn't matter whether this is done on the inlet or the outlet.

Mike