Some radiators work and others don't

[Ali Ahmed]

Hi I moved into my new house a year a ago and am having an absolute nightmare heating the home. There are 10 radiators and 3 towel rails. Only 8 rads and the towel rails work at any one time. Even then, in one of the rooms downstairs where there are 2 rads turn cold after about 40 mins. The trv in the room is set to 3. When it turns off, the room is barely warm. Then, if I turn the trv to 3.5 then it stays on but 2 of the rads upstairs stop working. I've tried balancing and bleeding them but to no avail. I have called an engineer but they cannot identify what the problem is or just come out with random stuff like I need an expansion vessel?????
The boiler is a Heatline combi condensing 13yrs old. I think it is 28KW which the engineer said is enough heat all the rads.
What do I do? Even the experts don't have a clue. My elderly parents live with me of whom my dad has cancer. My wife suffers from long term illness. I have an autistic son and a 3yr old daughter. I really need the rads to work and heat the home. I spent over £1000 in 4 months from using mainly electric heaters to heat the home during the cold winter months. Really cant afford that as I myself don't work due to mental health problems.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[muggles]

Do the radiators which aren't working work when you turn the ones off that are?

 

[TicTac]

You've got a basic plumber there mate, not a heating engineer; and I think you know that. If you can't get all the rads working together, then it's likely to be a pump problem, or a heat exchanger issue. Not sure on the heatline, but see if there's a higher pump speed. What's the boiler heat set to, and does it cycle on and off.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Do the radiators which aren't working work when you turn the ones off that are?

Yeah.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

You've got a basic plumber there mate, not a heating engineer; and I think you know that. If you can't get all the rads working together, then it's likely to be a pump problem, or a heat exchanger issue. Not sure on the heatline, but see if there's a higher pump speed. What's the boiler heat set to, and does it cycle on and off.

Hi
The boiler heat is set to maximum and it doesn't cycle on and off. Do u think that the boiler might not be powerful enough to run all the rads and towel rails.

 

[TicTac]

You can measure the size of the rads, and then go on to a website that sells radiators, and do an approximate match of their sizes, but as there's only 10 rads, they should be within the capacity of the boiler. When you balanced the rads, how much did you open each lockshield.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Hi
I didnt under

You can measure the size of the rads, and then go on to a website that sells radiators, and do an approximate match of their sizes, but as there's only 10 rads, they should be within the capacity of the boiler. When you balanced the rads, how much did you open each lockshield.

Hi
I didnt understand the first part of your reply in regards to measuring rads and mathing the sizes on a website?
The lockshields are mainly open 1/4 of the way on the ones that always turn on. 3 of them ard on full.

 

[TicTac]

Take a tape measure, and check the size of the rads, then look on any website to see what the BTU rating of a similar sized rad is. You've got a 28Kw boiler, which is equavalent to 95592btu (28x3414)

Open the lockshields up to about half or 1 turn on all the rads, and then start balancing them by opening them up a little, or closing them down a little as needed. a quarter may not be allowing enough water through.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Take a tape measure, and check the size of the rads, then look on any website to see what the BTU rating of a similar sized rad is. You've got a 28Kw boiler, which is equavalent to 95592btu (28x3414)

Open the lockshields up to about half or 1 turn on all the rads, and then start balancing them by opening them up a little, or closing them down a little as needed. a quarter may not be allowing enough water through.

Hi
I've tried to balance all the rads but there is 2 that are still not coming on. One is luke warm and the other is stone cold, even the pipes. Do u thing it could be the pump.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Also does anyone know what the w little switches on the trv are?
They are grey and black and can be pushed down or up.

 

[TicTac]

Now what did I say earlier Ali, open up the lockshileds to half or one turn, and then balance them. If there's any crap in the system, it can block the lockshield, and not let much water through, so the pipes wouldn't get hot either. And open up the TRVs to 5.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Now what did I say earlier Ali, open up the lockshileds to half or one turn, and then balance them. If there's any crap in the system, it can block the lockshield, and not let much water through, so the pipes wouldn't get hot either. And open up the TRVs to 5.

Hi
Thanks for the advice. I will try what you said about trying to balance the rads.
I will measure all the rada and see if the btu is okay.
Is there a chance that some of the rads are fitted wrong way. Some have trv on left shile others have it on the right.

 

[TicTac]

Most TRVs will handle being on either end of the rad, and you'll just get a hammer noise when they close if there's a problem, but the installer may not have been consistent on keeping the flow and return on the same side of each rad when the rads went in. If you check the the pipes on each rad as the system warms up, the pipe that warms up first will be the flow, and the TRV should be on that side.

 

[Ali Ahmed]

Hi
Thanks for the advice. I will try what you said about trying to balance the rads.
I will measure all the rada and see if the btu is okay.
Is there a chance that some of the rads are fitted wrong way. Some have trv on left shile others have it on the right.

Hi
I tried balancing the rada by turning them half a turn and trv up to 5. But the upstairs 3 upstairs rads would not heat up. Then I turned the lockshield to a full turn but still 2 would not heat up. When I turn 3 of the rads trv to 3 then only 1 upstairs rad does not work but the 3 rads with the trv set lower turn off after 3pmins and don't get hot again even thought the room temperature is very low.
I think there might be more serious problems.

 

[TicTac]

You need all TRVs set to maximum when you try and balance them; then you turn the TRVs down to control the room temperature, otherwise the TRV setting can fight with the lockshield setting.