Soooo cold - radiator thermostat question !

[IceBoy]

Morning All,

With the temperature the way it is the following is now very noticeable:

The living room rad is stone cold. I have taken the thermostat off to check the pin. The pin is out and the pipe coming into the rad where the thermostat is red hot !

So is the pipe blocked or maybe the valve stuck in the off position ??

Help much appreciated.

The heating system is only a couple of years old, combi boiler. The other rads are fine.

IceBoy

[kippax]

check the valve on opposite end of radiator is also open

H

[IceBoy]

Just check the other side and it is fully open !

What now?

[Puggit]

-6.9oC in Reading last night, coldest night for 5 years.

So much for global warming

[IceBoy]

I'm just down the road in Maidenhead !! Pretty darn cold !!

[voyds9]

Bleeding radiators

linky

[Steve996]

Yup I'd be checking for air too. I've seen a couple of my rads stone cold until bled.

[Z4monster]

Give the valve a little tap with a hammer. I stress LITTLE. Don't belt it with a 5lb lump hammer. Sounds like the valve has stuck in the closed position to me.

BTW I am not a Plumber!

[motco]

There must be some flow or the pipe would be cold too. It is just inadequate to heat the radiator. Either the rad is full of air, or the flow is restricted by the valve(s). Work the pin in and out a couple of times to see if it's sticky, check the lockshield valve is open, and bleed the rad.

[IceBoy]

OK:

1. No air in the rad....just bleed it and only water coming out.
2. The pipe coming into the rad with the valve on (Which I have taken completely off) is red hot.
3. Pushed the pin in a few times.
4. Tapped the pipe with the hammer.
5. The rad is not luke warm !!!!

Yippeeeeee !

That is a 100% improvement.

The thing is it is only luke warm.....I'm guess the valve must be stuck inside ???

Thanks All!

IceBoy

PS....should I start using my hammer for other stuff ? 8-)

[Momentofmadness]

IceBoy said:

3. Pushed the pin in a few times.

Isn't the trick to gently pull the pin out with pliers?

[lowdrag]

Just be grateful it is so warm there. Here at Le Mans it is -10C and we have an electricity cut. At least I have the log fire going but if this continues it is sleeping on the mezzanine over the fire tonight...................

On a serious note seem you need a new valve. For the moment have you thought of swapping it for one in a spare bedroom for example? That way you'll soon know if it is the valve.

[Puggit]

lowdrag said:

Just be grateful it is so warm there. Here at Le Mans it is -10C and we have an electricity cut. At least I have the log fire going but if this continues it is sleeping on the mezzanine over the fire tonight...................

I hope our house down at La-Chartre-sur-le-Loir is ok!

[Iain328]

IceBoy said:

OK:

1. No air in the rad....just bleed it and only water coming out.
2. The pipe coming into the rad with the valve on (Which I have taken completely off) is red hot.
3. Pushed the pin in a few times.
4. Tapped the pipe with the hammer.
5. The rad is not luke warm !!!!

Yippeeeeee !

That is a 100% improvement.

The thing is it is only luke warm.....I'm guess the valve must be stuck inside ???

Thanks All!

IceBoy

PS....should I start using my hammer for other stuff ? 8-)

Its probably a balance issue. If this rad is some way from the boiler it will not get much flow of water because the flow will always follow the easiest route so you ned to balance the system

The way to check if that is the issue is to close all the other T'stats down temporarily (making a note of what they were set at) and open this one up full. That should show you that thing thing isn't blocked and the valve isn't stuck.

If it doesn't get very hot when you do this then you have a problem that needs an engineer - i.e. the radiator may be blocked & need taking off the wall & cleaning out. It may also be that you have an airlock and that this will shift it and the thing will then start working properly.

If the rad does get hot by closing all the others down but stops woking when you open the other rads up again then you have a balance issue

To correct this you will need to turn the system off for an hour or two and wait for it to cool down then open all the Stats up fully & start the thing up again. Figure out which radiators get hottest quickest and turn the balancing valves on the other end of the rads from the T'stats down a bit. Keep reducing the flow to the radiators which get hottest quickest until you get a fairly even distribution of heat throughout the system. It may take two or three attempts but you will figure out where the heat is going & then you can sort it.

I.

Obviously you have made the offending radiator

[Iain328]

Momentofmadness said:

IceBoy said:

3. Pushed the pin in a few times.

Isn't the trick to gently pull the pin out with pliers?

Only if its not moving. Pushing it in & making sure it springs out again is the correct way to check its working properly. On this you can save yourself tons of time with this kind of aggravation with T'stats by going round the house & just turning them from max to min a few times once every 2-3 months throught the year to keep them free. Takes 5 minutes.

[Freezing Ferg]

If the valve appears to be open my cash would be on an airlock. Close every radiator, make sure pump is full up (3), programmer on 'Heating' only, close bypass valve if you have one (make sure you know where it was set) and just listen to it push air into that open radiator.

[King Herald]

We are having the opposite problem. Wifey e mailed me last night to tell me the house is 29C, heating appears to be stuck on. I read the e mail this morning, and I've told her to call the Homeserve people out. First thing they told her on the phone was turn off the gas, open the windows.......

-6c outside you say


ETA: And then they told her the earliest they can there is Wednesday....

So she got my dad involved, who informed them that our contract says they'll have an engineer to fix the problem within 24 hours. So now they are sending a guy tomorrow. Gonna be a cold night....

Edited by King Herald on Sunday 4th January 16:24

[Freezing Ferg]

Motorised valve.

[motco]

I may be wrong but I think the OP says it's okay now thanks to a good poking and a thump!