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88v8
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Hello and welcome.
Yes, but:
- It must not erase or damage any architectural features. If there are solid floors with tiles for example, do not dig them up. I would be inclined to ask for previous references where they have installed in a Period house, go and see.
- Iron radiators look best https://castironcolumnradiators.com/ and are nowadays widely available. Take up less wall space than modern rads.
- Be very careful to see that the installers do not hack through beams and other woodwork. There have been many threads on here lamenting the cosmetic and structural damage done by careless installers, plumbers, electricians. Cuts though floor joists must not be near the centre of the span, and should preferably be bored through the middle rather than chiselled into the top.
- When the heating is up and running, if the house previously had none, then do not be in a hurry to decorate. The woodwork will start to shrink as it dries out, joints will crack, gaps will open up. Wait at least a year.
- Still thinking about the drying out, buy a humidity meter (hygrometer) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Thermometer-Hygrometer-Instrument-Room-Control-Anthrazit-White/dp/B002U9U4B4 and watch that the air does not get too dry. Below 30% is not good for the woodwork, turn the heating down.
- In general, radiators work best under windows. This minimises the thermocline across the room. Think then about window sills and curtains, so you avoid the schoolboy error of drawing the curtains over the radiators.
- In the bathroom, a heated towel rail, yes? Have that on an Always On circuit with a TRV, then it will come on gently during the spring/autumn/summer and you will always have a cosy room and dry towels.
Hope it all goes well.
Ivor
Yes, but:
- It must not erase or damage any architectural features. If there are solid floors with tiles for example, do not dig them up. I would be inclined to ask for previous references where they have installed in a Period house, go and see.
- Iron radiators look best https://castironcolumnradiators.com/ and are nowadays widely available. Take up less wall space than modern rads.
- Be very careful to see that the installers do not hack through beams and other woodwork. There have been many threads on here lamenting the cosmetic and structural damage done by careless installers, plumbers, electricians. Cuts though floor joists must not be near the centre of the span, and should preferably be bored through the middle rather than chiselled into the top.
- When the heating is up and running, if the house previously had none, then do not be in a hurry to decorate. The woodwork will start to shrink as it dries out, joints will crack, gaps will open up. Wait at least a year.
- Still thinking about the drying out, buy a humidity meter (hygrometer) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Thermometer-Hygrometer-Instrument-Room-Control-Anthrazit-White/dp/B002U9U4B4 and watch that the air does not get too dry. Below 30% is not good for the woodwork, turn the heating down.
- In general, radiators work best under windows. This minimises the thermocline across the room. Think then about window sills and curtains, so you avoid the schoolboy error of drawing the curtains over the radiators.
- In the bathroom, a heated towel rail, yes? Have that on an Always On circuit with a TRV, then it will come on gently during the spring/autumn/summer and you will always have a cosy room and dry towels.
Hope it all goes well.
Ivor
I agree completely with Ivor's comments. Especially the bit about being vigilant with plumbers haphazardly cutting through joists and beams. It's been almost a year since we had the plumbing done and I still find it mind boggling the amount of damage that was done to the floor joists.
The point about buying a hygrometer is also a good one and something I plan to do in the coming month once all the sashes go back in and the heating is turned on.
Ivor - you mentioned the minimum recommended humidity for joinery. What is the amount of humidity that is considered too much? ie. where wood will begin to rot?
Many thanks.
Scott
The point about buying a hygrometer is also a good one and something I plan to do in the coming month once all the sashes go back in and the heating is turned on.
Ivor - you mentioned the minimum recommended humidity for joinery. What is the amount of humidity that is considered too much? ie. where wood will begin to rot?
Many thanks.
Scott
livias
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Contrariwise!!!!
.... Iron radiators look best https://castironcolumnradiators.com/ and are nowadays widely available. Take up less wall space than modern rads.
In a Victorian or later house I agree, but in an older house no radiator is correct so I use modern ones and concentrate on making them semi invisible by careful placement. Plan where the radiators and pipework are to go yourself, do not leave design totally to the plumber who will put them where it is easy
.... In general, radiators work best under windows. This minimises the thermocline across the room. Think then about window sills and curtains, so you avoid the schoolboy error of drawing the curtains over the radiators.
IMO full length curtains look nicer then short ones and they are much better at keeping the room warm by blocking off the cold spot that is a window. So I never put radiators under windows
.... Iron radiators look best https://castironcolumnradiators.com/ and are nowadays widely available. Take up less wall space than modern rads.
In a Victorian or later house I agree, but in an older house no radiator is correct so I use modern ones and concentrate on making them semi invisible by careful placement. Plan where the radiators and pipework are to go yourself, do not leave design totally to the plumber who will put them where it is easy
.... In general, radiators work best under windows. This minimises the thermocline across the room. Think then about window sills and curtains, so you avoid the schoolboy error of drawing the curtains over the radiators.
IMO full length curtains look nicer then short ones and they are much better at keeping the room warm by blocking off the cold spot that is a window. So I never put radiators under windows
Flyfisher
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At least modern plumbing allows the use of small diameter pipework, unlike the 2 to 3-inch cast iron pipework scattered throughout our house when radiators were installed in (I think) the 1930s.
Livias is right of course about radiator authenticity (it's a bit like 'Georgian light switches and power sockets :wink: ), so I'd say it's mainly down to personal preference. New cast iron rads are readily available (at a price) but be aware that they have significant thermal lag - not really a bad thing, just a different thing to modern steel rads.
As for pipework routing, the best way to minimise the sort of damage mentioned above is to decide, as far as possible, where YOU want the pipework to be routed rather than just let the installers decide (which applies to the rads as well really, as Livias points out), because they'll have the tools to go through anything in their way and will probably be concentrating on the most convenient route for them rather than being too concerned about the building fabric.
Livias is right of course about radiator authenticity (it's a bit like 'Georgian light switches and power sockets :wink: ), so I'd say it's mainly down to personal preference. New cast iron rads are readily available (at a price) but be aware that they have significant thermal lag - not really a bad thing, just a different thing to modern steel rads.
As for pipework routing, the best way to minimise the sort of damage mentioned above is to decide, as far as possible, where YOU want the pipework to be routed rather than just let the installers decide (which applies to the rads as well really, as Livias points out), because they'll have the tools to go through anything in their way and will probably be concentrating on the most convenient route for them rather than being too concerned about the building fabric.
Microbore radiator pipes can be 8mm so thinner than some electric cables. You need an individual feed to each radiator from a manifold, though.
Floor standing traditional radiators can be spaced off the wall below the window on a threaded rod clamp so the curtains can go behind.
Many modern boilers can have flue extension and can go out through the roof (and the boiler itself can go in the loft if boarded and railed access is provided)
Floor standing traditional radiators can be spaced off the wall below the window on a threaded rod clamp so the curtains can go behind.
Many modern boilers can have flue extension and can go out through the roof (and the boiler itself can go in the loft if boarded and railed access is provided)
88v8
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livias said:
That's a good point. But, the thermocline effect is also present during he day, when the curtains are open. So, for preference I would always put the rads beneath the windows. Or at the very least immediately adjacent. Do agree though that aesthetics sometimes trump comfort.
Flyfisher said:
Indeed. And some of the worst examples in terms of placement are those where the rads are back to back. Example, one in the hall, one in the sitting room on the other side of the wall. Nice for the plumber, minimal pipe run, but in terms of comfort, quite hopeless.
Owain said:
True, but unless the total run of microbore is kept very short, the pump pressure will have to be high and the system will thus be noisy, with constant bloopings and swooshes while water is being circulated. It's also more difficult to balance a mixture of small bore and microbore, as the smallbore pipes have to be considerably throttled, and this further exacerbates the back-pressure.
You won't hear any noise from Flyfisher's 3" pipes, which I would guess were part of a thermocycle system with no pump at all.
Microbore has its uses; in the system I designed and installed in our previous house I used about 4ft of 8mm to feed one rad, the pipe ran in a channel I routed through the back of a skirting in a room where I didn't want to take up a polished wood floor. So yes, it can be useful, so long as it's not just another means of doing the job on the cheap.
Microbore was all the rage in the 70s. Remember skirting rads? They'd almost be a Period feature now.
jsmac said:
Hmmm.
In our cellar, with the dehumidifier off for an extended period it reaches 80% RH, but neither soft nor hardwood has suffered. I don't believe decay will initiate through atmospheric moisture alone.
However, a high RH may be a symptom of conditions that could conduce to rot, such as timber in contact with wet ground or damp masonry, and of course if the air is stagnant then fungi can set up shop.
Good overview of rot here https://www.nachi.org/wood-decay.htm
This is perhaps a topic for another Thread.
Ivor
Flyfisher
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88v8 said:
The system has never worked in my time so I can't comment on the noise. The original (mostly large & very heavy!) radiators seemed to be connected 'in series' rather than across flow and return pipework, so perhaps that's what you mean by a 'thermocycle' system? There was a large old oil boiler in a separate outhouse 'lean-to' but that had pretty much rotted and collapsed - so all a bit of a mess really. I've gradually been removing the pipework as we progress through the house and there's not a lot remaining now, mostly in the attic rooms. I can't imagine it was a very efficient system. Some rooms had relatively small radiators and it seemed like the pipework feeding them would have had a larger surface area than the radiators! Perhaps this was taken into account during the system design? :lol: It must also have been a fairly 'industrial' process to install such large, heavy pipework, especially having to cut threads onto the ends of each pipe run.
88v8
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Flyfisher said:
And the rads are tapped Top and Bottom Opposite Ends?
So then one gets natural circulation without the need for a pump, due to difference in the specific gravity of hot & cold water.
It was and perhaps is common for the HW system to be thermocycle, even if the heating is pumped.
Had a 34 Lanchester with a tall radiator, no water pump The tallness produced a thermocycle that kept it cooled. No pump, no fan.
Not efficient, but less to go wrong.
Installing that size of piping was a real art. Screwed fittings, Have to plan the sequence. In our previous house I put iron tails on the rads, just for the look. Big brass valves, iron rads, iron tails. Visual Nirvana.
Ivor
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88v8
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Cubist said:
Yes. Even in my teens. At that time, pre-Ten year Test, cars of the 20s & 30s were still commonly in use. I cycled abount with a collection of old cameras round my neck, taking bad B&W photographs of them which doubtless I still have somewhere.
That Mulliner-bodied Lanchester, owned 1970-78, most of the time it was my basic transport, interspersed with a 1946 Wolseley 14/60, 1935 Standard (ran until I dismantled it to make a convertible, a classic case of over-ambition), another 35 Standard, Austin 7 Cambridge Engineering special (never ran), Daimler Straight 8 hearse (never ran), another Lanchester (drove home from The Lakes, parked in garden never ran again) and various motorbikes. Currently I have a 63 Rambler, which does run and will be doing so today.
The Lanchester, a humble 10HP, iirc cost new £345. In 1932 when our first house was built, that cost £325. Decent size 3-bed terrace in a 'garden city'. In those days both house and car were hand built. Funny that we've been so unsuccessful in the factory building of houses, but perhaps just as well given the impossibility of DIY repairing the average new car.
Ivor