Radiator problem

luckat

My radiators occasionally get into trouble, and the rather expensive plumber told me I could solve this myself by taking off the (useless) thermostat from the individual radiator, and then gently hitting a nipple inside the valve thus revealed with hammer and screwdriver to make the nipple pop back up.

But I can't get the thermostat - a gadget that winds to the left to turn the radiator up, and to the right to turn it down - off the dratted thing.

I seem to remember him telling me that you just screw it hard to the left, but it's not moving. And a friend says she thinks you press it down, then screw it to the left, like releasing a bayonet fitting bulb.

Has anyone done this; can anyone advise?

luckat

Solved this by looking online... to some extent. To the extent, that is, that I got the valves on the two most troubled radiators off (there's a ridged ring under the radiator thermostat; loosen that and the whole thing lifts off.

I lifted and dropped the nipple with a pliers a few times to loosen it and then put the thermostat back on and set it to 'hot', but while the pipe leading up into the radiator is now hot, the radiator itself isn't.

I did try bleeding the worst radiator, but gave back the key to a friend I'd borrowed it from - in a moment of madness I moved my radiator and meter keys recently from the kitchen drawer, where they'd always lived, to somewhere more sensible. Now, of course, I can't find the cursed things.