Radiator sludge

fasttalkerchat

One of my radiators doesn't heat at the bottom. I think there may be some sludge in it. I was going to remove it and hit it a few whacks with a hammer then run water through it. Would this be worth doing or should I get a professional to do something else to clear it?

heinbloed

Professional whacks with a hammer onto a radiator?

Name us that enterprise.

Probably just needs to be bled?

fasttalkerchat

Karsini wrote: »

Probably just needs to be bled?

Tried that. I get black water when I bleed it. It heats fine at the top but the bottom half is cold.

heinbloed

Has this radiator been installed correctly?

wayfarers

I don't know why OP suggests hitting it a whack with a hammer. Though normal procedure is to remove it ad flush out the sludge with water. If there's black liquid coming out when you bleed it then yeah that's sludge.

heinbloed

There are sludge separators available, common state of the art with modern rust prone CH systems.
If sludge can't be avoided, separate it from the circulated system.

slavetothegrind

get a heinbloed.sorry a heating engineer in, they will asses your system and treat appropriately. chances are system needs attention and also remedy of cause of sludge.

i'm off to serve out a probable ban but i am happy coz i am in from pb and merry

oh and the crap you dislodge wioth a hammer ends up in your boilers heat exchanger if you haven't got a decent filter in the way...

heinbloed

heinbloed wrote: »

There are sludge separators available, common state of the art with modern rust prone CH systems.
If sludge can't be avoided, separate it from the circulated system.

Good for protecting a boiler but not for a full system clean.

With system water black at the rad I would advise a power flush, if you do self clean by using chemicals, taking off rads, hammer:eek: etc.... You should succeed in removing a element of the sludge but rarely all, it is dependent on the level of sludge.

Adding inhibiter to contaminated water can lead to other problems, so it's best not to add inhibiter unless your happy the system water is fully clean.

fasttalkerchat

Since I posted that I fully opened both bleeding screws (double radiator) and shook it while still connected. It made a gurgling noise and some air came out in the streams of water. It's heating a lot better now so that should do the job for now.

The boiler pump seized up right after we moved in and after 4 days the Landlord hadn't got back to me so I had to get a boilerman out. It cost 200 quid to fix and he recommended getting the boiler serviced ASAP. 2 months later and that still hasn't happened and I haven't spoken to the Landlord yet so I don't expect to be able to get him to do much work any time soon.

Hopefully this temporary fix will last for 12 months!