Pinhole leak on radiator

Cuttlefish

Hi all,
Here's my story!!!

Woke this morning at bout 10:45am and was sitting on the side of the bed when I noticed a small pool of water under the radiator, which is situated under the bedroom window.

I initially thought it was water from the window as in a leak or broken seal. I went to the bathroom and got some toilet paper to mop it up. I returned to the bedroom and mopped up the water and in doing so noticed the slight rust stain on the bottom of the radiator, I literally touched the spot when all hell broke loose and water started spraying out from the pinhole! Mad panic for toilets and buckets to collect the water and contain the damage which we did Thank God.

We disabled the stop cock in the H / E tank on the attic and eventually disabled the radiator .

A plumber friend called to assess and he mentioned something about "rust inhibitor". This is new to me and why I am on this forum...

The house is about 40 years old, 3 bedroom semi built by McInerney and it has mixture of the original radiators and some new ones that we changed over the years, the radiator that leaked is quite new, we replaced it 10 years ago.


Questions...

1. Is this the start of problems with leaks developing all over the C/ H system? Would it be a case of rust travelling through the system attacking the weak spots?

2. Would rust inhibitor be of help or is it too late to use it?

3. If there are other weaknesses in the C/ H would rust inhibitor make it worse?

4. Any other suggestions or advice?

I shudder at the thought of it happening when the house was empty, the damage would be horrendous so I count myself lucky to have been present and to have kept damage to a minimum.

corkgsxr

Stick in a new radiator. Some inhibitor will never do any harm

Dtp79

Close the valves to the leaking radiator and refill your system. When it is full check to see if water is still coming from the ballcock in the small tank. Even a constant drop will indicate a leak on your system. If your system is having fresh water introduced then it is rotting from the inside out.

shane0007

corkgsxr wrote: »

Stick in a new radiator. Some inhibitor will never do any harm

Putting inhibitor into a dirty system is a waste it time & will probably lead to more complications.
Firstly, at 40 years old, is the system GB (Gun Barrel) or copper pipework? If GB, it is probably the sign for replacing the system as GB has an expected lifespan of circa 30 years.
If copper, then a Powerflush is the only way forward & then a good quality inhibitor, however, if one of the rads is in that state, I'm afraid the others won't be far behind. A thermal image camera survey will tell a lot.

Cuttlefish

Hi all thanks for the replies and advice

The system is copper as far as I can tell, our downstairs flooring is suspended and when we were renovating a number of years ago the flooring was open and you could see the copper pipe work.

There is no water coming from the ball cock in the small tank so that is a good sign no?

When you say the others won't be far behind can you explain? Is the a ticking time bomb? I could arrive home some day to a flooded house?

shane0007

If you have oxidisation of one rad, it will be mostly certainly happening in others. A Powerflush & camera survey will not be wasted on such an old system anyhow. Pinholes in rads happen for two reasons, oxidisation or electrolysis & Powerflushing will resolve both.
If the system was not so old I would be looking at the location of the f & e pipe but if this was the issue, the problem would have surfaced long before now.

gifted

The water in the system found a way out of the rad through the rust spot which was a weak spot, now that you have isolated this rad the water will now go the next weak spot, chances are that other rads have weak points and the water will find the weakest spot and so on....if that rad was only 10 years old and it started to rust then chances are all the rads are fairly well rusted.
I'd recommend changing the rads, powerflushing the system and then add some good inhibitor, but thats just my opinion, other chaps here will have their opinion.

Cuttlefish

That sounds expensive but so also is a flooded house!!

As I mentioned 4 of my radiators are the big old ones and the new ones are single panel with the heat distribution fins, I thought these would be more efficient!!

Sorry for my ignorance what is the F & E pipe?

Trying to add a photo of the leak

gifted

you could try pressure testing your rads and system, see if they hold a test, might be ok but chances are they are weak

Cuttlefish

Photo attached, I hope!

Dtp79

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Photo attached, I hope!

I'm assuming that was taken before the rad was disabled?

Cuttlefish

Yep!! Grabbed the baby bath to reduce the affects of the water, tied up the ballcock and ran down for tools!!

Panic!

oikster

System looks like it has inhibitor in it going by the suds in the bath
Could it just be a faulty radiator.

Cuttlefish

oikster wrote: »

System looks like it has inhibitor in it going by the suds in the bath
Could it just be a faulty radiator.

You see I have to express ignorance in this respect, I never heard of inhibitor until yesterday.

Could the suds be due to the pressure of the water being expelled?

Also I read on some sites that the color of the water from the radiator is important. Brown perhaps means rust? any thoughts comments?

oikster

Those tightly formed bubbles look like inhibitor to me plus the water is more of a yellow colour rather than brown.Could be wrong though but I hope I'm not as this would be an easy fix.

Cuttlefish

Appreciate everyones advice and opinions here, I am scared to death of water as in leaks etc. I really sympathise with home owners who walk into a flooded house and consider myself lucky to have been on hand when it happened.

My worry is that other radiators could be the same but as you say Oikster there might be inhibitor already in the system, that I am unaware of, and it might just be a faulty radiator.

What do others think?

I think you can get a kit to check so I will look into that this week.

Cuttlefish

Actually let me clarify a bit more

I never heard of inhibitor and if it is already in the system it has been there quite a few years.

Any plumbing work done over the years I was never told by the plumber that he was adding the inhibitor

We are always wiser after the fact eh?!!

corkgsxr

shane0007 wrote: »

Putting inhibitor into a dirty system is a waste it time & will probably lead to more complications.
Firstly, at 40 years old, is the system GB (Gun Barrel) or copper pipework? If GB, it is probably the sign for replacing the system as GB has an expected lifespan of circa 30 years.
If copper, then a Powerflush is the only way forward & then a good quality inhibitor, however, if one of the rads is in that state, I'm afraid the others won't be far behind. A thermal image camera survey will tell a lot.

How would it do harm tell me

Cuttlefish

Question for you all...

Can you inspect your radiators for tell tale signs and does pin hole damage occur in copper pipes also?

oikster

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Actually let me clarify a bit more

I never heard of inhibitor and if it is already in the system it has been there quite a few years.

Any plumbing work done over the years I was never told by the plumber that he was adding the inhibitor

We are always wiser after the fact eh?!!

Roughly how long ago since you had work (which entailed draining down) done.

Cuttlefish

oikster wrote: »

Roughly how long ago since you had work (which entailed draining down) done.

Good question and tbh I cant say, Boiler was replaced about 8/10 years ago
About 5 years ago a radiator added in the downstairs toilet.

Cant be any clearer than that sorry.

oikster

Cuttlefish wrote: »

Good question and tbh I cant say, Boiler was replaced about 8/10 years ago
About 5 years ago a radiator added in the downstairs toilet.

Cant be any clearer than that sorry.

You will really know better when you remove the radiator as to the extent of the rust, but here's hoping it's not too bad.

shane0007

corkgsxr wrote: »

How would it do harm tell me

It usually leads also loosening of compacted sludge which then in turn puts more stresses on the pump & also leads to further damage to heat exchangers.
Often problems are more highlighted after inhibitor has been added. It should only be added to clean systems.

esox28

Cuttlefish have you a solid fuel back boiler or stove connected to the ch system?

Oxidizing generally occurs when the ch systems water is reoxygenised through pitching or leaking in the system.
the pic you have shows the leak in the bottom centre of rad which i think looks like a faulty rad as I have only ever seen rads fail at bottom left or right sides near valve inlet as this is the point which bears most of the friction of inlet water velocities.
As the guys have said have the system chemically cleaned and flushed plus a pressure test would be important to rule out any leaking.

2 stroke

Lookingat that leak reminded me that I did a temporary repair to a rad during the freeze 2 years ago. Just checked, it's still holding water.

Cuttlefish

esox28 wrote: »

Cuttlefish have you a solid fuel back boiler or stove connected to the ch system?

Oxidizing generally occurs when the ch systems water is reoxygenised through pitching or leaking in the system.
the pic you have shows the leak in the bottom centre of rad which i think looks like a faulty rad as I have only ever seen rads fail at bottom left or right sides near valve inlet as this is the point which bears most of the friction of inlet water velocities.
As the guys have said have the system chemically cleaned and flushed plus a pressure test would be important to rule out any leaking.

Hi no back boiler or stove connected.

So based on some comments it might be a faulty rad? Would a plumber carry out the clean and flush?

Joey the lips

new radiator.i am all for system cleans but bear in mind. Cleaning the system can remove sludge which was blocking holes you dont know aboout.

If it were me system clean replace rad add inhibitor

Cuttlefish

Joey the lips wrote: »

new radiator.i am all for system cleans but bear in mind. Cleaning the system can remove sludge which was blocking holes you dont know aboout.

If it were me system clean replace rad add inhibitor

That is what concerns me there could be other weaknessess.

So are you suggesting replace the defective radiator only or all radiators?

gifted

Cuttlefish wrote: »

That is what concerns me there could be other weaknessess.

So are you suggesting replace the defective radiator only or all radiators?

Hence the suggestion of getting your system pressure tested..:)

Cuttlefish

gifted wrote: »

Hence the suggestion of getting your system pressure tested..:)

Is this done by a plumber or a specialist?

gifted

Plumber should be able do this, quite easy.