Hi,
We used to have an old boiler that warmed the kitchen but the modern, insulated model that has replaced it keeps the kitchen cold. I need to add a radiator but there is nowhere obvious to fit one because there are cupboards all around. Other than a fan heater in the plinth, what else do people do?
TIA
You can get fan radiators to go in the plinth space; I had a Smiths, but Myson used to do one too. However I took mine out again (noisy and not very effective), but I do have a wall for a conventional rad. You might find an electric fan heater in the plinth space cheap and effective, especially if you don't need too much heat. No plumbing and perhaps more freedom of placement. Don't block the inlet vents though!
I'm trying to decide what to do in a similar situation. The choice seems to be either a hydroponic plinth heater (i.e., the heat comes from what is essentially a compact radiator, and then electric fans blow air over the radiator and out of the plinth - did you mean this, or were you thinking of an all electric fan heater?), or a single-zone under-floor system like a Rayotec Floor Rad.
Normally underfloor systems work by heating the thermal mass of the floor, and can't deliver heating on-demand heating as a radiator system can. This makes me think that fitting an underfloor system in- line with a conventional radiator system might not work as well as the hydroponic plinth system, but I've not found any comment about this anywhere.
dan.
Fan assisted kickspace heaters are often the only retrofit option. UFH is one solution, but not easy to add to an existing kitchen. You may be able to squeeze in a small fan assisted wall heater like one of the Myson jobbies if there is some wall space.
Switch the cooker on :-) It's rare for anyone to be in ours for any length of time unless they're cooking something.
The only other heat in ours is a little 'leccy heater and a behemoth of a
30-odd year old fridge. There are three big windows in the room, and a door to the back porch which has to stay open a little bit to let the pets come and go - so it gets pretty chilly in there (it's -17C outside at the mo).cheers
Jules
In our case Aga, and underfloor heating. More than enough. Underfloor rarely comes on. only well below zero outside.
If you are pushed for space, the plinth kick spaces are about all you can do. Maybe a radiant electric or a fan blown convector somewhere else.
Kitchens are usually warm as the cupboards act as insulators!
What do we do? Have a cold kitchen. (Except when cooking.)
But that's OK - partner *needs* a cold floor for her feet.
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It doesn't have to be a plinth heater because you can get the same type of heater for high level heating if that's the kind of heating you need. I think Myson do a 12 volt plinth heater (12 volt fan motor / wet radiator) and possibly the same for high level.
Cic.
We were in the same position with no wall space to mount one on when I put a new kitchen in.
However, the floor to ceiling oven/drawer unit had a side that was exposed so I put a 1750mm x 600mm heated towel rail on it.
In a previous I house the occupants before me had removed the kitchen radiator, 'it's plenty warm enough', and put something else in its space, I can't remember what. I found that the kitchen was not warm enough and mounted a small panel radiator above the worktop - it worked for me, I don't know if it is still there 12 years after I moved.
Hi.
No, I hadn't heard of those "wet" radiators with fans before. I was thinking of electric fan heaters. I think the electric ones I have seen are about 70GBP though, which seems a lot considering "normal fan heaters are a third that.
I know a lot of people love UFH but I'm not sure. How do you manage to lift floorboards if they've all got pipes on top? There's always another cable to fit (tv, telephone, etc)!
We will redecorate the kitchen at some point but even then, we will want to maximise cupboard space so I can't see us creating any extra room. There is a bit of bare wall and I heard you can get triple thickness radiators, so perhaps I could squeeze one there. Can anyone point me in the direction of a make/merchant of these?
The only thing is, it is near the freezer, so I will have to consider moving the freezer into another corner when we redo the kitchen.
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If £70-00p is expensive don't look at the prices of the wet type until you've got a strong drink in your hand. Try a google for Myson plinth heaters.
Cic.
I used UltraHeat Compact 4 and Ultraheat Compact 6. The number refers to the number of pipe connection points. The 6 has two extra connections up into the bottom towards one end, so you don't need any side pipework. (Still need side access one end for access to the bleed valve, but other end can be hard up against something with no space lost for pipework.)
Sadly, their website is complete crap. You need to get a leaflet of their range from a plumbers merchant.
However, in my kitchen, I used a narrow (but quite tall) double. Kitchens have lots of their own heat sources and generally don't need to be as warm as some other rooms in the house anyway. If you have the oven and hob going, you want the kitchen rad to shut itself down with a TRV too.
I had a bit of spare wall next to the back door, and that's a good place as it counteracts the inevitable coldness from the door itself.
Thank you. They sounded ideal but I did the search and you are right, they are very expensive. Is that simply a numbers thing: not many are sold so the price is high?
Thanks, now that I've got a brand name I will look into triples but whilst these may allow me to use a narrower radiator, I will need to look carefully at how deep they are. Does anyone else make them?
Like you, I did wonder about using a narrow but tall double radiator. Perhaps that will work out cheaper than a triple? It's frustrating because I can get 600mm tall radiators from Screwfix or Toolstation for forty-odd pounds. Sadly they don't sell anything taller and if I look elsewhere even a 700mm radiator is twice that price.
We have a cold door too: it's mostly glazed. I guess replacing it with a warmer door should be put on the wish-list. I wasn't sure if it was a bad idea to put the radiator right next to it for fear of losing all the heat every time it was opened.
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That's probably one of the reasons; another reason is that they're not always suitable because they give out little or no heat once the fan switches off. A standard panel radiator will give heat for quite a long time after the boiler switches off or the TRV closes.
Cic.
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There is another remote possible solution to your problem. If you have a suspended floor you could explore the possibility of installing 'trench' heaters. These are effectively wet heating elements fitted in to trenches or channels in the floor. It wouldn't be easy but if all else fails it might be worth considering although an overhead infrared heater would be much easier.
Cic.
This might be a bit off the wall (haha), but can you take pipework from your central heating system into the kitchen? You could take the kickboards off under the units, and run some 22mm copper pipe all the way round, in the front. Put some 25mm foiled Kingspan behind, the keep the heat on the kitchen side and reflect it out, and put some kind of grille over the front. Floor-level radiator all round the kitchen. If you can't get all the way round you could double it back on itself.
Cheers Richard
The boiler is in the kitchen so all the CH pipe work is in there but rightly or wrongly it has been lagged. Perhaps if I took the lagging off, it would heat the kitchen. Perhaps this is a case of insulation being a bad thing?
You mentioned 22mm pipe, I presume because it has the greatest volume but I wonder whether surface area is more important for heating? Would a lot of microbore be better. I'm not thinking of doing this, I'm too lazy, but it's interesting to think about it. If you added a little fan, I am sure it would be the equivalent of these Myson hydronic radiators that cost a small fortune.
On the subject of triple radiators, I did a search for ultraheat but only found a couple of companies selling them and they looked like the same company under two names and the delivery charges cost more than a Screwfix standard 600mm double radiator. I may resort to buying the latter and hope it doesn't heat the freezer too much. By my calculations it will stop in line with the freezer door, so it will not run along side the freezer which is what I wanted to avoid but will it still be too close for comfort? Still , if that happens I'll have to swap the freezer into the other corner of the room.
I'm a bit apprehensive about starting the job now because I don't really want to drain down the system in the middle of this cold spell. Perhaps I should wait until it warms up, just in case of a mid-job catastrophe!
Thanks for all your help.
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