Just got a new boiler put in and the engineer put new TRVs on some radiators. Thing is, one of these radiators is either freezing or boiling. A tiny adjustment will set it either way, this point is somewhere between 1 and 2 on a scale of 0-6. Is it possible to self adjust without requiring the contractor to come out again?
You have totally misunderstood what a TRV does. The idea is that it is boiling hot until the ROOM is hot enough, and then it will shut down and go to luke warm.
You can reduce the peak a bit by turning down the balancing valve. Typically a square ended shaft on the opposite end to the TRV.
you can reduce temps in all rads by turning the boiler temp down.
The TRV is a _room_ thermostat, not a _radiator_ thermostat. You set it to the room temperature you want, and it will adjust the radiator to meet that setting, which will probably involve the radiator getting hot and cold at different times.
If you don't want radiators so hot, turn down the boiler. However, below a certain point, it will take longer to heat up the house, and may even struggle to keep the house at the set temperature when it's cold outside.
Sounds like you have a good system and good insulation. when the room is up to temp the radiator goes off - the thermostat is functioning. (Pity the poor installer trying to fend off the complaint!!)
Heh, thanks, they didn't explain that, and I wouldn't have complained, just asked his opinion. Actually the insulation in the house is very poor. Approximately what setting should I have the boiler turned up to, it's currently at maximum, which was the engineer setting, but some people suggested it might be lowered.
As it is a new boiler, it will almost certainly be a condensing one (It will produce water vapor "steam" from the flue), so ideally you need to get the temperature of the water returning to the boiler, to about 55°C, so having the boiler set to the max is probably not the most efficient setting.
What is the make and model of the boiler?
Toby...
In article , John Smith writes
Higher settings give red hot radiators which in turn give faster room warm up but the boiler is running balls out even when it doesn't really need to.
Lower settings give less hot radiators with a longer warm up times but a more gentle application of heat which, with a condensing boiler (now virtually compulsory), means a slightly more efficient use of gas.
Whatever setting you choose is a compromise between the two. Each system is different but as a guide, my boiler is normally set to about 6/10 for
3/4 of the year. I turn it up to about 9/10 when it is particularly cold.If you want to upset your installer, ask him if he balanced the radiators in the system when it was installed, many don't bother saying that it isn't necessary for systems with TRVs, this is not the case.
See this guide for a description of balancing, particularly the principles section:
The most efficient setting is having the boiler low enough that the room stat almost, but never quite has to switch off the call for heat signal to the boiler.
There are some problems with this though. You will have to adjust it every time the outside temperature changes. You will have to turn it up if you need extra heat to heat the house up from cold. If you don't have separate temperature control for hot water, it won't be hot enough for your hot water much of the time. This means that it doesn't lend itself to manual control, and you generally need to find a compromise setting which is higher than the most economic setting, but probably well below maximum. The other option is to get a boiler which has weather compensation and does this adjustment for you automatically.
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