I bought a water heated towel rail from eBay. It has some dents in the lower horizontal rail. Does it look like I'd be able to heat the joints at both ends of the rail and rotate the dents to the back without losing the water seal? Also, would the flow be best going in at the top and return from the connection at the bottom? Here's a picture:
so thats where me Zimmer went. ;-)
I wish you' d've driven it more carefully.
Gawd! you got no taste man,what possesed you to buy that ugly thing? I thought red skirting and flooring went out of fashion in the 80's?
It's not really that modern. Nor is it red, except to my camera.
On Sun, 09 Apr 2006 14:27:40 +0100 someone who may be Mike Halmarack wrote this:-
If you are careful and don't mind the possible loss of finish at the joints then this may be possible. Do you have two suitable heating implements and a means of rotating the pipe.?
Yes.
I did initially wonder if the chroming was done after assembly making the chrome continuous but on looking closer I see a dull grey line defining each joint.
I have a paraffin blow lamp that I can use if I can find a paraffin supplier and I'm going to buy a gas torch to replace the blow lamp for general plumbing use. Then again, I wonder if it would be best to heat the tube from the middle in an attempt to equalise the temperature at each end.
I'm considering a pair of padded stilsons for the leverage but would be happy to hear of a better solution.
Thanks for the advice.
In article , Mike Halmarack writes
Lots of thermal mass at both ends and no real idea of whether the joint is soft soldered or brazed. In summary, the chances of this not ending in tears are somewhere between zero and sweet very little at all.
This is definitely one to forget about and move on, no one but you will know about the dents when they are covered in roasty toasty towels :-).
You make a very convincing point. :-)
The Chrome would get discoloured too.
I had one of those towel rails, it went in the skip last year, it looks kind of familiar ...
The joints were however definitely brazed.
DG
You could 've decked it out in a few fluffy towels before chucking it, cheapskate.
Then again, if you look on some of the towel rail websites, you'll see that these classic style towel rails are more than twice the price of the modern ones, for very good reason. Practicality, some adherence to the 'form follows function' principle and a superior jointing system.
My limited knowledge of brazing is that the colour of braze is yellowish. The joint lines on this towel rail are dull grey.
On Sun, 09 Apr 2006 15:33:14 +0100 someone who may be Mike Halmarack wrote this:-
It is most unlikely that you will be able to warm the joints up enough this way.
Personally I think that sort of heated towel rail is very expensive for a few bits of pipe. I would leave it alone and convince myself that the dents add character, because I would be very angry with myself if I buggered some expensive bits of pipe up.
Alternatively Dimplex do chromed towel rails that have an electric heating element in them. Far more useful in my view. There are also now towel rails that are connected to the heating system and also have an electric element for summer use.
It does seem to be expecting a lot from a little.
I think the pipe would be expensive, the ball joints more so.
It's a tempting level of versatility but people keep telling me that summer heating is most economically done with gas. Maybe not for much longer though.
On Sun, 09 Apr 2006 19:08:36 +0100 someone who may be Mike Halmarack wrote this:-
Running a 15kW boiler to heat some pipework, floorboards, a hot water cylinder and a towel rail is not particularly efficient, compared to 100% efficient immersion heaters. However, a lot depends on the duty cycle and electricity tariff. Modulating boilers also add to the difficulties of calculating what is best.
However, just to run a towel rail, a 120W - 240W immersion heater in an oil filled towel rail is probably going to be a better bet than a boiler that can modulate down to 5kW driving a water filled towel rail.
I appreciate the detailed explanation. I don't think I'd ever be using a boiler to heat just a towel rail. Certainly not a modulating boiler anyway, unless I invest in one 25 years younger. :-)
Mine were definitely very hard and chromed over. 8-/ ?
'Spose it's possible the corner fittings were commonly available to the trade and were assembled into towell rails by all and sundry.
If your tube got dented it might tend to indicate it was made of soft copper. Mine didn't maybe that indicates it was made of ...
Summat Else.
DG
Soft and thin too, going by the weight when compared to one I fitted in my last house.
If you're going to do that sort of comparison, you need to take into account that the electricity as delivered to you is already barely 40% efficient, so an immersion heater can't be any better than that.
If you happen to have a thermal store, that would be ideal to drive a towel rail from. Personally, I think heated towel rails are very much over rated -- I find an unheated towel rail a few feet above the radiator more effective.
8-(
On 09 Apr 2006 20:18:48 GMT someone who may be snipped-for-privacy@cucumber.demon.co.uk (Andrew Gabriel) wrote this:-
The aim of my comparison was to show that despite gas being rather cheaper than electricity when it comes into the house than electricity it may not be cheaper to utilise, because of the inefficiencies of using gas.
Not much use when the radiator is turned off and also expensive to run in the summer just to dry towels. Electrically heated towel rails are a better bet in the summer in my view, unless the towel rail happens to be near a hot water storage device that will be warmed anyway and the towel rail is taken off that. A thermal store, especially one fed by solar, would be ideal for this.
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