Balance your radiators and heat your home efficiently

Please note, we can only give you basic advice on this page to do the job yourself. Make sure you use the right tools and protective equipment to avoid hurting yourself or damaging your home. Always consult a professional for more complex repairs.

If you’ve noticed that some of your radiators take much longer to heat up than others, it’s possible that your radiators need balancing and means that some areas of your home will be colder than others.

The hot water coming from your boiler isn’t being evenly distributed and in the approach to winter, this can become an issue when you need your home heated as efficiently as possible

When to balance and when to bleed a radiator

When you balance your radiators, you’re allowing more water to flow to the colder radiators in your home and preventing flow from radiators that are too hot.

If some of your radiators are showing cold spots in particular spots, you’ll need to bleed them first.

You’ll need:

• Radiator key

• Valve key/adjustable spanner

• Screwdriver

• Digital thermometer

1. Switch off your heating: to balance your radiators, they must all be completely cold. It also helps if you’ve recently bled them, as your temperature readings will be more accurate.

2. Open the radiator valves: you can do this by turning the valves anti-clockwise.

3. Make a list: turn your heating on and make a note of the speed at which each of your radiators heat up. Those nearest the boiler tend to heat up first.

4. Turn your heating off and on again: once your radiators are completely cool, switch your central heating back on again.

5. Adjust the fastest radiator: close the valve on this radiator completely, then open it a quarter of a turn and take temperature readings. Measure the temperature of the pipework next to the valve first and then the temperature of the pipework on the opposite side of the radiator. Make a note of both readings. Slowly open the valve until the temperature difference between the two pipes is 12°C

   IMPORTANT: remember this can take time as you’ll need to wait for the temperature of the radiator to change each time you adjust the valve.

6. Repeat: now do this for your other radiators in the order they took to heat up. You should find that the amount the valve needs to be opened relates to the distance the radiator is from the boiler.

How often should I balance my radiators?

Check periodically that your radiators are heating up at the same time, and balance again if not. You may find you need to do this:

• Following the replacement of your boiler/any alterations to your heating system

• If you’ve removed the radiators for decorating

• Following the flushing of your heating system

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