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Fool proof rad balancing guide

Robert

Robert

Robert

Soldato
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I can never seem to get it right, do auto balancing valves exist?

Am I right in saying the left pipe on rad is flow (the one you tweak to balance) and the right side is the trv valve? If so, for auto balancing do you replace both or just the trv?
 
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No reliance on left/right, they can be piped up any which way and the TRV can be on the flow or return.

The one with the numbers on it is the TRV. Look up the model and set it to what seems right for you, usually around 21C. Then the balancing happens on the lockshield side, it’s the valve with the smaller head. Usually there’s a plastic cap you can pop off then inside is a head you can tweak with an Allen key. In terms of the actual balancing itself you need a thermal camera really or somewhere to measure heat incoming and outgoing. Then you want the delta to be a certain value… can’t remember Google it.

Good luck.

The balancing works principally in that imagine your house is freezing and so every TRV is fully open and let’s say every lock shield is fully open. The hottest water will be closest to the boiler. This means the radiators closest will get the hottest water that dissipates into the room. Meaning the radiators furthest away will take longer to heat up. It doesn’t matter because eventually the rooms closest will get up to temperature, the TRVs will close and then hotter water will end up heating the rads further away. The idea is by slightly closing the lock shields on the rads closest to the boiler, flow is restricted and more of the hot water gets to the further away rads.

After balancing all your rads should heat up at roughly the same rate, that’s the goal anyway.
 
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Robert said:
I can never seem to get it right, do auto balancing valves exist?

Am I right in saying the left pipe on rad is flow (the one you tweak to balance) and the right side is the trv valve? If so, for auto balancing do you replace both or just the trv?
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Yes auto balancing valves exist. Or just fit smart TRVs and the system will balance itself.
 
I don’t agree with smart TRVs negating the need to balance a system.

The idea with balancing is radiators, and therefore areas/rooms, heat up at the same rate, you don’t get some radiators boiling hot and others luke warm or even cold.

I guess you could argue that with smart TRVs that luke warm radiator will eventually receive heat once most others have reached the desired temperature and shut off.
 
As above, TRVs can’t balance a system, no matter how ‘smart’ they are.

You want all of your radiators to heat up at the same rate, this is particularly important with a condensing boiler because the lower the return temperature, the more efficient the boiler is.
 
b0rn2sk8 said:
As above, TRVs can’t balance a system, no matter how ‘smart’ they are.

You want all of your radiators to heat up at the same rate, this is particularly important with a condensing boiler because the lower the return temperature, the more efficient the boiler is.
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Yes they can. Mine do, specifically says not to manually balance radiators.
It learns for the first few weeks how long each room takes to warm up and adjusts.
Manual balancing wouldn't achieve anything as you never know which radiators will be on and which won't.

For example when mine was first switched on the radiators closest to the boiler obviously we're screaming hot and the ones further away took a lot longer, this showed in those rooms heating up first. The next time it came on it was better, and it only gets better with time now if I switch every room on at the same time they all warm up equally but if I switch on only one it still will only heat up the required amount to heat the room to the desired temp.
 
How does it behave if you heat the majority of rooms at once? Are all radiators of similar temperature at the same time?

Which TRVs do you have?
 
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