I'm looking for 3 covers for the down stairs and living room.
I heard before that these block the heat getting out, but then I also heard that they can be energy efficient?!!? Which one is fact and which is fiction?
Can you still dry clothes on them?
Despite their name, Radiators do not heat the space by radiation, they primarily heat using convection currents.
The air closest to the radiator is heated up, and this rises. Colder air is drawn in from the rest of the room which is then heated. A constant movement of air occurs, which raises the temperature of the whole room.
Blocking the free movement of air around the radiator and especially just above the radiator will reduce the efficiency.
If the warm air close to the radio cannot freely circulate, then you are paying to heat the space inside the cover. If you block the top of the cover with pictures, you are making this worse.
If you have radiator covers and your room is warm, then you are still paying a lot of more for your heating that you need to.
I know about convection. Still doesn't make sense to me. There are gaps all along the bottom of the covers, sucking up cold air, and gaps along the top, blowing out hot, and gaps in the mesh in front too. There has to be circulation of air due to the temp difference, and I can feel the warm air coming out.
I have made sure my TRVs are outside of the cover.
I'm not saying they don't take some heat, I just think it's a small amount. I'm open minded and could be convinced by some study.
If the heat is not getting out of the radiator the boiler is not working as hard, no increase in bills. If you have inefficiency, where is the heat going that you are losing ?
But most of the radiator covers are very open, cutouts top and bottom and grill, surely the warm air is not going to stay inside. Is it not part of the theory, (I'm no expert here now), that the cold air in the room falls, goes in the gap in the bottom of the cabinet, gets warmed, rises and exits the top gap?
Yes, but the more airflow there is, the more efficiently this will happen.
No radiator cover is the best situation as air can freely pass over the whole rad . If you have one, the more gaps the better.
Not all radiator covers have enough gaps to allow lots of air flow.
I have seen some that are pretty boxed in.
Someone here recommended rad covers, as a lovely shelf.
Radiators are under windows to stop cold down draughts from the window
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