Radiators/Ppework and moving them

[Hayemaker]

hi guys

I have a bathroom and toilet and i have a wall dividing them which i want to take down and make into one single bathroom/toilet .... problem i have is thier is a small radiator either side of the wall that i wanna knock down ... what do i need to do to move the radiators and pipework so that a new towel radiator can be fitted to the wall thats gonna be built where the old toilet door was. is it easy to do how much cost is it .. my parents asked me to do it for them as they cannot afford the costs of a plumber for a day or two. also where there are two radiators and two sets of pipework do i have to cap one set off and re-route the other set of pipes or can i join them all together to re-route ANY advice would be gratefull.

In lamens terms i'd loke to know how to do the following

Remove the radiators
Re-route the pipework to a new position for the new radiator
install new radiator
Costs and work involved.


Thanks

 

[Paulus]

Hi Hayemaker

If you haven't done any plumbing before my first advice is to get a plumber in. This is not particularly an easy job for a novice.
If you insist on doing it yourself this is what you need to do.

1) Expose pipework to the two radiators.
2) Drain down the system.
3) Decide which set of pipes from the old radiators would be easiest to re-route to the new towel warmer.
4) If possible, replace the pipe with the tee's in that your not going to use with a straight connector (preferably soldered). If you can't do that, cut redundant pipes as short as possible but allowing enough to fit a cap and cap off.
5) Cap off the pipes you are going to use for the new radiator temporarily with speedfit caps which are easy to remove later.
6) Build the new wall for the new towel warmer. Presumably this will be a stud wall so you ensure that you put some timber in where the new towel warmer bracets will be screwed in.
7) Secure towel warmer to wall.
8) Drain down system again and remove speedfit caps from the pipes you are going to use.
9) Extend the pipes to below towel warmer valves and fit elbows to come up through the floor to the new valves. Best to leave a reasonable amount of vertical play in these tails to the valves for ease of fitting.
10) Refill system, not forgetting to add inhibiter.

Ensure new pipes are clipped under the floor at regular intervals and not tight against woodwork to allow for expansion. Personally I would do all the new pipework in copper but you could use pushfit.

This is simply to give you an idea of what is involved. If you decide to go ahead yourself you can come back to the forum at stages to ask for more help as you go.

I hope this helps.

 

[stevetheplumber]

chances are they will be on one run of pipe

 

[Simon F]

check that the heat output of the towel radiator is sufficient for the space. you are swapping 2 rads for one, you could end up with a cold bathroom. also if you are fitting the new rad to the old inner door space, then the outer edges of the room might suffer.

 

[rocketmanbkk]

Friends

Can I ask on this subject, if you want to remove a rad and for arguements sake had no clue what to do so you jjst removed it and turned off the valves each end leaving the pipes/valves in place..

What would happen? Would the system still work?

I know how to move rads etc. but just curious

 

[Simon F]

simple answer its fine. but depends on system,for example one pipe system where flow is one rad then next without a common loop. or is the rad the one left without a trv acting as system bypass.

 

[SimonG]

Friends

Can I ask on this subject, if you want to remove a rad and for arguements sake had no clue what to do so you jjst removed it and turned off the valves each end leaving the pipes/valves in place..

What would happen? Would the system still work?

I know how to move rads etc. but just curious

In 99.9% of cases it will still work. However I have seen one system where once the bathroom rad is switched off it isolates the whole heating system!

 

[rocketmanbkk]

yeah, i cant quite fathom how this heating loop works, i can see diagrams of the simplest system but it still confuses me!!

It'll come I'm sure

Cheers all

 

[Hayemaker]

appreciate all the advice guys much obliged .... so basically i turn the valves off at each end of rad ... remove rads leaving only the pipework exposed .... knock wall down n deal with pipework .... seems pretty stright forward going by the comments lol ....

 

[PlumbBobBob]

as already said, they will probably be joined to the same pipes under the floor so should be relatively simple to do.