Unsecure chicken perches

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

We've had a difficulty heating two of the bedrooms for all the time we've been here One's got a large bay with hung tile on the outside. The other is on an exposed extension. We've had to have the rads turned up to 6 to try to get a decent heat and then the room temperature is a little too cool if really cold, despite only needing the house thermostat on 16 degrees (very warm house generally). As we're now about to decorate the bedroom with the bay Fur has done some investigation as to what to put behind the radiator for best effect (on the bay wall).

 

What he's discovered has made a radical change within an hour of installation and we didn't need to wait until we decorated The product is called Radflek and you just cut the sheets to shape & slide them down the back of the radiator. They can be removed occasionally for dusting so aren't fixed permanently.

 

We ordered a pack on Thursday evening with some tape (which we haven'et had to use but will come in handy ). It arrived yesterday so we sorted out the two rooms last night.

 

They were easy to fit & we felt the difference within an hour - we've now turned the rad thermostats down to 4!. We decided not to use the hangers but to cut the material to the size of the whole radiator in each case (as suggested in FAQs on their website. One of the raditaors is exactly the size of one sheet (1200x600) and the other is not much narrower so they took up a sheet each.

 

We bought a 10 radiator pack for 7 radiators (we've got 10 radiators, but have 3 on inside walls). We're so impressed that we're going to do the rest of the radiators (even the 3 on inside walls) to see if that also improves on fuel economy. Thought in these days of pinching every penny it might be helpful to post on these. Total cost was £28

 

If anyone's interested, here's the link radflek

Edited February 5, 2012 by Guest

[Ain't Nobody Here]

That sounds like a clever idea . So the sheets prevent heat loss to the walls and reflect it back into the room?

[Sam Palmer]

Our heating system is pants anyway. Some radiators work well on the system and others give out little heat. Will show this to OH to see what he thinks. We could do with conserving what heat we do get!

[superkitty]

That looks interesting, we have the same problem in a couple of rooms in our house. Might get a pack and see whether it makes a difference! We spend a ridiculous amount of money on heating oil so anything that reduces that would be great, however small! Thanks

[Olly]

My smallest bedroom is on an exposed corner, and is always cold - thanks, might try this.

[scubababe]

Thanxs for the top tip. Have just ordered a set!

 

With fuel bills in excess of £220.00 each month at the moment anything is worth it!!

 

I've done quite a lot of draft proofing last year which is working as my bill were £260 each month!!

 

New double glazing is on the cards this year so it all helps!!

[Lavenders_Blue]

Great post, thanks! My house is thankfully very well insulated and stays warm, but at that price it's still worth investigating, any saving on the fuel bill has to be a good thing.

[greyhoundgirl]

Just moved to an old cottage with oil heating. It's freezing

Thanks so much for the link, I've just ordered enough for all the outside rads. Hopefully it'll make a difference and we'll be a bit warmer.

[Guest]

Ordered!

My house is quite snug, but is tile hung upstairs! All the cavities are insulated but of course you can't do the bit where the tiles are - so this will help!

Thanks!

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

That sounds like a clever idea . So the sheets prevent heat loss to the walls and reflect it back into the room?

 

That's right. The material reflects back up to 95% of the heat according to the manufacturer's website and is supposed to reduce heat loss by up to 45%.

 

Well, here's an update folks. We are astonished at the rapid difference.

 

We've just completed all the outside wall radiators, bar the lounge (that rad is 1400x600, so we've set aside a sheet and have now taped an offcut from one of the used cut sheets to add the neccessary extra width joined with the tape).

 

Already we've noticed the difference. The upstairs box room is on a cold corner with a small rad. It's now very warm whereas before it always felt a bit of a chill. We've just turned it down from 4 to 3 on the thermostat. Our bedroom is comfortable on 4, whereas before it could still be chilly on 6. The extension bedroom is now comfortable on 4. The dining room rad is now on 3 and the rad is cool but the room is comfortable. We've had to turn the hall rad from 4 to 3 as the hall became very warm. We also noticed the wall mirror above the rad is warm where it was cool before!

 

By the way, 5 inches of snow outside, so a good test environment.

 

One note. If you have large radiators or you want to use the alternative method where you cut the sheet to the whole radiator area and hang it without the supplied hangers, you will find that you need a greater quantity than suggested. We have 4 wide/large radiators and as a result the packet for 10 rads has been just enough for 7.

 

It seems that quite a lot of people are interested in this post! Thanks very much for your responses. It proves it's always worth posting ideas or products that we find.

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

Ordered!

My house is quite snug, but is tile hung upstairs! All the cavities are insulated but of course you can't do the bit where the tiles are - so this will help!

Thanks!

 

 

Sounds the same as ours, and we found the benefit.

[Lewis]

Our house is cold, massive single glazed sash window, must be 6x7 foot? so all the heat goes straight out.

 

Might be a good idea to get some of this but only need 1 sheet - is this a soft roll or hard sheets?

Seen single sheets rolled up online, is it a similar thing?

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

Our house is cold, massive single glazed sash window, must be 6x7 foot? so all the heat goes straight out.

 

Might be a good idea to get some of this but only need 1 sheet - is this a soft roll or hard sheets?

Seen single sheets rolled up online, is it a similar thing?

 

Radflek comes in 1200x600 sheets folded up. It's like a plasticised aluminium so can be folded and appears to have a grid welded into it (?reinforcement). Don't know of any roll version but you can check on their website. The smallest pack is 3 sheets for £12.99 & we paid £1.99 p&p. Hope this is helpful.

 

As an update, we've just noticed that our boiler has been off for a while & some of the rads are cooler, which we wouldn't normally have in the current weather. We think it must be that more heat is being kept in the rooms, rather than escaping through the brickwork. Can't believe the difference a few sheets can make

[Reikiranf]

Thank you for posting this Feathers, I've ordered some too

 

Our house is chilly at the best of times & our fuel bills are still horrendous. I bought the rolls of foam backed reflective stuff years ago but DH has never got round to doing it So hopefully I can do the Radflek myself

[BizzyMomma]

Will certainly be ordering some of this, ground floor of my house is a knocked through lounge/diner and it gets chilly in there!! Thanks for the tip!!

[Eggasperated]

Really interested in this product Fur 'n' Feathers, but we don't have very big gaps down the back of the radiators so would you know if this is likely to be a problem?

Thanks in advance .

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

Really interested in this product Fur 'n' Feathers, but we don't have very big gaps down the back of the radiators so would you know if this is likely to be a problem?

Thanks in advance .

 

A couple of our radiators are very tight to the wall but it wasn't a problem. The sheets are like strong flexible plastic covered aluminium foil, so you just slide them down the back from the top. Also, we haven't used the hangers that they supply as we wanted to cover as much of the area behind the radiator as possible (our brackets are quite low & far in on some of the rads so would only have covered a small area using the hanger method). This makes it easier on tight fittings as well. The FAQs on the website have this as an alternative method along with a video showing how to fit using the standard method (apparently the hangers are more about the asthetics of the sheet not being visible, but if it's cut slightly smaller than the total rad size then it doesn't show anyway!) The sheet is strong so we cut it to 1cm less than the rad width on each side, cut a slit up each side so it would slide over the brackets (measured carefully of course) and be suspended on them. If you cut the slits so the sheet drops 1cm lower than the top of the rad it doesn't show.

[The Dogmother]

Now that's timely! I've been looking at these as I have taken out the manky polystyrene ones that I inherited with the house and needed something to replace them. My house was built in 1897 and the walls are solid, so no cavities. i will order some and report back.... I might even see if I can cut down and pop some behind the stove (so that it can't be seen) to reflect more heat back into the room.

[Eggasperated]

Thank you Fur 'n' , I will look at their alternative installation method and work out how much I need.

My house was built around 160 years ago (we think), didn't people feel the cold then? Even with the oil heating and two wood burners we still have lots of cold spots.

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

We're beginning to sound like agents for this product but are really impressed with it so far. Today we found the box room & two bedrooms have been quite cozy, if not a bit too warm . The one that is out on a limb is used as a study and has always been a bit cold. We had thought we might need to put extra insulation in the loft but the reflector sheet has done the trick. It isn't the insulation as the roof is still white

[chickweed]

Fur 'n' feathers, we have two quite long curved radiators that are under the bay windows. Are these reflectors flexible enough to follow the curve or are they too rigid?

[scubababe]

How quick was that!!! My order from Radflex turned up this morning ...so guess that's my next job

[Eggasperated]

Ordered mine today .

[MummyHen]

Been reading this with much interest as our rads are totally pants (as i sit here in my office with the fan heater on).

We have a chap coming later this week to replace two single rads with doubles and I'm hopeful that they will make a little difference to the office and hall. He also mentioned that the system may need cleaning out [not sure what that means or involves].

After reading all the excellent reports I have also ordered a 10 rad pack

[Fur 'n' Feathers]

Fur 'n' feathers, we have two quite long curved radiators that are under the bay windows. Are these reflectors flexible enough to follow the curve or are they too rigid?

 

We don't see there'd be any problem with this. It's as flexible as a thick sheet of polythene, with the curvability (if that's a word ) of foil.

 

The only thing we can think would be a problem is the length as it might droop a bit in the centre. If your radiator has another bracket in between the end ones than that would stop this happening as you could hang it over this.

 

Apparently there are some hooks you can buy that are for use with floor mounted radiators. There are some posts on Amazon by people who have used these on their radiators to assist hanging. One post said their's fell off (too hot for the sticky) but another said it worked well.