Customer with ringing noise in radiators

[Cainan]

Hi again fellas. Went to a house today where she has had several gas engineers/plumbers round to find the route cause of a strange kind of ringing noise in the radiators when the central heating is turned on. I must say it has baffled me a bit and said I would be in contact when I have looked into it (meaning coming on here lol) the other people she had out have had no idea and not got back to her but the noise is so irritating she is saying just rip out the pipework and renew it all.
This where it gets slightly more confusing, the boiler was changed about 2 months ago to a combi,before the combi went in (used to be vented cylinder, tank etc) the hall radiator only made a slight noise now every single one does.

any help or advice would be appreciated

 

[SimonG]

Single direction trvs and somebodys reversed the flow and return on fitting new boiler. Or system not flushed properly and bits of solder running around system.

 

[SimonG]

Where's the engineer who changed the boiler?

 

[IDCHAPPY]

Are the flow and return valves bi directional and or installed correctly? Have you tried to turn the pump speed down to see if it makes any difference? Boiler bypass operating correctly?

 

[Ch4 plumbing]

Single direction trvs and somebodys reversed the flow and return on fitting new boiler. Or system not flushed properly and bits of solder running around system.

Exactly what I was thinking as I read the post.

 

[Cainan]

Trvs are all bi directional, engineer who installed is refusing to accept liability as "all he did was fit the boiler" and he hasn't even filled in the benchmark so her 5year warranty isn't valid

in all honesty idchappy I didn't check the pump which I probably should have but even if it reduced it it was quite loud ringing that I'm positive noise would still be there

 

[Cainan]

The first thing that come to my mind was something was in the pipework and a flush would sort the issue

 

[IDCHAPPY]

Best of luck with it Cainan dude, sounds an interesting one 🙂

 

[Cainan]

Don't want to flush system and it not be sorted though, she already seems quite crabbit without that happening, might play it safe and quote renewing the pipework . Only a one bed flat so not much work involved ........

 

[SimonG]

Was the install registered with gas safe?

Id be tempted to walk away from this one. Sounds like a cowboy install on the cheap, no flush, no benchmark and prob no gas safe.

 

[Cainan]

You may be correct simon, I did suggest to her check his name in the gas safe website. It is a friend of a friend that works for a company, apparently he fits boilers for a living according to her.

 

[Ray Stafford]

Trvs are all bi directional,

What brand are they Cainan? There is at least one TRV on the market which claims to be bi-directional but which absolutely isn't under certain circumstances. If they are honeywell, danfoss, drayton, pegler or westco then thats probably not the problem. If its a cheap import, I wouldn't believe everything thats printed on the box or the website.

 

[Cainan]

Their danfoss ones ray, same as I fit every time so can't be them

 

[SimonG]

Could be a knackered valve.

 

[Ray Stafford]

Their danfoss ones ray, same as I fit every time so can't be them

Yep, Danfoss should be sound. I know its hard to answer this over a forum, but how loud is the ringing nose?

 

[Cainan]

SimonG it's every single rad, some worse than others


ray- it is very hard to describe, some you can hear comfortably just standing in same room it's like tapping a nail against pipe almost, and some rads you need to put ear to it making me think something in pipework is vibrating the noise?

 

[Ray Stafford]

Is it rhythmic or at random intervals?

 

[Cainan]

Constant the whole time the heatings on

 

[Ray Stafford]

it's like tapping a nail against pipe almost,

That bit makes me think of solder stuck somewhere and rattling. But it wouldn't be likely to be in every rad.

 

[Cainan]

I know this is the confusing thing if it was one rad then fair enough but every one it's quite odd. Thinking whether or not to just not bother as I'm snowed under anyway. Or renew all pipework as surely this would solve it

 

[mache]

Hi, just an opion from someone who isn't in the trade, but have you tried isolating each rad in turn. As you say if it's only a one bed flat with water being such a good transmitter of sound then it would be very difficult to isolate a possible location of solder/foriegn body in a particular leg because the sound could easily travel through the whole system. If you could isolate each leg in turn you might get a result to narrow down the problem rad/leg. If not then I guess you would have to come to the conclusion that it is in either the main feed or return runs ??
Just a thought
Regards
Martin.

 

[JCplumb]

Hi, just an opion from someone who isn't in the trade, but have you tried isolating each rad in turn. As you say if it's only a one bed flat with water being such a good transmitter of sound then it would be very difficult to isolate a possible location of solder/foriegn body in a particular leg because the sound could easily travel through the whole system. If you could isolate each leg in turn you might get a result to narrow down the problem rad/leg. If not then I guess you would have to come to the conclusion that it is in either the main feed or return runs ??
Just a thought
Regards
Martin.

I was going to post something similar to this earlier but presumed the noise you heard ruled it out. Still worth checking though.
When you mentioned that it was louder in some than others I thought maybe the sound was travelling.
Nice work Mache!

 

[Ch4 plumbing]

Check the l/s valves, if it's a1 bed flat prob not going to need balancing so open them fully.

 

[oz-plumber]

We had exactly the same issue with a boiler / system and almost the same circumstances - except for the fact we fixed the problem.

The issue was the boilers internal by-pass valve.
Took some finding and when the by-pass was switched off the problem solved itself.
Replaced mechanism and problem solved.

 

[mike-c]

The older danfoss valves said they were bi-directional and they were, as long as they were positioned in the correct orientation. I.e. Vertical return, horizontal flow. Try taking the heads off and see if that makes a difference.