No Return Upstairs??? HELP

[Joynt]

Hello all,

I'm after a little advice on my central heating system please.

The upstairs of our house will not warm up no matter what I try to do to it, the rooms downstairs can get boiling hot fairly rapidly yet as you walk up the stairs you can literally feel the air getting colder and colder.

The system is fed from a baxi combi boiler in the kitchen and feeds 4 rads down stairs and 5 rads upstairs however I have discovered that the rads downstairs all have two pipes to them (flow and return??) However the system then splits as it goes upstairs into a single pipe arrangement I.e the pipe goes in one end of the rad out the other then straight into the next rad on the system.

Could it be this that is causing the rads upstairs not to warm up properly?. They get slightly warm but nothing at all compared to the rads downstairs

The system has been flushed twice and also has a maglock installed, the house is fully insulated (roof and walls) and has double glazing throughout so I don't think we are losing the heat I think it's never produced in the first place.

Anybody have any suggestions why the system would be laid out like this?

Thanks in advance

 

[snowhead]

Has it ever worked properly?

Why was the system flushed and by whom?

Has the system been balanced?

Are the 2 pipes serving upstairs tee'd into the same pipe downstairs, if so how close together?

 

[PETE 123]

I had a job once where if i opened a rad in hall the rads on first floor would work
i think the installer or owned designed it that way for cold and not so cold days

 

[village idiot]

System has been flushed TWICE????? You need to get them back.
For now, turn off valves to downstairs radiators and see if this pushes heat to the upstairs radiators

 

[Joynt]

Thanks for the reply,

House has always been like it I believe,

System first flushed by local plumber, made a big difference downstairs but changed nothing upstairs

Second flush was by BG managed to swindle it out of them on the service agreement, this chap was thorough, had every rad off and flushed the system for hours and hours they also added the maglock? That traps any metal parts.

As far as I can tell the feed upstairs just taps off the flow from downstairs it then goes through each rad individually and comes back to the boiler then taps into the return from the downstairs pipe work about 6inch before the boiler.

I've attempted to balance the system by turning all downstairs rads right down on the return side, still makes no difference at all, If I close any rads upstairs all this does is restrict the flow to the rest I.e if I turn the first fed rad upstairs completely off it also turns every other rad off upstairs too.

Should the system be ran like this?

Thanks

P's I do have a photo of the pipes where they split however I'm struggling to upload it

 

[Sparkgap]

Looks like you need to rip out all the upstairs pipes and start again!
Depending on where the flow and return pipes pop up you could either run a normal flow and return or a reverse return system to pick up the rads, but I reckon you can't do anything with the first floor as it is. Dept Of Stating The Obvious: I take it there is enough water in the system and the upstairs rads are full?

 

[Joynt]

:sweatdrop::sweatdrop:

Looks like you need to rip out all the upstairs pipes and start again!
Depending on where the flow and return pipes pop up you could either run a normal flow and return or a reverse return system to pick up the rads, but I reckon you can't do anything with the first floor as it is. Dept Of Stating The Obvious: I take it there is enough water in the system and the upstairs rads are full?

Yep system fully pressurised and bled for any air locks. Looking like a case of all floorboards up and running a new system for upstairs